1755 Lisbon earthquake a benevolent deity. The Lisbon disaster provided a counterexample. As Theodor Adorno wrote, "[t]he earthquake of Lisbon sufficed to cure Voltaire of the theodicy of Leibniz" ("Negative Dialectics" 361). In the later twentieth century, the 1755 earthquake has sometimes been compared to the Holocaust as a catastrophe that transformed European culture and philosophy. Jean-Jacques Rousseau was also influenced by the devastation following the earthquake, whose severity he believed was due to too many people living within the close quarters of the city. Rousseau used the earthquake as an argument against cities as part of his desire for a more naturalistic
1303 Crete earthquake port city of Acre, on the Levantine coast, was also affected; buildings were destroyed and people swept to their deaths. In Egypt the earthquake caused severe damage in Cairo, dislodging much of the Great Pyramid's white limestone casing and toppling minarets on many mosques. In Alexandria the city walls were mostly destroyed and the lighthouse was badly damaged. Although the precise location of the epicenter is uncertain, it is generally agreed that the earthquake ruptured the eastern segment of the Hellenic arc somewhere between Crete and Rhodes. The earthquake caused damage over a wide area including Crete, the Peloponnese, Rhodes,