Fact Finder - History

The Hanging Gardens are the only one of the Seven Wonders whose actual location has never been established by archaeology. Legend says King Nebuchadnezzar II built them for his wife, Amytis, who missed the green mountains of her homeland. Descriptions depict an ascending series of tiered gardens containing a wide variety of trees, shrubs, and vines, resembling a large green mountain constructed of mud bricks. To keep the gardens lush in the arid climate, an advanced irrigation system involving screws or pumps would have been required to lift water from the Euphrates. Some modern scholars, like Stephanie Dalley, argue the gardens were actually located in Nineveh and built by the Assyrian King Sennacherib, citing the Assyrians' superior mastery of water engineering.