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The Great Mosque of Kairouan (جامع القيروان الأكبر), also known as the Mosque of Uqba (Arabic: جامع عقبة بن نافع‎), is one of the most important mosques in Tunisia, situated in the UNESCO World Heritage town of Kairouan.
Established by the Arab general Uqba ibn Nafi in 670 AD (the year 50 according to the Islamic calendar) at the founding of the city of Kairouan, the mosque is spread over a surface area of 9,000 square metres and it is one of the oldest places of worship in the Islamic world, as well as a model for all later mosques in the Maghreb. The Great Mosque of Kairouan is one of the most impressive and largest Islamic monuments in North Africa, its perimeter is almost equal to 405 metres (1,328 feet). This vast space contains a hypostyle prayer hall, a huge marble-paved courtyard and a massive square minaret. In addition to its spiritual prestige, the Mosque of Uqba is one of the masterpieces of both architecture and Islamic art.
Under the Aghlabids (9th century), huge works gave the mosque its present aspect.The fame of the Mosque of Uqba and of the other holy sites at Kairouan helped the city to develop and repopulate increasingly. The university, consisting of scholars who taught in the mosque, was a centre of education both in Islamic thought and in the secular sciences. Its role can be compared to that of the University of Paris in the Middle Ages.With the decline of the city of Kairouan from the mid 11th century, the centre of intellectual thought moved to the University of Ez-Zitouna in Tunis.see more

This is an amazing site located in between the border of Zambia and North of Zimbabwe along the Zambezi River. Although Victoria Falls is neither the widest nor the highest waterfall on Earth, this breathtaking waterfall occupies around 2 kilometer mile and is 354 feet high. It emits mist that is spotted by somebody about 20 kilometers away and hence it’s traditional “Mosi-oa Tunya” that simply means “thundering smoke”. It was named Victoria Falls by a Scottish explorer David Livingstone. He’s believed to have been the first person from Europe to visit Victoria Falls on 16 November 1855. By the end of the 90s around 300,000 visitors were seeing Victoria Falls each year, and it was expected to increase to a million or more in the next decade. However, today Victoria Falls has more visitors from Zimbabwe and Zambia than from other countries in the world. The waterfall is accessible by train and bus, and it’s rather cheap to reach, so why not visit this beautiful place this year. see more

The Great Wall of China is a series of fortifications made of stone, brick, tamped earth, wood, and other materials, generally built along an east-to-west line across the historical northern borders of China to protect the Chinese states and empires against the raids and invasions of the various nomadic groups of the Eurasian Steppe. Several walls were being built as early as the 7th century BC;^[3] these, later joined together and made bigger and stronger, are now collectively referred to as the Great Wall.^[4] Especially famous is the wall built 220–206 BC by Qin Shihuang, the first Emperor of China. Little of that wall remains. Since then, the Great Wall has on and off been rebuilt, maintained, and enhanced; the majority of the existing wall is from the Ming Dynasty.
Other purposes of the Great Wall have included border controls, allowing the imposition of duties on goods transported along the Silk Road, regulation or encouragement of trade and the control of immigration and emigration. Furthermore, the defensive characteristics of the Great Wall were enhanced by the construction of watch towers, troop barracks, garrison stations, signaling capabilities through the means of smoke or fire, and the fact that the path of the Great Wall also served as a transportation corridor.
The main Great Wall line stretches from Shanhaiguan in the east, to Lop Lake in the west, along an arc that roughly delineates the southern edge of Inner Mongolia. A comprehensive archaeological survey, using advanced technologies, has concluded that the Ming walls measure 8,850 km (5,500 mi).^[5] This is made up of 6,259 km (3,889 mi) sections of actual wall, 359 km (223 mi) of trenches and 2,232 km (1,387 mi) of natural defensive barriers such as hills and rivers.^[5] Another archaeological survey found that the entire wall with all of its branches measure out to be 21,196 km (13,171 mi)see more

The Colosseum or Coliseum, also known as the Flavian Amphitheatre (Latin: Amphitheatrum Flavium; Italian: Anfiteatro Flavio or Colosseo) is an elliptical amphitheatre in the centre of the city of Rome, Italy. Built of concrete and stone,^[1] it is the largest amphitheatre in the world, and is considered one of the greatest works of architecture and engineering.^[2]
The Colosseum is situated just east of the Roman Forum. Construction began under the emperor Vespasian in 72 AD,^[3] and was completed in 80 AD under his successor and heir Titus.^[4] Further modifications were made during the reign of Domitian (81–96).^[5] These three emperors are known as the Flavian dynasty, and the amphitheatre was named in Latin for its association with their family name (Flavius).
The Colosseum could hold, it is estimated, between 50,000 and 80,000 spectators,^[6][7] and was used for gladiatorial contests and public spectacles such as mock sea battles, animal hunts, executions, re-enactments of famous battles, and dramas based on Classical mythology. The building ceased to be used for entertainment in the early medieval era. It was later reused for such purposes as housing, workshops, quarters for a religious order, a fortress, a quarry, and a Christian shrine.
Although in the 21st century it stays partially ruined because of damage caused by devastating earthquakes and stone-robbers, the Colosseum is an iconic symbol of Imperial Rome. It is one of Rome's most popular tourist attractions and has close connections with the Roman Catholic Church, as each Good Friday the Pope leads a torchlit "Way of the Cross" procession that starts in the area around the Colosseum.^[8]
In 2007 the complex was included among the New7Wonders of the World, following a competition organized by New Open World Corporation.see more

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.^[24] 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.^[25] 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.^[26]
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.see more

The approximate date of the statue (the third quarter of the 5th century BC), was confirmed in the rediscovery (1954–1958) of Phidias' workshop, sited more or less where Pausanias said the statue of Zeus was constructed. Archaeological finds included tools for working gold and ivory, ivory chippings, precious stones and terracotta moulds. Most of the latter were used to create glass plaques, and to form the statue's robe from sheets of glass, naturalistically draped and folded, then gilded. A cup inscribed "Ανήκω σε Φειδία" or "I belong to Phidias" was found at the site.see more

The Hanging Gardens of Babylon were one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, and the only one whose location has not been definitely established.
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 II, who ruled between 605 and 562 BC. There are no extant Babylonian texts which mention the gardens, and no definitive archaeological evidence has been found in Babylon.^[1][2]
According to one legend, Nebuchadnezzar II 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 the 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.^[3] If it did indeed exist, it was destroyed sometime after the first century AD.^[4][5]
Alternatively, the original garden may have been a well-documented one 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.see more