The close of the Persian age brought in new conditions under Alexander. Wide as had been the liberty of Judaism under the international empire of Persia, it obtained still more liberal treatment from the Macedonian conqueror. In consequence of the assistance that the Jews had given against the Egyptians, Alexander granted to them equal rights with the Greeks in the new foundation of Alexandria.[22] They had there a separate quarter called the Delta,[23] and they were allowed to be called Macedonians,[24] to mark them as being under royal protection. This status in Alexandria, though suspended by Caligula, was renewed by Claudius. The Jews had also other places assigned to them in Egypt, and were ruled by an ethnarch, who was chief judge and registrar of the whole of the settlers.[25] In the Fayum they naturally found space, as the province was land reclaimed from the lake, in order to settle Greek troops as colonists. A village of Samareia is named,[26] also Jews in Psenuris.[27] At Thebes Simon son of Eleazar was tax collector.[28] Ptolemy Philopator tried to curb the power of the Jews in Egypt; and the libellous retort on him is the subject of the third book of Maccabees.[29] The number of Jews in Egypt, and their familiarity with Greek, led to various Greek translations of books of the Hebrew Scriptures.[30] These, in popular rather than literary style, were probably used by proselytes, and followed in synagogues where Hebrew was drifting out of use. They were at last compiled, and probably completed by adding all the remaining books which were familiar as religious literature, though not canonical. Thus seems to have grown up the Greek version known as the Septuagint. Its differences from the Hebrew must not all be assigned to caprice, for its sources probably antedate the formal text of the Masorah. It represents to some extent the sources of the final orthodox text. The production of such a body of translation in Egypt is proof of the large demand that must have existed in a population far more familiar with Greek than with Hebrew.