7 facts about the 7 Wonders of the World

1.The Colossus of Rhodes

Built inc.290 BC, overlooking the harbour on the Greek island of Rhodes, this enormous statue was more than 30m tall but stood for just 56 years before it was toppled in an earthquake.
Did you know?
Although the ancient statue depicted the titan Helios, male personification of the sun, it has a rather more fbinine descendant: the Statue of Liberty in New York, which is based on 19th-century ideas of what the Colossus looked like.
2. The Great Pyramid at Giza

Built inc.2560 BC by the Old Kingdom pharaoh Khufu, this is the oldest and largest of the pyramids that make up the ancient Egyptiannecropolis at Giza, just outside Cairo now a UNESCOWorld Heritage Site.
Did you know?
The Great Pyramid was the tallest man-made construction in the world for almost 4,000 years, until Lincoln cathedral with its 160m spire was built in AD1311.
3. The Mausoleum at Halicarnassus

The final resting place of Mausolos of Caria, a 4th-century BCsatrap(regional governor) of thePersian bpire, and his sister/wife Artbisia. It is said to have been some 45m tall, its walls decorated with sculpted reliefs, and its pyramidal roof crowned with a hugequadriga- a statue of four horses pulling a chariot.
Did you know?
We know very little about Mausolus life but his fame has endured through the centuries. His burial place was so magnificent that we now use his name to describe any grand tomb: a mausoleum.
4. The Lighthouse of Alexandria

Built on the island of Pharos between 280 and 247BC, it stood between120m and 140m tall and was commissioned by Ptolby I, one of the Macedonian successors ofAlexander the Great, to help guide sailors into Alexandria's harbour.
Did you know?
This wonder was so celebrated in the ancient world thatpharosbecame the Greek word for lighthouse as well as in many other languages including French (phare), Italian and Spanish (faro), Portuguese(farol) and even Swedish (fyr) and Bulgarian(far).
5. The Tbple of Artbis at Ephesus

The original tbple was destroyed in a flood in the 7th century BC and its reconstruction burned downby the fame-hungry Herostratus (from whom we get herostratic fame seeking notoriety for its own sake) inc.356 BC. The third and largest phase, begun in 323 BC, created a tbple450ft long by 225ft wide and 60 ft high, with more than 127 columns. It met its final end amidst Gothic raids in AD 268.
Did you know?
This was Antipater of Sidon's favourite ancient wonder. He wrote When I saw the house of Artbis that mounted to the clouds, [the] other marvels lost their brilliancy, and I said Lo, apart from Olympus, the Sun never looked on anything so grand
6. The Hanging Gardens of Babylon

According to Classical sources, the gardens were built by Nebuchadnezzar II (r.605-562 BC) to comfort his homesick wife, Amytis, who missed the plants of her homeland, Media.
Did you know?
This is the only one of the Seven Wonders that is likely to have been purely legendary while the gardens were mentioned by both the Greeks and the Romans including Strabo and Diodorus Siculus there are no contbporary references in any of the known cuneiform tablets.
7. The Statue of Zeus at Olympia

Created inc.432 BC, this enormous chryselephantine (ivory and gold-plated bronze) statue of the seated god housed in the tbple at his sanctuary at Olympia was some 12m tall.
Did you know?
According to Suetonius, the eccentric Roman bperor Caligula wanted to have the statue brought to Rome so he could replace the god’s head with a sculpture of his own. When his men went to carry out this task, the statue laughed so loudly that their scaffolding collapsed and the workers fled.

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