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It was untouched when the city fell to Alexander the Great in 334 BC and still undamaged after attacks by pirates in 62 and 58 BC. It stood above the city's ruins for sixteen centuries. Then a series of earthquakes shattered the columns and sent the bronze chariot crashing to the ground. By AD 1404, only the base of the Mausoleum was still recognizable.
The Knights of St John of Rhodes invaded the region and built Bodrum Castle (Castle of Saint Peter). When they decided to fortify it in 1494, they used the stones of the Mausoleum. This is also about when "imaginative reconstructions" of the Mausoleum began to appear.[25] In 1522, rumours of a Turkish invasion caused the Crusaders to strengthen the castle at Halicarnassus (which was by then known as Bodrum) and much of the remaining portions of the tomb were broken up and used in the castle walls. Sections of polished marble from the tomb can still be seen there today. Suleiman the Magnificent conquered the base of the knights on the island of Rhodes, who then relocated first briefly to Sicily and later permanently to Malta, leaving the Castle and Bodrum to the Ottoman Empire. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mausoleum_at_Halicarnassus |
[citation needed]
During the fortification work, a party of knights entered the base of the monument and discovered the room containing a great coffin. In many histories of the Mausoleum one can find the following story of what happened: the party, deciding it was too late to open it that day, returned the next morning to find the tomb, and any treasure it may have contained, plundered. The bodies of Mausolus and Artemisia were missing too. The small museum building next to the site of the Mausoleum tells the story. Research done by archeologists in the 1960s shows that long before the knights came, grave robbers had dug a tunnel under the grave chamber, stealing its contents. Also the museum states that it is most likely that Mausolus and Artemisia were cremated, so only an urn with their ashes was placed in the grave chamber. This explains why no bodies were found.[citation needed]
Before grinding and burning much of the remaining sculpture of the Mausoleum into lime for plaster, the Knights removed several of the best works and mounted them in the Bodrum castle. There they stayed for three centuries. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mausoleum_at_Halicarnassus |
[citation needed]
Discovery and excavation[edit]
An actress performs a play in front of two statues from the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus. Room 21, the British Museum, London
In the 19th century a British consul obtained several of the statues from Bodrum Castle; these now reside in the British Museum. In 1852, the British Museum sent the archaeologist Charles Thomas Newton to search for more remains of the Mausoleum. He had a difficult job. He did not know the exact location of the tomb, and the cost of buying up all the small parcels of land in the area to look for it would have been astronomical. Instead Newton studied the accounts of ancient writers like Pliny to obtain the approximate size and location of the memorial, then bought a plot of land in the most likely location. Digging down, Newton explored the surrounding area through tunnels he dug under the surrounding plots. He was able to locate some walls, a staircase, and finally three of the corners of the foundation. With this knowledge, Newton was able to determine which plots of land he needed to buy.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mausoleum_at_Halicarnassus |
Newton then excavated the site and found sections of the reliefs that decorated the wall of the building and portions of the stepped roof. Also discovered was a broken stone chariot wheel some 2 m (6 ft 7 in) in diameter, which came from the sculpture on the Mausoleum's roof. Finally, he found the statues of Mausolus and Artemisia that had stood at the pinnacle of the building. In October 1857, Newton carried blocks of marble from this site by HMS Supply and landed them in Malta. These blocks were used for the construction of a new dock in Malta for the Royal Navy. Today this dock is known at Dock No. 1 in Cospicua, but the building blocks are hidden from view, submerged in Dockyard Creek in the Grand Harbour.[26]
From 1966 to 1977, the Mausoleum was thoroughly researched by Prof. Kristian Jeppesen of Aarhus University, Denmark. He has produced a six-volume monograph, The Maussolleion at Halikarnassos.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mausoleum_at_Halicarnassus |
The beauty of the Mausoleum was not only in the structure itself, but in the decorations and statues that adorned the outside at different levels on the podium and the roof: statues of people, lions, horses, and other animals in varying scales. The four Greek sculptors who carved the statues: Bryaxis, Leochares, Scopas and Timotheus were each responsible for one side. Because the statues were of people and animals, the Mausoleum holds a special place in history, as it was not dedicated to the gods of Ancient Greece.
Today, the massive castle of the Knights Hospitaller (Knights of St. John) still stands in Bodrum, and the polished stone and marble blocks of the Mausoleum can be spotted built into the walls of the structure. At the site of the Mausoleum, only the foundation remains, and a small museum. Some of the surviving sculptures at the British Museum include fragments of statues and many slabs of the frieze showing the battle between the Greeks and the Amazons. There the images of Mausolus and his queen watch over the few broken remains of the beautiful tomb she built for him.
Reconstruction of the Amazonomachy can be seen in the left background. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mausoleum_at_Halicarnassus |
British Museum Room 21
Statue usually identified as Artemisia; reconstruction of the Amazonomachy can be seen in the left background. British Museum Room 21
This lion is among the few free-standing sculptures from the Mausoleum at the British Museum.
Slab from the Amazonomachy believed to show Herculeas grabbing the hair of the Amazon Queen Hippolyta.
Influence on modern architecture[edit]
Modern buildings whose designs were based upon or influenced by interpretations of the design of the Mausoleum of Mausolus include Fourth and Vine Tower in Cincinnati; the Civil Courts Building in St. Louis; the National Newark Building in Newark, New Jersey; Grant's Tomb and 26 Broadway in New York City; Los Angeles City Hall; the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne; the spire of St. George's Church, Bloomsbury in London; the Indiana War Memorial (and in turn Salesforce Tower) in Indianapolis;[27][28] the House of the Temple in Washington D.C.; the National Diet in Tokyo; the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall in Pittsburgh;[29] and the Commerce Bank Building in Peoria, IL.
The design of the Shrine of Remembrance in Melbourne was inspired by that of the Mausoleum.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mausoleum_at_Halicarnassus |
The Masonic House of the Temple of the Scottish Rite, Washington, DC, designed by John Russell Pope, 1911–1915, another scholarly version.
Gallery of 2nd century replica site[edit]
In Milas (also the site of the tomb of Hecatomnus, who was the father of Mausolus), is also the site of the Gümüşkesen, a small-scale Roman-era (2nd century BC) copy of the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus:
Gümüşkesen in Milas
Milas Gümüşkesen front
Gümüşkesen in Milas detail of ceiling
Gümüşkesen in Milas detail of ceiling
Gümüşkesen in Milas detail of ceiling and capitals
Gümüşkesen in Milas capital
Gümüşkesen in Milas Lower part of tomb | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mausoleum_at_Halicarnassus |
The Temple of Artemis or Artemision (Greek: Ἀρτεμίσιον; Turkish: Artemis Tapınağı), also known as the Temple of Diana, was a Greek temple dedicated to an ancient, local form of the goddess Artemis (identified with Diana, a Roman goddess). It was located in Ephesus (near the modern town of Selçuk in present-day Turkey). By 401 AD it had been ruined or destroyed.[1] Only foundations and fragments of the last temple remain at the site.
The earliest version of the temple (a Bronze Age temenos) antedated the Ionic immigration by many years. Callimachus, in his Hymn to Artemis, attributed it to the Amazons. In the 7th century BC, it was destroyed by a flood.
Its reconstruction, in more grandiose form, began around 550 BC, under Chersiphron, the Cretan architect, and his son Metagenes. The project was funded by Croesus of Lydia, and took 10 years to complete. This version of the temple was destroyed in 356 BC by an arsonist.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
The next, greatest, and last form of the temple, funded by the Ephesians themselves, is described in Antipater of Sidon's list of the world's Seven Wonders:
I have set eyes on the wall of lofty Babylon on which is a road for chariots, and the statue of Zeus by the Alpheus, and the hanging gardens, and the colossus of the Sun, and the huge labour of the high pyramids, and the vast tomb of Mausolus; but when I saw the house of Artemis that mounted to the clouds, those other marvels lost their brilliancy, and I said, "Lo, apart from Olympus, the Sun never looked on aught so grand".[2]
Location and history[edit]
The fame of the Temple of Artemis was known in the Renaissance, as demonstrated in this imagined portrayal of the temple in a 16th-century hand-colored engraving by Martin Heemskerck.
The Temple of Artemis (Artemision) was located near the ancient city of Ephesus, about 75 kilometres (47 mi) south from the modern port city of İzmir, in Turkey. Today the site lies on the edge of the modern town of Selçuk.
The sacred site (temenos) at Ephesus was far older than the Artemision itself. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
Pausanias was certain that it antedated the Ionic immigration by many years, being older even than the oracular shrine of Apollo at Didyma.[3] He said that the pre-Ionic inhabitants of the city were Leleges and Lydians. Callimachus, in his Hymn to Artemis attributed the earliest temenos at Ephesus to the Amazons, legendary warrior-women whose religious practise he imagined already centered upon an image (bretas) of Artemis, their matron goddess. Pausanias believed that the temple pre-dated the Amazons.[4]
Pausanias's estimation of the site's antiquity seems well-founded. Before World War I, site excavations by David George Hogarth seemed to identify three successive temple buildings. Re-excavations in 1987–88 and re-appraisal of Hogarth's account [5] confirmed that the site was occupied as early as the Bronze Age, with a sequence of pottery finds that extend forward to Middle Geometric times, when a peripteral temple with a floor of hard-packed clay was constructed in the second half of the 8th century BC.[6] The peripteral temple at Ephesus offers the earliest example of a peripteral type on the coast of Asia Minor, and perhaps the earliest Greek temple surrounded by colonnades anywhere.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
In the 7th century BC, a flood[7] destroyed the temple, depositing over half a meter of sand and flotsam over the original clay floor. Among the flood debris were the remains of a carved ivory plaque of a griffin and the Tree of Life, apparently North Syrian, and some drilled tear-shaped amber drops of elliptical cross-section. These probably once dressed a wooden effigy (xoanon) of the Lady of Ephesus, which must have been destroyed or recovered from the flood. Bammer notes that though the site was prone to flooding, and raised by silt deposits about two metres between the 8th and 6th centuries, and a further 2.4 m between the sixth and the fourth, its continued use "indicates that maintaining the identity of the actual location played an important role in the sacred organization".[8]
Second phase[edit]
The new temple was sponsored at least in part by Croesus,[9] who founded Lydia's empire and was overlord of Ephesus.[10] It was designed and constructed from around 550 BC by the Cretan architect Chersiphron and his son Metagenes. It was 115 m (377 ft) long and 46 m (151 ft) wide, supposedly the first Greek temple built of marble. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
Its peripteral columns stood some 13 m (40 ft) high, in double rows that formed a wide ceremonial passage around the cella that housed the goddess's cult image. Thirty-six of these columns were, according to Pliny, decorated by carvings in relief. A new ebony or blackened grapewood cult statue was sculpted by Endoios,[11] and a naiskos to house it was erected east of the open-air altar.
Foundation deposit[edit]
Electrotype of electrum coin from Ephesus, 625–600 BC. Stag grazing right, ΦΑΕΝΟΣ ΕΜΙ ΣΕΜΑ (retrograde, “I am the badge of Phanes”).
The earliest known inscribed coinage, from the foundation deposit of the Temple of Artemis: electrum coin of Phanes from Ephesus, 625-600 BC. Obverse: Stag grazing right, ΦΑΝΕΟΣ (retrograde). Reverse: Two incuse punches, each with raised intersecting lines.[12]
A rich foundation deposit from this era, also called the "Artemision deposit", yielded more than a thousand items, including what may be the earliest coins made from the silver-gold alloy electrum.[12] The deposit contains some of the earliest inscribed coins, those of Phanes, dated to 625–600 BC from Ephesus, with the legend ΦΑΕΝΟΣ ΕΜΙ ΣΗΜΑ (or similar) (“I am the badge of Phanes”), or just bearing the name ΦΑΝΕΟΣ (“of Phanes”). | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
[12]
Fragments of bas-relief on the lowest drums of the temple columns, preserved in the British Museum, show that the enriched columns of the later temple, of which a few survive (illustration below) were versions of this earlier feature. Pliny the Elder, seemingly unaware of the ancient continuity of the sacred site, claims that the new temple's architects chose to build it on marshy ground as a precaution against earthquakes, with lower foundation layers of fleeces and pounded charcoal.[13]
The temple became an important attraction, visited by merchants, kings, and sightseers, many of whom paid homage to Artemis in the form of jewelry and various goods. It also offered sanctuary to those fleeing persecution or punishment, a tradition linked in myth to the Amazons who twice fled there seeking the goddess's protection from punishment, firstly by Dionysus and later, by Heracles.[14] Diogenes Laertius claims that the misanthropic philosopher Heraclitus, thoroughly disapproving of civil life at Ephesus, played knucklebones in the temple with the boys, and later deposited his writings there.[15]
Destruction[edit]
In 356 BC, the temple burned down. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
Various sources describe this as a vainglorious act of arson by a man, Herostratus, who set fire to the wooden roof-beams, seeking fame at any cost; thus the term herostratic fame.[16] For this outrage, the Ephesians sentenced the perpetrator to death and forbade anyone from mentioning his name; but Theopompus later noted it.[17] Aristotle's Meteorology describes the temple's conflagration, but not its cause.[18] In Greek and Roman historical tradition, the temple's destruction coincided with the birth of Alexander the Great (around 20/21 July 356 BC). Plutarch remarks that Artemis was too preoccupied with Alexander's delivery to save her burning temple; he does not specify a cause for the fire.[19]
Herostratus' part in the temple's destruction has been questioned in modern scholarship. Stefan Karweise notes that any arsonist would have needed access to the wooden roof framing;[20]: 57
Dieter Knibbe writes of an "entire corps" of attested temple guards and custodians. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
[21]: 88–89
The fire might even have been deliberately and covertly set by the temple's administrators, aware of that the temple's foundation was sinking, but prevented from re-siting it elsewhere by religious constraints;[21]: 89 Bammer has noted the conservation of the original sacred location throughout successive rebuildings, despite continued problems with flooding and foundations.[22] Karwiese questions the motive of Herostratus since he only divulged his purpose under torture, which does not fit a man seeking fame.[20]: 57 Dieter Knibbe [de] considers Herostratus a "useful idiot in the service of the priesthood."[21]: 89
Third phase[edit]
Alexander offered to pay for the temple's rebuilding; the Ephesians tactfully refused, saying "it would be improper for one god to build a temple to another",[23] and eventually rebuilt it after his death, at their own expense. Work started in 323 BC and continued for many years. The third temple was larger than the second; 137 m (450 ft) long by 69 m (225 ft) wide and 18 m (60 ft) high, with more than 127 columns. Athenagoras of Athens names Endoeus, a pupil of Daedalus, as sculptor of Artemis' main cult image. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
[24]
A drum from the base of a column from the 4th-century rebuilding, now in the British Museum
Pausanias (c. 2nd century AD) reports another image and altar in the temple, dedicated to Artemis Protothronia (Artemis "of the first seat") and a gallery of images above this altar, including an ancient figure of Nyx (the primordial goddess of Night) by the sculptor Rhoecus (6th century BC). Pliny describes images of Amazons, the legendary founders of Ephesus and Ephesian Artemis' original protégés, carved by Scopas. Literary sources describe the temple's adornment by paintings, columns gilded with gold and silver, and religious works of renowned Greek sculptors Polyclitus, Pheidias, Cresilas, and Phradmon.[24]
Further claims of destruction[edit]
This reconstruction survived for 600 years, and appears multiple times in early Christian accounts of Ephesus. According to the New Testament, the appearance of the first Christian missionary in Ephesus caused locals to fear for the temple's dishonor. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
[25] The 2nd-century Acts of John includes an apocryphal tale of the temple's destruction: the apostle John prayed publicly in the Temple of Artemis, exorcising its demons and "of a sudden the altar of Artemis split in many pieces... and half the temple fell down," instantly converting the Ephesians, who wept, prayed or took flight.[26]
Against this, a Roman edict of 162 AD acknowledges the importance of Artemesion, the annual Ephesian festival to Artemis, and officially extends it from a few holy days over March–April to a whole month, "one of the largest and most magnificent religious festivals in Ephesus' liturgical calendar".[27]
In 268 AD, according to Jordanes, a raid by the Goths, under their leaders "Respa, Veduc and Thurar",[28][29] "laid waste many populous cities and set fire to the renowned temple of Diana at Ephesus."[30] ; the extent and severity of the damage are unknown; the temple may have lain derelict until its official closure during the persecution of pagans in the late Roman Empire,[31] Ammonius of Alexandria comments on its closure, perhaps as early as 407,[31] or no later than the mid 5th century. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
After closure and after the city had become Christian, the name of Artemis appears to have been erased from inscriptions throughout Ephesus.[31]
Cyril of Alexandria credited Archbishop of Constantinople John Chrysostom with destroying the temple, referring to him as "the destroyer of the demons and overthrower of the temple of Diana". A later Archbishop of Constantinople, Proclus, noted the achievements of John, saying "In Ephesus, he despoiled the art of Midas," but there is little evidence to support this claim.[32]
At least some of the stone from the abandoned temple was used in construction of other buildings.[33] A late medieval legend claims that some of the columns in the Hagia Sophia were taken from the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, but there is no truth to this story.[34][35]
The main primary sources for the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus are Pliny the Elder's Natural History,[36] Pomponius Mela i:17, and Plutarch's Life of Alexander [37] (referencing the burning of the Artemiseum).
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
Rediscovery of the temple[edit]
Reconstructive plan of Temple of Artemis at Ephesus according to John Turtle Wood (1877)
After six years of searching, the site of the temple was rediscovered in 1869 by an expedition led by John Turtle Wood and sponsored by the British Museum. These excavations continued until 1874.[38] A few further fragments of sculpture were found during the 1904–1906 excavations directed by David George Hogarth. The recovered sculptured fragments of the 4th-century rebuilding and a few from the earlier temple, which had been used in the rubble fill for the rebuilding, were assembled and displayed in the "Ephesus Room" of the British Museum.[39] In addition, the museum has part of possibly the oldest pot-hoard of coins in the world (600 BC) that had been buried in the foundations of the Archaic temple.[40]
Today the site of the temple, which lies just outside Selçuk, is marked by a single column constructed of dissociated fragments discovered on the site.
Cult and influence[edit]
The archaic temeton beneath the later temples clearly housed some form of "Great Goddess" but nothing is known of her cult. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
The literary accounts that describe it as "Amazonian" refer to the later founder-myths of Greek emigrés who developed the cult and temple of Artemis Ephesia. The wealth and splendor of temple and city were taken as evidence of Artemis Ephesia's power, and were the basis for her local and international prestige: despite the successive traumas of Temple destruction, each rebuilding – a gift and honor to the goddess – brought further prosperity.[41] Large numbers of people came to Ephesus in March and in the beginning of May to attend the main Artemis Procession.[42]
Artemis' shrines, temples and festivals (Artemisia) could be found throughout the Greek world, but Ephesian Artemis was unique. The Ephesians considered her theirs, and resented any foreign claims to her protection. Once Persia ousted and replaced their Lydian overlord Croesus, the Ephesians played down his contribution to the temple's restoration. On the whole, the Persians dealt fairly with Ephesus, but removed some religious artifacts from Artemis' Temple to Sardis and brought Persian priests into her Ephesian cult; this was not forgiven.[43] When Alexander conquered the Persians, his offer to finance the temple's second rebuilding was politely but firmly refused. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
[44] Ephesian Artemis lent her city's diplomacy a powerful religious edge.
Under Hellenic rule, and later, under Roman rule, the Ephesian Artemisia festival was increasingly promoted as a key element in the pan-Hellenic festival circuit. It was part of a definitively Greek political and cultural identity, essential to the economic life of the region, and an excellent opportunity for young, unmarried Greeks of both sexes to seek out marriage partners. Games, contests and theatrical performances were held in the goddess's name, and Pliny describes her procession as a magnificent crowd-puller; it was shown in one of Apelles' best paintings, which depicted the goddess's image carried through the streets and surrounded by maidens.[45] In the Roman Imperial era, the emperor Commodus lent his name to the festival games, and might have sponsored them.[46]
Ephesian Artemis[edit]
.mw-parser-output .tmulti .multiimageinner{display:flex;flex-direction:column}.mw-parser-output .tmulti .trow{display:flex;flex-direction:row;clear:left;flex-wrap:wrap;width:100%;box-sizing:border-box}.mw-parser-output .tmulti .tsingle{margin:1px;float:left}.mw-parser-output .tmulti .theader{clear:both;font-weight:bold;text-align:center;align-self:center;background-color:transparent;width:100%}.mw-parser-output .tmulti .thumbcaption{background-color:transparent}.mw-parser-output .tmulti .text-align-left{text-align:left}.mw-parser-output .tmulti .text-align-right{text-align:right}.mw-parser-output .tmulti .text-align-center{text-align:center}@media all and (max-width:720px){.mw-parser-output .tmulti .thumbinner{width:100%!important;box-sizing:border-box;max-width:none!important;align-items:center}.mw-parser-output .tmulti .trow{justify-content:center}.mw-parser-output .tmulti .tsingle{float:none!important;max-width:100%!important;box-sizing:border-box;text-align:center}.mw-parser-output .tmulti .tsingle .thumbcaption{text-align:left}.mw-parser-output .tmulti .trow>.thumbcaption{text-align:center}}The Lady of Ephesus no. 712, 1st century AD, Ephesus Archaeological MuseumThe Lady of Ephesus no. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
718, 1st century AD, Ephesus Archaeological Museum
From the Greek point of view, the Ephesian Artemis is a distinctive form of their goddess Artemis. In Greek cult and myth, Artemis is the twin sister of Apollo, a virgin goddess of the hunt, the wilderness and the moon, who, despite being a goddess of childbirth was nevertheless known for her chastity. At Ephesus, a goddess whom the Greeks associated with Artemis was venerated in an archaic, pre-Hellenic cult image[47] that was carved of wood (a xoanon) and kept decorated with jewelry.
The features are most similar to Near-Eastern and Egyptian deities, and least similar to Greek ones. The body and legs are enclosed within a tapering pillar-like term, from which the goddess' feet protrude. On the coins minted at Ephesus, the goddess wears a mural crown (like a city's walls), an attribute of Cybele as a protector of cities (see polos).[47]
Traditional many-breasted interpretation in a 16th-century fountain of Diana Efesina, Villa d'Este, Tivoli, Italy
The traditional interpretation of the oval objects covering the upper part of the Ephesian Artemis is that they represent multiple breasts, symbolizing her fertility. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
This interpretation began in late antiquity and resulted in designations of the Ephesian goddess as Diana Efesia Multimammia and other related descriptions.[48][page needed] This interpretation was rooted in Minucius Felix and Jerome's Christian attacks on pagan popular religion, and modern scholarship has cast doubt on the traditional interpretation that the statue depicts a many-breasted goddess.[48][page needed]
Evidence suggests that the oval objects were not intended to depict part of the goddess' anatomy at all. In some versions of the statue, the goddess' skin has been painted black, likely to emulate the aged wood of the original, while her clothes and regalia, including the so-called "breasts", were left unpainted or cast in different colors.[48][page needed]
Robert Fleischer suggested that instead of breasts, the oval objects were decorations that would have been hung ceremonially on the original wood statue (possibly eggs or the scrotal sacs of sacrificed bulls[49]), and which were incorporated as carved features on later copies.[48][page needed] The "breasts" of the Lady of Ephesus, it now appears, were likely based on amber gourd-shaped drops, elliptical in cross-section and drilled for hanging, that were rediscovered in the archaeological excavations of 1987–1988. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
These objects remained in place where the ancient wooden statue of the goddess had been caught by an 8th-century flood. This form of jewelry, then, had already been developed by the Geometric Period.[50][51]
On the coins she rests either arm on a staff formed of entwined serpents or of a stack of ouroboroi, the eternal serpent with its tail in its mouth. In some accounts, the Lady of Ephesus was attended by eunuch priests called "Megabyzoi"; this could have been a proper name or a title. The practise of ritual self-emasculation as qualification to serve a deity is usually identified with Cybele's eunuch mendicant priests, the Galli. The Megabyzoi of Ephesian Artemis were assisted by young, virgin girls (korai).[52][53]
A votive inscription mentioned by Florence Mary Bennett,[54] which dates probably from about the 3rd century BC, associates Ephesian Artemis with Crete: "To the Healer of diseases, to Apollo, Giver of Light to mortals, Eutyches has set up in votive offering [a statue of] the Cretan Lady of Ephesus, the Light-Bearer." | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
The Greek habits of syncretism assimilated all foreign gods under some form of the Olympian pantheon familiar to them—in interpretatio graeca—and it is clear that at Ephesus, the identification with Artemis that the Ionian settlers made of the "Lady of Ephesus" was slender. Nevertheless, later Greeks and Romans identified her with both Artemis and Diana, and there was a tradition in ancient Rome that identified her with the goddess Isis as well.[48][page needed]
The Christian approach was at variance with the syncretistic approach of pagans to gods who were not theirs. A Christian inscription at Ephesus[55] suggests why so little remains at the site:
Destroying the delusive image of the demon Artemis, Demeas has erected this symbol of Truth, the God that drives away idols, and the Cross of priests, deathless and victorious sign of Christ.
The assertion that the Ephesians thought that their cult image had fallen from the sky, though it was a familiar origin-myth at other sites, is only known at Ephesus from Acts 19:35:
What man is there that knoweth not how that the city of the Ephesians is a worshipper of the great goddess Diana, and of the [image] which fell down from Jupiter?
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
Lynn LiDonnici observes that modern scholars are likely to be more concerned with origins of the Lady of Ephesus and her iconology than her adherents were at any point in time, and are prone to creating a synthetic account of the Lady of Ephesus by drawing together documentation that ranges over more than a millennium in its origins, creating a falsified, unitary picture, as of an unchanging icon.[56]
Panorama[edit]
A 360-degree panoramic view of the site of the temple | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temple_of_Artemis |
The Lighthouse of Alexandria, sometimes called the Pharos of Alexandria (/ˈfɛərɒs/; Ancient Greek: ὁ Φάρος τῆς Ἀλεξανδρείας, contemporary Koine Greek pronunciation: [ho pʰá.ros tɛ̂ːs a.lek.sandrěːaːs]), was a lighthouse built by the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Ancient Egypt, during the reign of Ptolemy II Philadelphus (280–247 BC).[2] It has been estimated to have been at least 100 metres (330 ft) in overall height.[3] One of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, for many centuries it was one of the tallest man-made structures in the world.
The lighthouse was severely damaged by three earthquakes between 956 and 1323 AD and became an abandoned ruin. It was the third-longest surviving ancient wonder, after the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus and the extant Great Pyramid of Giza, surviving in part until 1480, when the last of its remnant stones were used to build the Citadel of Qaitbay on the site.
In 1994, a team of French archaeologists dove into the water of Alexandria's Eastern Harbour and discovered some remains of the lighthouse on the sea floor. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse_of_Alexandria |
[4] In 2016 the Ministry of State of Antiquities in Egypt had plans to turn submerged ruins of ancient Alexandria, including those of the Pharos, into an underwater museum.[5]
Origin[edit]
Pharos was a small island located on the western edge of the Nile Delta. In 332 BC Alexander the Great founded the city of Alexandria on an isthmus opposite Pharos. Alexandria and Pharos were later connected by a mole[6] spanning more than 1,200 metres (0.75 miles), which was called the Heptastadion ("seven stadia"—a stadion was a Greek unit of length measuring approximately 180 m).
The etymology of “Pharos” is uncertain. The word became generalized in modern Greek (φάρος ‘fáros’), and was loaned into Italian (‘faro’) and French (‘phare’).
The east side of the mole became the Great Harbour, now an open bay; on the west side lay the port of Eunostos, with its inner basin Kibotos now vastly enlarged to form the modern harbour. Today's city development lying between the present Grand Square and the modern Ras el-Tin quarter is built on the silt which gradually widened and obliterated this mole. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse_of_Alexandria |
The Ras el-Tin promontory, where Ras el-Tin Palace was built in the 19th century, represents all that is left of the island of Pharos,[7] the site of the lighthouse at its eastern point having been weathered away by the sea.
Construction[edit]
Lighthouse of Alexandria by Philip Galle; 1572, Rijksmuseum
The lighthouse was constructed in the third century BC. After Alexander the Great died, the first Ptolemy (Ptolemy I Soter) declared himself king in 305 BC, and commissioned its construction shortly thereafter. The building was finished during the reign of his son, Ptolemy II Philadelphus, and took twelve years to complete at a total cost of 800 talents of silver.[8] The light was produced by a furnace at the top, and the tower was said to have been built mostly with solid blocks of limestone and granite.[9]
In his encyclopedic manuscript Geographica, Strabo, who visited Alexandria in the late first century BC, reported that Sostratus of Cnidus had a dedication to the "Saviour Gods" inscribed in metal letters on the lighthouse. Writing in the first century AD, Pliny the Elder stated in his Natural History that Sostratus was the architect, although this conclusion is disputed. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse_of_Alexandria |
[10] In his second century AD educational treatise How to Write History, Lucian claimed that Sostratus hid his name under plaster which bore the name of Ptolemy, so that when the plaster eventually fell off, Sostratus's name would be visible in the stone.[11][12]
The blocks of sandstone and limestone used in the construction of the lighthouse have been scientifically analysed in order to discover where they originated, with mineralogical and chemical analysis pointing to the Wadi Hammamat quarries, which are located in the desert to the east of Alexandria.[13]
Height and description[edit]
A size comparison between a 1909 (inner shape) and a 2006 study (outer shape) of the building.
Arab descriptions of the lighthouse are consistent despite it undergoing several repairs after earthquake damage. Given heights vary only fifteen percent from 103 to 118 m (338 to 387 ft), on a 30 by 30 m (98 by 98 ft) square base.[1]
The Arab authors indicate that the lighthouse was constructed from large blocks of light-coloured stone. The tower was made up of three tapering tiers: a lower square section with a central core; a middle octagonal section; and, at the top, a circular section. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse_of_Alexandria |
[14] Al-Masudi wrote in the 10th century that the seaward-facing side featured an inscription dedicated to Zeus.[15] Geographer Al-Idrisi visited the lighthouse in 1154 and noted openings in the walls throughout the rectangular shaft with lead used as a filling agent in between the masonry blocks at the base. He reckoned the total height of the lighthouse to be 300 dhira rashashl (162 m).[16]
At its apex was a mirror which reflected sunlight during the day; a fire was lit at night. Extant Roman coins struck by the Alexandrian mint show that a statue of Triton was positioned on each of the building's four corners, and a statue of Poseidon or Zeus stood atop.[17]
The fullest description of the lighthouse comes from Arab traveler Abou Haggag Youssef Ibn Mohammed el-Balawi el-Andaloussi, who visited Alexandria in 1166 AD.[18] Balawi provided description and measurement of the interior of the lighthouse's rectangular shaft. The inner ramp was described as roofed with masonry at 7 shibr (189 cm, 6.2 ft) noted as to allow two horsemen to pass at once. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse_of_Alexandria |
In clockwise rotation, the ramp held four stories with eighteen, fourteen, and seventeen rooms on the second, third, and fourth floors, respectively.[16]
Balawi accounted the base of the lighthouse to be 45 ba (30 m, 100 ft) long on each side with connecting ramp 600 dhira (300 m, 984 ft) long by 20 dhira (10 m, 32 ft) wide. The octangle section is accounted at 24 ba (16.4 m, 54 ft) in width, and the diameter of the cylindrical section is accounted at 12.73 ba (8.7 m, 28.5 ft). The apex of the lighthouse's oratory was measured with diameter 6.4 ba (4.3 m 20.9 ft).[16]
Late accounts of the lighthouse after the destruction by the 1303 Crete earthquake include Ibn Battuta, a Moroccan scholar and explorer, who passed through Alexandria in 1326 and 1349. Battuta noted that the wrecked condition of the lighthouse was then only noticeable by the rectangle tower and entrance ramp. He stated the tower to be 140 shibr (30.8 m, 101 ft) on either side. Battuta detailed Sultan An-Nasir Muhammad's plan to build a new lighthouse near the site of the collapsed one, but these went unfulfilled after the Sultan's death in 1341. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse_of_Alexandria |
[16]
The Lighthouse on coins minted in Alexandria in the second century AD (1: reverse of a coin of Antoninus Pius, and 2: reverse of a coin of Commodus).
A 3D reconstruction of the Lighthouse of Alexandria
Destruction[edit]
The lighthouse was partially cracked and damaged by earthquakes in 796 and 951, followed by structural collapse in the earthquake of 956, and then again in 1303 and 1323. Earthquakes propagate from two well known tectonic boundaries, the African–Arabian and Red Sea Rift zones, respectively 350 and 520 km from the lighthouse's location. Documentation shows the 956 earthquake to be the first to cause structural collapse of the top 20+ metres of the construction.[19]
Documented repairs after the 956 earthquake include the installment of an Islamic-style dome after the collapse of the statue that previously topped the monument. The most destructive earthquake in 1303 was an estimated intensity of VIII+ originating from the Greek island of Crete (280–350 km from Alexandria).[20] The stubby remnant disappeared in 1480, when the then-Sultan of Egypt, Qaitbay, built a medieval fort on the larger platform of the lighthouse site using some of the fallen stone.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse_of_Alexandria |
The 10th-century writer al-Mas'udi reports a legendary tale on the lighthouse's destruction, according to which at the time of Caliph Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan (r. 705–715) the Byzantines sent a eunuch agent, who adopted Islam, gained the Caliph's confidence and secured permission to search for hidden treasure at the base of the lighthouse. The search was cunningly made in such a manner that the foundations were undermined, and the Pharos collapsed. The agent managed to escape in a ship waiting for him.[21]
Archaeological research and rediscovery[edit]
Lighthouse remains found in the Mediterranean Sea.
Gaston Jondet made in 1916 the first detailed description of the submerged ruins of the old port of Alexandria. He was followed by Raymond Weill in the same year, and by Sir Leopold Halliday Savile in 1940.[22][23]
In 1968, the lighthouse was rediscovered. UNESCO sponsored an expedition to send a team of marine archaeologists, led by Honor Frost, to the site. She confirmed the existence of ruins representing part of the lighthouse. Due to the lack of specialized archaeologists and the area becoming a military zone, exploration was put on hold. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse_of_Alexandria |
[24]
A team of French archaeologists led by Jean-Yves Empereur re-discovered the physical remains of the lighthouse in late 1994 on the floor of Alexandria's Eastern Harbour. He worked with cinematographer Asma el-Bakri who used a 35 mm camera to capture the first underwater pictures of the scattered remains of collapsed columns and statues. Empereur's most significant findings consisted of blocks of granite 49–60 tonnes in mass often broken into multiple pieces, 30 sphinxes, 5 obelisks and columns with carvings dating back to Ramses II (1279–1213 BC).[25]
The cataloging of over 3,300 pieces was completed by Empereur and his team at the end of 1995 using a combination of photography and mapping. Thirty-six pieces of Empereur's granite blocks and other discoveries have been restored and are currently on display in Alexandria museums.[25] Satellite imaging has revealed further remains. In the early 1990s, the underwater archaeologist Franck Goddio began exploration at the opposite side of the harbor from where Empereur's team had worked.[26]
Satellite and sonar imaging has revealed the additional remains of wharves, houses and temples[27] which had all fallen into the Mediterranean sea as a result of earthquakes and other natural disasters. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse_of_Alexandria |
[28] It is possible to go diving and see the ruins. The secretariat of the UNESCO Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage is currently working with the Government of Egypt on an initiative to add the Bay of Alexandria (including the remains of the lighthouse) to a World Heritage List of submerged cultural sites.[29]
Significance[edit]
A mosaic depicting the Pharos of Alexandria, (labeled "Ο ΦΑΡΟϹ"), from Olbia, Libya c. 4th century AD.
Legend has it that the people of the island of Pharos were wreckers; hence, Ptolemy I Soter had the lighthouse built to help guide ships into port at night.[30]
Pharos became the etymological origin of the word "lighthouse" in Greek (φάρος), many Romance languages such as French (phare), Italian and Spanish (faro) – and thence into Esperanto (faro) – Catalan, Romanian (far) and Portuguese (farol), as well as Swedish and Danish (fyr), and even some Slavic languages like Bulgarian (far). In French, Portuguese, Turkish, Serbian and Russian, a derived word means "headlight" (phare, farol, far, фар, фара).
Proposed reconstruction[edit]
Since 1978 a number of proposals have been made to replace the lighthouse with a modern reconstruction. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse_of_Alexandria |
In 2015, the Egyptian government and the Alexandria governorate suggested building a skyscraper on the site of the lighthouse as part of the regeneration of the eastern harbour of Alexandria Port.[31]
Pharos in culture[edit]
The lighthouse as depicted in the Book of Wonders, a late 14th-century Arabic text
The Pharos of Abusir, an ancient funerary monument thought to be modelled after the Pharos at Alexandria, with which it is approximately contemporaneous
The lighthouse remains a civic symbol of the city of Alexandria and of the Alexandria Governorate with which the city is more or less coterminous. A stylised representation of the lighthouse appears on the flag and seal of the Governorate and on many public services of the city, including the seal of Alexandria University.
In architecture[edit]
A well-preserved ancient tomb in the town of Abusir, 48 kilometres (30 mi) southwest of Alexandria, is thought to be a scaled-down model of the Alexandria Pharos. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse_of_Alexandria |
Known colloquially under various names – the Pharos of Abusir, the Abusir funerary monument and Burg al-Arab (Arab's Tower) – it consists of a 3-storey tower, approximately 20 metres (66 ft) in height, with a square base, an octagonal midsection and cylindrical upper section, like the building upon which it was apparently modelled. It dates to the reign of Ptolemy II (285–246 BC), and is therefore likely to have been built at about the same time as the Alexandria Pharos.
The design of minarets in many early Egyptian Islamic mosques followed a three-stage design similar to that of the Pharos, attesting to the building's broader architectural influence.[32]
The George Washington Masonic National Memorial, located in Alexandria, Virginia, is fashioned after the ancient Lighthouse.[33]
A fictionalized version of the structure – known as the "Pharos Lighthouse" – serves as the park icon, centerpiece, and identifier of Universal's Islands of Adventure theme park, opened in 1999 at the Universal Orlando Resort. The real, functioning lighthouse resides in the park's Port of Entry area, recalling a literary, seaside explorers' marketplace of global architectural elements real, ancient, and imagined.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse_of_Alexandria |
In literature[edit]
Julius Caesar, in his Civil Wars (Part III, 111–112), describes the Pharos and its strategic importance. Gaining control of the lighthouse helped him subdue Ptolemy XIII's armies (48 BC):.mw-parser-output .templatequote{overflow:hidden;margin:1em 0;padding:0 40px}.mw-parser-output .templatequote .templatequotecite{line-height:1.5em;text-align:left;padding-left:1.6em;margin-top:0}Now because of the narrowness of the strait there can be no access by ship to the harbour without the consent of those who hold the Pharos. In view of this, Caesar took the precaution of landing his troops while the enemy was preoccupied with fighting, seized the Pharos and posted a garrison there. The result was that safe access was secured for his corn supplies and reinforcements.[34]— Caesar, b.civ. 3.112 ??; or Anon., b.Alex.??
The Romano-Jewish historian Josephus (37 – c. 100 AD) describes it in his book The Jewish War (4.10.5) when he gives a geographical overview of Egypt.
It was described in the Zhu fan zhi ("Records of Foreign Peoples") by Zhao Rugua (1170–1228), a Chinese customs inspector for the southern port city of Quanzhou during the Song dynasty. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse_of_Alexandria |
[35]
Ibn Battuta visited the lighthouse in 1326, finding "one of its faces in ruins," yet he could enter and noted a place for the guardian of the lighthouse to sit and many other chambers. When he returned in 1349, he "found that it had fallen into so ruinous a condition that it was impossible to enter it or to climb up to the doorway."[36] | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lighthouse_of_Alexandria |
The Hanging Gardens of Babylon were one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World listed by Hellenic culture. They were described as a remarkable feat of engineering with an ascending series of tiered gardens containing a wide variety of trees, shrubs, and vines, resembling a large green mountain constructed of mud bricks. It was said to have been built in the ancient city of Babylon, near present-day Hillah, Babil province, in Iraq. The Hanging Gardens' name is derived from the Greek word κρεμαστός (kremastós, lit. 'overhanging'), which has a broader meaning than the modern English word "hanging" and refers to trees being planted on a raised structure such as a terrace.[1][2][3]
According to one legend, the Hanging Gardens were built alongside a grand palace known as The Marvel of Mankind, by the Neo-Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar II (who ruled between 605 and 562 BC), for his Median wife, Queen Amytis, because she missed the green hills and valleys of her homeland. This was attested to by the Babylonian priest Berossus, writing in about 290 BC, a description that was later quoted by Josephus. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon |
The construction of the Hanging Gardens has also been attributed to the legendary queen Semiramis[4] and they have been called the Hanging Gardens of Semiramis as an alternative name.[5]
The Hanging Gardens are the only one of the Seven Wonders for which the location has not been definitively established.[6] There are no extant Babylonian texts that mention the gardens, and no definitive archaeological evidence has been found in Babylon.[7][8] Three theories have been suggested to account for this: first, that they were purely mythical, and the descriptions found in ancient Greek and Roman writings (including those of Strabo, Diodorus Siculus and Quintus Curtius Rufus) represented a romantic ideal of an eastern garden;[9] second, that they existed in Babylon, but were destroyed sometime around the first century AD;[10][4] and third, that the legend refers to a well-documented garden that the Assyrian King Sennacherib (704–681 BC) built in his capital city of Nineveh on the River Tigris, near the modern city of Mosul.[11][1]
Descriptions in classical literature
There are five principal writers whose descriptions of Babylon exist in some form today. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon |
These writers concern themselves with the size of the Hanging Gardens, their overall design and means of irrigation, and why they were built.
Josephus (c. 37–100 AD) quotes a description of the gardens by Berossus, a Babylonian priest of Marduk,[6] whose writing c. 290 BC is the earliest known mention of the gardens.[5] Berossus described the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II and is the only source to credit that king with the construction of the Hanging Gardens.[12][13]
.mw-parser-output .templatequote{overflow:hidden;margin:1em 0;padding:0 40px}.mw-parser-output .templatequote .templatequotecite{line-height:1.5em;text-align:left;padding-left:1.6em;margin-top:0}In this palace he erected very high walls, supported by stone pillars; and by planting what was called a pensile paradise, and replenishing it with all sorts of trees, he rendered the prospect an exact resemblance of a mountainous country. This he did to gratify his queen, because she had been brought up in Media, and was fond of a mountainous situation.[14]
Hanging gardens of Semiramis, by H. Waldeck
Diodorus Siculus (active c. 60–30 BC) seems to have consulted the 4th century BC texts of both Cleitarchus (a historian of Alexander the Great) and Ctesias of Cnidus. Diodorus ascribes the construction to a Syrian king. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon |
He states that the garden was in the shape of a square, with each side approximately four plethra long. The garden was tiered, with the uppermost gallery being 50 cubits high. The walls, 22 feet thick, were made of brick. The bases of the tiered sections were sufficiently deep to provide root growth for the largest trees, and the gardens were irrigated from the nearby Euphrates.[15]
Quintus Curtius Rufus (fl. 1st century AD) probably drew on the same sources as Diodorus.[16] He states that the gardens were located on top of a citadel, which was 20 stadia in circumference. He attributes the building of the gardens to a Syrian king, again for the reason that his queen missed her homeland.
The account of Strabo (c. 64 BC – 21 AD) possibly based his description on the lost account of Onesicritus from the 4th century BC.[17] He states that the gardens were watered by means of an Archimedes' screw leading to the gardens from the Euphrates river.
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon |
The last of the classical sources thought to be independent of the others is A Handbook to the Seven Wonders of the World by the paradoxographer Philo of Byzantium, writing in the 4th to 5th century AD.[18] The method of raising water by screw matches that described by Strabo.[19] Philo praises the engineering and ingenuity of building vast areas of deep soil, which had a tremendous mass, so far above the natural grade of the surrounding land, as well as the irrigation techniques.
Historical existence
This copy of a bas relief from the North Palace of Ashurbanipal (669–631 BC) at Nineveh shows a luxurious garden watered by an aqueduct.
It is unclear whether the Hanging Gardens were an actual construction or a poetic creation, owing to the lack of documentation in contemporaneous Babylonian sources. There is also no mention of Nebuchadnezzar's wife Amyitis (or any other wives), although a political marriage to a Median or Persian would not have been unusual.[20] Many records exist of Nebuchadnezzar's works, yet his long and complete inscriptions do not mention any garden. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon |
[21] However, the gardens were said to still exist at the time that later writers described them, and some of these accounts are regarded as deriving from people who had visited Babylon.[2] Herodotus, who describes Babylon in his Histories, does not mention the Hanging Gardens,[22] although it could be that the gardens were not yet well known to the Greeks at the time of his visit.[2]
To date, no archaeological evidence has been found at Babylon for the Hanging Gardens.[6] It is possible that evidence exists beneath the Euphrates, which cannot be excavated safely at present. The river flowed east of its current position during the time of Nebuchadnezzar II, and little is known about the western portion of Babylon.[23] Rollinger has suggested that Berossus attributed the Gardens to Nebuchadnezzar for political reasons, and that he had adopted the legend from elsewhere. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon |
[24]
Identification with Sennacherib's gardens at Nineveh
See also: Nineveh § Sennacherib's Nineveh
Oxford scholar Stephanie Dalley has proposed that the Hanging Gardens of Babylon were actually the well-documented gardens constructed by the Assyrian king Sennacherib (reigned 704 – 681 BC) for his palace at Nineveh; Dalley posits that during the intervening centuries the two sites became confused, and the extensive gardens at Sennacherib's palace were attributed to Nebuchadnezzar II's Babylon.[1] Archaeological excavations have found traces of a vast system of aqueducts attributed to Sennacherib by an inscription on its remains, which Dalley proposes were part of an 80-kilometre (50 mi) series of canals, dams, and aqueducts used to carry water to Nineveh with water-raising screws used to raise it to the upper levels of the gardens.[25]
Dalley bases her arguments on recent developments in the analysis of contemporary Akkadian inscriptions. Her main points are:[26]
The name Babylon, meaning "Gate of the Gods",[27] was the name given to several Mesopotamian cities.[28] Sennacherib renamed the city gates of Nineveh after gods,[29] which suggests that he wished his city to be considered "a Babylon".
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon |
Only Josephus names Nebuchadnezzar as the king who built the gardens; although Nebuchadnezzar left many inscriptions, none mentions any garden or engineering works.[30] Diodorus Siculus and Quintus Curtius Rufus specify a "Syrian" king. By contrast, Sennacherib left written descriptions,[31] and there is archaeological evidence of his water engineering.[32] His grandson Assurbanipal pictured the mature garden on a sculptured wall panel in his palace.[33]
Sennacherib called his new palace and garden "a wonder for all peoples". He describes the making and operation of screws to raise water in his garden.[34]
The descriptions of the classical authors fit closely to these contemporary records. Before the Battle of Gaugamela in 331 BC Alexander the Great camped for four days near the aqueduct at Jerwan.[35] The historians who travelled with him would have had ample time to investigate the enormous works around them, recording them in Greek. These first-hand accounts have not survived into modern times, but were quoted by later Greek writers.
King Sennacherib's garden was well-known not just for its beauty – a year-round oasis of lush green in a dusty summer landscape – but also for the marvelous feats of water engineering that maintained the garden. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon |
[36] There was a tradition of Assyrian royal garden building. King Ashurnasirpal II (883–859 BC) had created a canal, which cut through the mountains. Fruit tree orchards were planted. Also mentioned were pines, cypresses and junipers; almond trees, date trees, ebony, rosewood, olive, oak, tamarisk, walnut, terebinth, ash, fir, pomegranate, pear, quince, fig, and grapes. A sculptured wall panel of Assurbanipal shows the garden in its maturity. One original panel[37] and the drawing of another[38] are held by the British Museum, although neither is on public display. Several features mentioned by the classical authors are discernible on these contemporary images.
Assyrian wall relief showing gardens in Nineveh
Of Sennacherib's palace, he mentions the massive limestone blocks that reinforce the flood defences. Parts of the palace were excavated by Austin Henry Layard in the mid-19th century. His citadel plan shows contours which would be consistent with Sennacherib's garden, but its position has not been confirmed. The area has been used as a military base in recent times, making it difficult to investigate further.
The irrigation of such a garden demanded an upgraded water supply to the city of Nineveh. The canals stretched over 50 kilometres (31 mi) into the mountains. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon |
Sennacherib was proud of the technologies he had employed and describes them in some detail on his inscriptions. At the headwater of Bavian (Khinnis)[39] his inscription mentions automatic sluice gates. An enormous aqueduct crossing the valley at Jerwan was constructed of over two million dressed stones. It used stone arches and waterproof cement.[40] On it is written:
Sennacherib king of the world king of Assyria. Over a great distance I had a watercourse directed to the environs of Nineveh, joining together the waters.... Over steep-sided valleys I spanned an aqueduct of white limestone blocks, I made those waters flow over it.
Sennacherib claimed that he had built a "Wonder for all Peoples", and said he was the first to deploy a new casting technique in place of the "lost-wax" process for his monumental (30 tonne) bronze castings. He was able to bring the water into his garden at a high level because it was sourced from further up in the mountains, and he then raised the water even higher by deploying his new water screws. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon |
This meant he could build a garden that towered above the landscape with large trees on the top of the terraces – a stunning artistic effect that surpassed those of his predecessors.
Plants
Date palms are a common tree species in Babylon.
The gardens, as depicted in artworks, featured blossoming flowers, ripe fruit, burbling waterfalls and terraces exuberant with rich foliage. Based on Babylonian literature, tradition, and the environmental characteristics of the area, some of the following plants may have been found in the gardens:[41][unreliable source?]Olive (Olea europaea)
Quince (Cydonia oblonga)
Common pear (Pyrus communis)
Fig (Ficus carica)
Almond (Prunus dulcis)
Common grape vine (Vitis vinifera)
Date palm (Phoenix dactylifera)
Athel tamarisk (Tamarix aphylla)
Mt. Atlas mastic tree (Pistacia atlantica)
Imported plant varieties that may have been present in the gardens include the cedar, cypress, ebony, pomegranate, plum, rosewood, terebinth, juniper, oak, ash tree, fir, myrrh, walnut, and willow.[42] Some of these plants were suspended over the terraces and draped over its walls with arches underneath. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon |