Orestes, Prefect of Egypt

Orestes was the Roman imperial governor of Egypt in 415 AD, serving as Augustal prefect at Alexandria. His administration became dominated by a struggle for authority with Cyril, the city’s recently appointed bishop. Their dispute intensified after religious violence between Christians and Jews, Cyril’s expulsion of members of Alexandria’s Jewish community, and attacks on Orestes by monks loyal to the bishop. Although Orestes was a Christian, he resisted Cyril’s attempts to extend ecclesiastical power into matters of civil government.

Orestes was politically allied with Hypatia, the influential Alexandrian philosopher and teacher, whose support strengthened his position among the city’s educated and non-Christian communities. Her murder by a Christian mob associated with Cyril deprived him of a crucial ally and appears to have ended his resistance to the bishop; he subsequently left Alexandria. Orestes appears in Ki Longfellow’s novel Flow Down Like Silver: Hypatia of Alexandria and is portrayed by Oscar Isaac in the film Agora, both of which dramatise the conflict surrounding Hypatia’s death.