The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World Reading Comprehension Lesson

Reading Passage

The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World

The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World is a famous list of remarkable structures and monuments from antiquity, compiled by Greek scholars beginning around the 2nd century BC. The list was intended to serve as a kind of travel guide for ancient tourists, highlighting the most impressive human-made structures in the known world — primarily the Mediterranean region and the Near East. Of the seven wonders, only one still exists today: the Great Pyramid of Giza. The others were destroyed by earthquakes, fire, or human activity over the centuries. The list has captivated the imagination of people for over two thousand years.

The Great Pyramid of Giza, built around 2560 BC for the Egyptian pharaoh Khufu (also called Cheops), is the oldest and largest of the Seven Wonders. Located on the Giza Plateau near modern Cairo, Egypt, it stood at 481 feet tall when first completed and remained the world’s tallest man-made structure for over 3,800 years. The pyramid was constructed from approximately 2.3 million stone blocks, each weighing an average of 2.5 to 15 tons. How the ancient Egyptians moved and placed these enormous stones without modern machinery remains a subject of study and wonder. Two other large pyramids — built for Khufu’s son and grandson — stand nearby.

The Hanging Gardens of Babylon were reportedly built in ancient Babylon (in present-day Iraq) around 600 BC, possibly by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar II for his wife, who missed the green hills of her homeland. Ancient sources described them as a series of tiered terraces filled with exotic plants and trees, rising like a mountain in the middle of the flat Mesopotamian plains, with an elaborate irrigation system drawing water from the Euphrates River. Interestingly, no Babylonian texts mention the gardens, and no definitive archaeological evidence has been found — some historians have questioned whether they actually existed as described, or whether the location may have been different.

The Statue of Zeus at Olympia was a massive gold-and-ivory statue of the Greek king of the gods, created by the sculptor Phidias around 435 BC and housed in the Temple of Zeus at Olympia, Greece. Ancient sources described it as so magnificent that Phidias himself reportedly asked Zeus if the god approved, and lightning struck in reply. The Temple of Artemis at Ephesus (in present-day Turkey) was a grand temple to the Greek goddess of the hunt, reportedly rebuilt multiple times and finally destroyed by arson in 356 BC (the night, legend has it, that Alexander the Great was born). The Mausoleum at Halicarnassus (in Turkey) was an elaborate tomb built for a Persian satrap, so magnificent that the word ‘mausoleum’ comes from his name, Mausolus.

The Colossus of Rhodes was a giant bronze statue of the Greek sun-god Helios, reportedly standing over 100 feet tall at the entrance to the harbor of the island of Rhodes. Built to celebrate a military victory, it stood for only about 56 years before being toppled by an earthquake around 226 BC. The Lighthouse of Alexandria, on the island of Pharos in the harbor of Alexandria, Egypt, was built around 280 BC and stood between 330 and 490 feet tall — making it one of the tallest man-made structures in the ancient world. It guided ships safely into the harbor for over 1,500 years before being damaged by a series of earthquakes. Today, these ancient wonders continue to inspire wonder and curiosity about the achievements of the ancient world.

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