The letters are invented compositions to a fictitious correspondent, which are a device for vignettes of agricultural and rural life, set in Attica, though mellifluous Aelian once boasted that he had never been outside Italy, never been aboard a ship (which is at variance, though, with his own statement, de Natura Animalium XI.40, that he had seen the bull Serapis with his own eyes).
According to Valerius Maximus: "When the senate decreed that the temples of Isis and Serapis be demolished and none of the workmen dared touch them, Consul L. Aemilius Paullus took off his official gown, seized an axe, and dashed it against the doors of that temple."(I, 3.3; quoting Julius Paris (translation from Loeb edition))
During his tenure of office he oversaw several architectural projects in the province, including a new portico in the Oasis of Thebes that was dedicated to Isis and Serapis.
According to Plutarch, Ptolemy stole the cult statue from Sinope, having been instructed in a dream by the "unknown god" to bring the statue to Alexandria, where the statue was pronounced to be Serapis by two religious experts.
Sarapamon (Serapis Amon), Bishop of the Holy Diocese of Atbara, Um Durman and All the North of the Sudan and Titular Bishop of the Great and Ancient Metropolis of Nubia: Faras of Nobadia, Dongola of Makouria and Soba of Aloudia.
In the engagement, USS Bonhomme Richard and Pallas, with USS Alliance, captured HMS Serapis and HM hired ship Countess of Scarborough, the best-known incident of Capt. John Paul Jones's naval career.
Red Basilica, also known as the 'Red Hall', a temple to Serapis in Pergamon
Jones, now commanding the Serapis without an ensign, sailed to the island port of Texel, which was run by the neutral Dutch United Provinces.
During the Roman Period a pagan shrine to either the Egyptian god Serapis or the Greek god Asclepius, both gods of healing, stood on the grounds next to the two Pools of Bethesda.
On 23 September 1779, Capt. Richard Pearson, RN, of HMS Serapis, nailed the British ensign to the ensign staff with his own hands before going into battle against Continental Navy ship Bonhomme Richard.