Thursday, May 19, 2016

DID YOU KNOW?

The Hanging Gardens of Babylon, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, is the only one whose location has not been definitively established.

The Hanging Gardens were said to be a distinctive feature of ancient Babylon and a great source of pride to the people.  The gardens are believed to be a feat of engineering; an ascending series of tiered gardens containing all manner of trees, shrubs and vines.  The gardens were said to have looked like a large green mountain constructed of bud bricks.

This hand-coloured engraving, probably made in the 19th century after the first excavations in the Assyrian capital. depicts the fabled Hanging Gardens, with the Tower of Babel in the background:


Traditionally, they were said to have been built in the ancient city of Babylon, near present-day Hillah, Babil province, in Iraq.  The Babylonian priest Berossus, writing in about 290 BC, and quoted later by Josephus, attributed the gardens to the Neo-Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar 11, who ruled between 605 and 562 BC.  There aare no extant Babylonioan texts which mention the gardens, are no definitive archaeological evidence has been found n Babylon.

According to one legend, Nebuchadnezzar 11 built the Hanging Gardens for his Median wife, Queen Amytis, because she missed the green hills and valleys of her homeland.  He also built a grand palace that came to be known as "The Marvel of Mankind:.

Because of the lack of evidence it has been suggested that the Hanging Gardens are purely mythical, and the descriptions found in ancient Greek and Roman writers including Strabo, Diodorus Siculus and Quintus Curtius Rufus represent a romantic ideal of an eastern garden.   If it did indeed exist, it as destroyed sometime after the first century AD.

This a 20th century interpretation of the Hanging Gardens:


There is a lot more on Wikipedia about the Hanging Gardens.  If you are interested you might take a peek and then decide if the gardens did actually exist.

8 comments:

  1. Hari OM
    It is such a wonderful ideal... one would love to think there is basis for the legend! Thanks again Mimsie. YAM xx

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    1. I feel that as well Yamini...if only it were true. xx

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  2. I hope they did exist.
    And am constantly amazed at the beautiful (and long-lasting) things which were created without the benefit of our 'superior' technology.

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    1. Was there superior knowledge of a different kind way back then I wonder. People today seem to lack imagination, more's the pity.

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  3. .. I love the idea of the Hanging Gardens and I hope that they did exist.. it's so romantic to think that someone went to this effort to plant and create beauty.. xxx Barb xxx

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    1. I am a romantic at heart too Barbara and like to think they did exist. Great to think someone may have loved another person so much. xx

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  4. I learned of the hanging gardens from a library book when I was about eight or nine and I decided then that I would be rich when I grew up and have a big house with hanging gardens as a fence all the way around it. Not so different from the dreams I have now.

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    1. I guess our dreams don't change that much as we grow older but it is the capacity to fulfill those dream that is often lacking. Still nice to have had them and continue to have them regardless of time.

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