Suez Canal
artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt
The Suez Canal (; Egyptian Arabic: قناة السويس, Qanāt as-Suwais) is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea through the Isthmus of Suez and dividing Africa and Asia (and by extension, the Sinai Peninsula from the rest of Egypt). The 193.3-kilometre-long (120.1-mile) canal is a key trade route between Europe and Asia.
In 1858, French diplomat Ferdinand de Lesseps formed the Compagnie de Suez for the express purpose of building the canal. Construction of the canal lasted from 1859 to 1869 and it officially opened on 17 November 1869. It offers vessels a direct route between the North Atlantic and northern Indian oceans via the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea, avoiding the South Atlantic and southern Indian oceans and reducing the journey distance from the Arabian Sea to London by approximately 8,900 km (5,500 mi), to 10 days at 20 knots (37 km/h; 23 mph) or 8 days at 24 knots (44 km/h; 28 mph). The canal extends from the northern terminus of Port Said to the southern terminus of Port Tewfik at the city of Suez. In 2021, more than 20,600 vessels traversed the canal (an average of 56 per day).
The original canal featured a single-lane waterway with passing locations in the Ballah Bypass and the Great Bitter Lake. It contained, according to Alois Negrelli's plans, no locks, with seawater flowing freely through it. In general, the water in the canal north of the Bitter Lakes flows north in winter and south in summer.
“Suez Canal” enters the record as artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Suez, Canal and artificial can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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“Suez Canal” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Suez, Canal and artificial provides the most credible route into that argument.
The strongest evidence will usually combine a dated visual record with documents produced by the authority responsible for the place. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 22, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q899. VIAF identifies the subject as 2146095140600371077. The Library of Congress control number is sh85129633. Authority coordinates are 30.705, 32.344. 2 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 2 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1858, 1859, 1869 and 2021.
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This entry incorporates text from “Suez Canal” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.