Abu Qir Bay

The Abū Qīr Bay (sometimes transliterated Abukir Bay or Aboukir Bay) (Arabic: خليج أبو قير‎; transliterated: Khalīj Abū Qīr) is a spacious bay on the Mediterranean Sea in Egypt, lying between Abu Qir (near Alexandria) and the Rosetta mouth of the Nile. It contains a natural gas field, discovered in the 1970s.

Battle of the Nile

On August 1, 1798, Horatio Nelson fought the naval Battle of the Nile, often referred to as the "Battle of Aboukir Bay". (Not to be confused with the Battle of Abukir (1799) and the Battle of Abukir (1801).)

On 1 March 1801, some 70 British warships, together with transports carrying 16,000 troops, anchored in Aboukir Bay near Alexandria. The intent was to defeat the French expeditionary force that had remained in Egypt after Napoleon's return to France.

Bad weather delayed disembarkation by a week but, on 8 March, Captain Alexander Cochrane of HMS Ajax deployed 320 boats, in double line abreast, to bring the troops ashore. French shore batteries opposed the landing, but the British were able to drive them back and, by the next day, all of Sir Ralph Abercromby's British army was ashore. The British then defeated the French army at the Battle of Alexandria. The Siege of Alexandria followed, with the city falling on 2 September 1801.

Abu Qir

Coordinates: 31°19′N 30°04′E / 31.317°N 30.067°E / 31.317; 30.067

Abu Qir (Egyptian Arabic: ابو قير pronounced [æbuˈʔiːɾ, æbo-]; also spelled Abukir or Aboukir) is a town on the Mediterranean coast of Egypt, 23 kilometers (14 mi) northeast of Alexandria by rail. It is located on Abu Qir Peninsula, with Abu Qir Bay to the east. The name is taken from the name of an Egyptian Christian martyr, named Cyrus, Arabized as قير Qīr .

The town contains a castle that, early in the 19th century, at the time of Muhammad Ali of Egypt, was used as a prison.

Near the village are many remains of ancient buildings, Egyptian, Greek and Roman. About three kilometers (two miles) southeast of the village are ruins supposed to mark the site of Canopus. A little farther east the Canopic branch of the Nile (now dry) entered the Mediterranean.

Stretching eastward as far as the Rosetta mouth of the Nile is the spacious Abu Qir Bay (Khalīj Abū Qīr), where on 1 August 1798, Horatio Nelson fought the Battle of the Nile, often referred to as the "Battle of Aboukir Bay". The latter title is applied more properly to an engagement between the French expeditionary army and the Turks fought on 25 July the following year; see Battle of Abukir of 1799. Near Abū Qīr, on 8 March 1801, units of the British army commanded by Sir Ralph Abercromby landed from their transports in the face of a strenuous opposition from a French force entrenched on the beach. Abercromby died of wounds received in the battle.

Qir

Qir (Persian: قير‎‎, also Romanized as Qīr) is a city in and the capital of Qir and Karzin County, Fars Province, Iran. At the 2006 census, its population was 16,839, in 3,722 families. It has an altitude of 771 metres (2,530 ft).

On 10 April 1972, Qir was completely destroyed by a large earthquake, killing 3,399 people, two-thirds of the population at that time.

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