The new 7 wonders of the world

موضوع: The new 7 wonders of the world 18/12/2010, 6:53 am

THE NEW 7 WONDERS OF THE WORLD

The
online campaign to name the New Seven Wonders of the World was so
popular that it generated server-crushing traffic in its final hours.
Voting at the website,

Welcome to the official global voting platform of New7Wonders | New7Wonders, ended. The total vote count was approximately 100 million, cast by people from over 200 countries

The results include (in no particular order

The Great Wall of China
Peru's Machu Picchu
Petra in Jordan
Brazil's statue of Christ the Redeemer
India's Taj Mahal
Mexico's Chichen Itza pyramid
The Colosseum in Rome

The
New 7 Wonders were announced at a star-studded event in Lisbon,
Portugal, that featured performances by Jennifer Lopez, Chaka Khan, and
tenor Jose Carreras. Hosts included Oscar winners Hilary Swank and Ben
Kingsley, and Bollywood star Bipasha Basu

Machu Picchu (1460-1470), Peru

In
the 15th century, the Incan Emperor Pachacútec built a city
in the clouds on the mountain known as Machu Picchu ("old mountain").
This extraordinary settlement lies halfway up the Andes Plateau, deep in
the Amazon jungle and above the Urubamba River. It was probably
abandoned by the Incas because of a smallpox outbreak and, after the
Spanish defeated the Incan Empire, the city remained 'lost' for over
three centuries. It was rediscovered by Hiram Bingham in 1911

Christ Redeemer (1931) Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

This
statue of Jesus stands some 38 meters tall, atop the Corcovado mountain
overlooking Rio de Janeiro. Designed by Brazilian Heitor da Silva Costa
and created by French sculptor Paul Landowski, it is one of the world’s
best-known monuments. The statue took five years to construct and was
inaugurated on October 12, 1931. It has become a symbol of the city and
of the warmth of the Brazilian people, who receive visitors with open
arms

Petra (9 B.C. - 40 A.D.), Jordan

On
the edge of the Arabian Desert, Petra was the glittering capital of the
Nabataean empire of King Aretas IV (9 B.C. to 40 A.D.). Masters of
water technology, the Nabataeans provided their city with great tunnel
constructions and water chambers. A theater, modelled on Greek-Roman
prototypes, had space for an audience of 4,000. Today, the Palace Tombs
of Petra, with the 42-meter-high Hellenistic temple facade on the
El-Deir Monastery, are impressive examples of Middle Eastern culture

The Great Wall of China (220 B.C and 1368 - 1644 A.D.) China

The
Great Wall of China was built to link existing fortifications into a
united defense system and better keep invading Mongol tribes out of
China. It is the largest man-made monument ever to have been built and
it is disputed that it is the only one visible from space. Many
thousands of people must have given their lives to build this colossal
construction.

Chichén Itzá, Mexico

Chichén
Itzá, the most famous Mayan temple city, served as the
political and economic center of the Mayan civilization. Its various
structures - the pyramid of Kukulkan, the Temple of Chac Mool, the Hall
of the Thousand Pillars, and the Playing Field of the Prisoners – can
still be seen today and are demonstrative of an extraordinary commitment
to architectural space and composition. The pyramid itself was the
last, and arguably the greatest, of all Mayan temples.

The Roman Colloseum, Italy

This
great amphitheater in the centre of Rome was built to give favors to
successful legionnaires and to celebrate the glory of the Roman Empire.
Its design concept still stands to this very day, and virtually every
modern sports stadium some 2,000 years later still bears the
irresistible imprint of the Colosseum's original design. Today, through
films and history books, we are even more aware of the cruel fights and
games that took place in this arena, all for the joy of the spectators.

The Taj Mahal, India

This
immense mausoleum was built on the orders of Shah Jahan, the fifth
Muslim Mogul emperor, to honor the memory of his beloved late wife.
Built out of white marble and standing in formally laid-out walled
gardens, the Taj Mahal is regarded as the most perfect jewel of Muslim
art in India. The emperor was consequently jailed and, it is said, could
then only see the Taj Mahal out of his small cell .

The
following is a list of Seven Wonders of the Ancient World between 3000
B.C. and A.D. 476. All of the ancient wonders include objects made by
human beings that were considered important because of their size or
some other unusual quality

ANCIENT WONDERS

The
amazing works of art and architecture known as the Seven Wonders of the
Ancient World serve as a testament to the ingenuity, imagination and
sheer hard work of which human beings are capable. They are also,
however, reminders of the human capacity for disagreement, destruction
and, possibly, embellishment. As soon as ancient writers compiled a list
of "seven wonders," it became fodder for debate over which achievements
deserved inclusion. Ultimately, human hands joined with natural forces
to destroy all but one of the wonders. Furthermore, it is possible that
at least one of the wonders might not have existed at all. Still, all
seven continue to inspire and be celebrated as the remarkable products
of the creativity and skill of Earth’s early civilizations.
Great Pyramid of Giza, Egypt

The Great Pyramids of Egypt

The
Great Pyramids, located at Giza on the west bank of the Nile River
north of Cairo, are the only wonder of the ancient world that has
survived to the present day. The three pyramids--Khufu (Cheops), Khafra
(Chephren) and Menkaura (Mycerimus)--were built between 2700 B.C. and
2500 B.C. as royal tombs. The largest and most impressive is Khufu,
which covers 13 acres and is believed to contain more than 2 million
stone blocks that weigh from two to 30 tons each. For more than 4,000
years, Khufu reigned as the tallest building in the world. In fact, it
took modern man until the 19th century to build a taller structure.
Amazingly, the nearly symmetrical pyramids were built without the aid of
modern tools or surveying equipment. Scientists believe that the
Egyptians used log rollers and sledges to move the stones into place.
The sloped walls, which were intended to mimic the rays of Ra, the sun
god, were originally built as steps, and then filled in with limestone.
The interior of the pyramids included narrow corridors and hidden
chambers in an unsuccessful attempt to foil grave robbers. Although
modern archeologists have found some great treasures among the ruins,
they believe most of what the pyramids once contained was looted within
250 years of their completion.

Hanging Gardens of Babylon

According
to ancient Greek poets, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon were built near
the Euphrates River in modern-day Iraq by the Babylonian king
Nebuchadrezzar II around 600 B.C. The gardens were said to have been
planted as high as 75 feet in the air on a huge square brick terrace
that was laid out in steps like a theater. The king allegedly built the
towering gardens to ease his lover Amytis’ homesickness for the natural
beauty of her home in Media (the northwestern part of modern-day Iran).
Later writers described how people could walk underneath the beautiful
gardens, which rested on tall stone columns. Modern scientists have
deduced that for the gardens to survive they would have had to be
irrigated using a system consisting of a pump, waterwheel and cisterns
to carry water from the Euphrates many feet into the air. Though there
are multiple accounts of the gardens in both Greek and Roman literature,
none of them are firsthand, and no mention of the gardens has been
found in Babylonian cuneiform inscriptions. As a result, most modern
scholars believe that the existence of the gardens was part of an
inspired and widely believed but still fictional tale.

Statue of Zeus at Olympia

The
famed statue of Zeus was crafted by the Athenian sculptor Phidias and
completed and placed in the temple of Zeus at Olympia, site of the
ancient Olympics, around the mid-fifth century B.C. The statue depicted
the god of thunder seated bare-chested at a wooden throne. Holding up
the thrones’ armrests were two carved sphinxes, mythical creatures with
the head and chest of a woman, the body of lion and the wings of a bird.
The statue of Zeus was richly decorated with gold and ivory. At 40
feet, it was so tall that its head nearly touched the top of the temple.
According to legend, the sculptor Phidias asked Zeus for a sign of his
approval after finishing the statue; soon after, the temple was struck
by lightning. The Zeus statue graced the temple at Olympia for more than
eight centuries before Christian priests persuaded the Roman emperor to
close the temple in the fourth century A.D. At that time, the statue
was moved to a temple in Constantinople, where it is believed to have
been destroyed in a fire in the year 462.

Temple of Artemis at Ephesus

There
was actually more than one Temple of Artemis: A series of several
altars and temples was destroyed and then restored on the same site in
Ephesus, a Greek port city on the west coast of modern-day Turkey. The
most fabulous of these structures were two marble temples built around
550 B.C. and 350 B.C., respectively. The former was designed by the
Cretan architect Chersiphron and his son **** genes and decorated by
some of the most celebrated artists of the ancient world. The building
burned on July 21, 356 B.C., according to legend the same night that
Alexander the Great was born. About six years later, the building of a
new temple to replace it was begun. The new building was surrounded by
marble steps that led to a more than 400-foot-long terrace. Inside stood
127 60-foot marble columns and a statue of Artemis. Archeologists
disagree as to whether the building had an open-air ceiling or was
topped with wood tiles. The temple was largely destroyed by Ostrogoths
in A.D. 262, and it was not until the 1860s that archeologists dug up
the first of the ruins of the temple’s columns at the bottom of the
Cayster River.

Mausoleum at Halicarnassus

Located
in what is now southeastern Turkey, the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus was a
tomb built by Artemisia for her husband, Mausolus, the king of Carnia
in Asia Minor, after his death in 353 B.C. Mausolus was also Artemisia’s
brother, and, according to legend, she was so grief-stricken at his
passing that she mixed his ashes with water and drank them in addition
to ordering the mausoleum’s construction. The massive mausoleum was made
entirely of white marble and is thought to have been about 135 feet
high. The building’s complicated design, consisting of three rectangular
layers, may have been an attempt to reconcile Lycian, Greek and
Egyptian architectural styles. The first layer was a 60-foot of steps,
followed by a middle layer of 36 Ionic columns and a stepped,
pyramid-shaped roof. At the very top of the roof lay the tomb, decorated
by the work of four sculptors, and a 20-foot marble rendition of a
four-horse chariot. The mausoleum was largely destroyed in an earthquake
in the 13th century and its remains were later used in the
fortification of a castle. In 1846, pieces of one of the mausoleum’s
friezes were extracted from the castle and now reside, along with other
relics from the Halicarnassus site, in London’s British Museum.

Colossus of Rhodes

The
Colossus was an enormous bronze sculpture of the sun god Helios built
by the Rhodians over 12 years in the third century B.C. The city was the
target of a Macedonian siege early in the fourth century B.C. and,
according to legend, the Rhodians sold the tools and equipment left
behind by the Macedonians to pay for the Colossus. Designed by the
sculptor Chares, the statue was, at 100 feet, the tallest of the ancient
world. It was completed around 280 B.C. and stood for sixty years until
it was toppled in an earthquake. It was never rebuilt. Hundreds of
years later, Arabs invaded Rhodes and sold the remains of the statue as
scrap me tal. Because of this, archeologists do not know much about the
exact loc ation of the statue or what it looked like. Most believe that
it depicted the sun god standing naked while he lifted a torch with one
hand and held a spear in the other. It was once believed that the statue
stood with one leg on each side of a harbor, but most scholars now
agree that the statue’s legs were most likely built close together to
support its immense weight.

Lighthouse of Alexandria

Engraving of the Lighthouse of Alexandria (photo credit: Corbis)
The
Lighthouse of Alexandria was located on a small island called Pharos
near the city of Alexandria. Designed by the Greek architect Sostratos
and completed around 270 B.C. during the reign of Ptolemy II, the
lighthouse helped to guide Nile River ships in and out of the city’s
busy harbor. Archeologists have found ancient coins on which the
lighthouse was depicted, and from them deduced that the structure had
three tiers: a square level at the bottom, an octagonal level in the
middle and a cylindrical top. Above that stood a 16-foot statue, most
likely of Ptolemy II or Alexander the Great, for whom the city was
named. Although estimates of the lighthouse’s height have ranged from
200 to 600 feet, most modern scholars believe it was about 380 feet
tall. The lighthouse was gradually destroyed during a series of
earthquakes from 956 to 1323. Some of its remains have since been
discovered at the bottom of the Nile.

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موضوع: رد: The new 7 wonders of the world 19/12/2010, 4:58 am

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موضوع: رد: The new 7 wonders of the world 22/12/2010, 5:26 am

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موضوع: رد: The new 7 wonders of the world 22/12/2010, 5:34 am

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