The Acropolis of Athens is an ancient fortress located on a rocky outcrop above the city, containing the remains of several ancient buildings (including the Parthenon). It is the most striking and complete ancient Greek monumental complex still existing in our times, and was planned and constructed under the guidance of the great general and statesman Pericles of Athens (495 - 429 BC). Wishing to create a lasting monument which would both honour the goddess Athena (who presided over Athens) and proclaim the glory of the city to the world, Pericles spared no expense in the construction of the Acropolis.
If you're having trouble finding information, also research 'Parthenon', the main building on top of the acropolis.
Encyclopedia Britannica database: Acropolis
Angkor Wat is an enormous Buddhist temple complex located in northern Cambodia, and is the largest religious structure in the world by area, measuring 162.6 hectares. At the centre of the temple stands a quincunx of four towers surrounding a central spire that rises to a height of 65 m above the ground. It was originally built in the first half of the 12th century as a Hindu temple, dedicated to the Hindu god Vishnu, Its name translates to “temple city” in the Khmer language of the region.
Encyclopedia Britannica database: Angkor Wat
World History Encyclopedia: Angkor Wat
World Famous Unsolved Mysteries: The jungles of Angkor. eBook chapter. Use your student number to borrow the book and then download chapter 23: The jungles of Angkor.
Carthage in North Africa was one of the most powerful cities of the ancient world, spawning the powerful Carthaginian Empire which dominated much of the western Mediterranean as an important – and resultantly affluent – trading hub. Hannibal was its most famous general and statesman. Today, the extensive ruins of this famed city can be found on the outskirts of modern day Tunis. Three long and brutal wars with Rome, known as the Punic Wars, eventually led to the downfall and destruction of Carthage in 146 BC. It is even said the Romans salted the earth so nothing more could live on the site of the once-dominant city.
World History Encyclopedia: Carthage
History World: History of Carthage
Encyclopedia Britannica database: Carthage
Chichén Itzá is a ruined ancient Mayan city occupying an area of 10 square km in south-central Yucatan state in Mexico. It is a sacred site, thought to have been a religious, military, political, and commercial centre that at its peak would have been home to 35,000 people. It has a nearly 1,000 year old history, Maya priests in Chichen Itza sacrificed children to petition the gods for rain and fertile fields by throwing them into sacred sinkhole caves, known as “cenotes.” The caves served as a source of water for the Mayans and were also thought to be an entrance to the underworld.
The Colosseum is an oval amphitheatre in the centre of the city of Rome, Italy, just east of the Roman Forum. It is the largest ancient amphitheatre ever built, and is still the largest standing amphitheatre in the world today, despite its age. Measuring 189 metres long, 156 metres wide and 50 metres in height, it could seat around 50,000 spectators for a variety of events. These included gladiator contests, animal hunts and re-enactments of famous battles.
Encyclopedia Britannica database: Colosseum
World History Encyclopedia: Colosseum
The Colosseum (Ebook)
Easter Island Moai Statues, Chile - In 1722, Dutch explorers found a remote island in the Pacific off the coast of Chile dotted with hundreds of huge stone statues. Where had the Islanders originally come from? Why and how had they built the figures? There are nearly 900 moai on Easter Island, in various stages of construction. Opinions differ widely on how they were moved and raised (Some think they were walked; others that they were pushed on log rollers.) but no one disputes the years of effort involved in getting the statues carved and into place. Some stones weighed 80 tons, twice the weight of Stonehenge's, and were transported 16km from the quarry.
Easter Island
Great Wall of China is a series of fortifications that were built across the historical northern borders of ancient Chinese states and Imperial China as protection against various nomadic groups from the Eurasian Steppe, such as Genghis Khan. It is one of the largest building-construction projects ever undertaken. The Great Wall actually consists of numerous walls—many of them parallel to each other—built over some two millennia across northern China and southern Mongolia. The main wall is around 3,460 km long with an extra 2,860 km of branches and spurs.
Encyclopedia Britannica database: Great Wall of China
World History Encyclopedia: Great Wall of China
Lascaux is famous for its Palaeolithic cave paintings, found in a complex of caves in the Dordogne region of southwestern France, because of their exceptional quality, size, sophistication and antiquity. The are the combined efforts of many generations, and are estimated to be anywhere up to 20,000 years old, and the paintings consist primarily of large animals, once native to the region. Horses are the most numerous, but deer, aurochs, ibex, bison, and even some felines can also be found.
Encyclopedia Britannica database: Lascaux Cave paintings discovered
Great Scientific Achievements: Five boys discover prehistoric cave paintings at Lascaux
The cave art paintings of the Lascaux Caves
Musée Archoléogie Nationale: Lascaux
Cave of Lascaux
On September 12, 1940, four teenage boys went exploring in a cave on the west bank of the Vezere River in southwestern France. Little did they know that they had stumbled on a historical treasure! Your students can join these boys in uncovering the lives of people who lived during the last Ice Age, more than 17,000 years ago, and learn why the preservation of their paintings has closed the cave to the public.
Machu Picchu, Peru - This is one of the most iconic and important archeological sites in the world, but the origins of the Inca's Machu Picchu remain a mystery. The Inca left no record of why they built the site 600 years ago,or how they used it before it was abandoned in the early16th century. It is amazing that this dramatic and towering fortress of stone cut from cliffs was fashioned by men without the wheel, tools or mortar, yet the stones fit so tightly together that not even a knife's blade could fit between them.
Ticket Machu Picchu: The Mystery Hiding the Skeletons Found in Machu Picchu
GW Today: Using Ancient DNA, Researchers Unravel the Mystery of Machu Picchu
Phys.Org: Using ancient DNA, researchers unravel the mystery of Machu Picchu
Mysteries of Machu Picchu (Ebook)
Who built Machu Picchu? (Ebook)
Mesa Verde National Park is in southwest Colorado. It's known for its well-preserved Ancestral Puebloan cliff dwellings, notably the huge Cliff Palace. The Chapin Mesa Archeological Museum has exhibits on the ancient Native American culture. Mesa Top Loop Road winds past archaeological sites and overlooks, including Sun Point Overlook with panoramic canyon views. Petroglyph Point Trail has several rock carvings.
Encyclopedia Britannica database: Mesa Verde National Park
National Geographic: Mesa Verde National Park
US National Park Service: Mesa Verde National Park.
LiveScience: Cliff dwellings of the Anasazi
National Park Foundation: Palaces of the past - Mesa Verde National Park
Mohenjo-Daro is an important archaeological find because it once one of the most important centres of the Indus Valley civilization, which was one of the earliest settlements in the world's history.
Kiddle: Mohenjo-Daro facts for kids
Wonderopolis: What happened to Mohenjo-Daro?
New World Encyclopedia: Mohenjo-Daro
Wonderopolis: What happened to Mohenjo-Daro?
Encyclopedia Britannica: Mohenjo-Daro
History Today: Lost and found: Mohenjo-Daro
BBC News: Mohenjo Daro: Could this ancient city be lost forever?
The Nazca Lines are a collection of giant geoglyphs—designs or motifs etched into the ground—located in the Peruvian coastal plain about 400 kilometers south of Lima, Peru. Created by the ancient Nazca culture in South America, and depicting various plants, animals, and shapes, the 2,000-year-old Nazca Lines can only be fully appreciated when viewed from the air given their massive size. Despite being studied for over 80 years, the geoglyphs—which were designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1994—are still a mystery to researchers.
Museum of Unnatural History: Nazca Lines
Archaeology Online: The Nazca Lines: A Mystery on the Plains
National Geographic: Nazca Lines: The Sacred Landscape
Historic Mysteries: The Mysterious Nazca Lines
St Stephen's College Library: Nazca Lines Information
YouTube: What is hiding under the world famous Nazca Lines in Peru?
National Geographic: Why the Nasca lines are among Peru's greatest mysteries
I-Travel2Learn: I – Peru – the Nazca Lines
Vasser University: Redrawing the Lines-Understanding the Nazca Lines of Peru
Unsolved History: Ancient riddles - the mystery of the Nazca Lines
Ebook chapter.
World Famous Unsolved Mysteries: What do the Nazca Lines signify?
Ebook chapter.
The Mystery Chronicles: Mystery of the Nazcar Lines
Ebook chapter.
Inhabited since prehistoric times, this Nabataean caravan-city, situated between the Red Sea and the Dead Sea, was an important crossroads between Arabia, Egypt and Syria-Phoenicia. Petra is half-built, half-carved into the rock, and is surrounded by mountains riddled with passages and gorges. It is one of the world's most famous archaeological sites, where ancient Eastern traditions blend with Hellenistic architecture.
Encyclopedia Britannica database: Petra
Smithsonian Magazine: Reconstructing Petra
Pompeii is a preserved ancient Roman city near Naples at the southeastern base of Mount Vesuvius. Around noon in 79 CE, a huge eruption from Mount Vesuvius showered volcanic debris over the city of Pompeii, followed the next day by clouds of blisteringly hot gases. Buildings were destroyed, the population was crushed or asphyxiated, and the city was buried beneath a blanket of ash and volcanic glass. For many centuries Pompeii slept beneath its pall of ash, which perfectly preserved the remains. When these were finally unearthed, in the 1700s, the world was astonished at the discovery of a sophisticated Greco-Roman city frozen in time.
Encyclopedia Britannica database: Pompeii
Built during a time when Egypt was one of the richest and most powerful civilizations in the world, the pyramids—especially the Great Pyramids of Giza—are some of the most magnificent man-made structures in history. Their massive scale reflects the unique role that the pharaoh, or king, played in ancient Egyptian society. More than 4,000 years later, the Egyptian pyramids still retain much of their majesty, providing a glimpse into the country’s rich and glorious past.
Stonehenge is a prehistoric monument on Salisbury Plain. The bluestones in the middle weigh about 3.6 tonnes each (that’s the same as two cars!), while the bigger sarsen stones each weigh a whopping 22 tonnes. Archaeologists believe that the sarsen stones were hauled to the site on big wooden sledges from 32km away, but the bluestones have been traced to rock outcrops 225km away in Wales! It’s thought they could have been dragged on sledges to a waterway and then floated on rafts to the building site.
LiveScience: Stonehenge: Facts and Theories About This Mysterious Monument
Museum of Unnatural History: Stonehenge: Mystery on the Salisbury Plain
Stonehenge (Ebook)
Stonehenge: The Story of a Sacred Landscape (Ebook)
Tenochtitlán was the capital city of the Aztec civilisation that flourished between A.D. 1325 and 1521. Built on an island on Lake Texcoco, it had a system of canals and causeways that supplied the hundreds of thousands of people who lived there. Tenochtitlan was a city of great wealth, obtained through the spoils of tribute from conquered regions. It was largely destroyed by the Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés after a siege in 1521, and modern-day Mexico City now lies over much of its remains.
Ducksters: Aztec empire - Tenochtitlan
Thought.co: The founding of Tenochtitlan and the origin of the Aztecs
Ebook: 20 Fun Facts About Tenochtitlan
The Terracotta Army is a collection of terracotta sculptures depicting the armies of Qin Shi Huang, the first Emperor of China. It is a form of funerary art buried with the emperor in 210–209 BCE with the purpose of protecting the emperor in his afterlife. Three pits containing the Terracotta Army held more than 8,000 soldiers, 130 chariots with 520 horses, and 150 cavalry horses, the majority of which remained buried in the pits near Qin Shi Huang's mausoleum Other terracotta non-military figures were found in other pits, including officials, acrobats, strongmen, and musicians.
Ducksters: Ancient China - The Terracotta Army
Smithsonian Institution: Terracotta soldiers on the march
LiveScience: Terracotta warriors - an army for the afterlife
World History Encyclopedia: Terracotta army
Discovery Magazine: Terracotta Warriors
The name Troy refers both to a place in legend and a real-life archaeological site in modern day Turkey, near Gallipoli. In legend, Troy is a city that was besieged for 10 years and eventually conquered by a Greek army led by King Agamemnon. The Trojan horse was a huge hollow wooden horse constructed by the Greeks to gain entrance into Troy during the Trojan War. Despite the warnings the horse was taken inside the city gates. That night Greek warriors emerged from it and opened the gates to let in the returned Greek army, who slaughtered the Trojans and burnt the city.
Lost Worlds and Mysterious Civilizations
The Valley of the Kings was part of the ancient city of Thebes and was the burial site of almost all the kings (pharaohs) of the from 1539–1075 BC, from Thutmose I to Ramses X, when they no longer used pyramids. These pharaohs, fearing for the safety of their rich burial sites, adopted a new plan of concealing their tombs sunk into the heart of the mountain. The plan of the tombs consists essentially of a descending corridor interrupted by deep shafts to baffle robbers and by pillared chambers or vestibules. At the farther end of the corridor is a burial chamber with a stone sarcophagus (stone coffin) in which the royal mummy was laid and store chambers around which furniture and equipment were stacked for the king’s use in the next world.
National Geographic: Valley of the Kings: Information and Facts
Encyclopedia Britannica database: Valley of the Kings
Galleries of the outback: The rock art of Australian Aborigines (Slideshare)
National Museum of Australia - First rock art
National Museum of Australia: Earliest known Australian rock art
Victorian Govt: First Peoples relations - Fact sheet: Aboriginal rock art
Australian Govt: Dept. of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water - Rock art
UNESCO: World Heritage Centre - Rock art
Bradshaw Foundation: Bradshaw Paintings
Creative Spirits: Bradshaw (Gwion Gwion) Rock Art
The Gwion Gwion: Australia's first civilisation
Sydney Morning Herald: Why Scientists are Intrigued by the Gwion Gwion Rock Art
Under a recent moon (pdf)
The Sunday Herald - They left their mark: but who were they?
Atlas Obscura - Ubirr Rock Art, Kakadu, Australia
Parks Australia - Rock art: Kakadu National Park
Check out what the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) has to say about World Heritage.
Criteria for selection as a world heritage area
