The magnificent walls and palaces of Babylon fully show the architectural level of the ancient two river basins. Nebuchadnezzar II built Babylon on a large scale, making it the most prosperous city in the world at that time and the most important industrial and commercial city in the Middle East. The city of Babylon is surrounded by two walls. Outside the outer wall is a ditch filled with water and an earth embankment. The center of the main road in the city is paved with white and rose stone slabs. Another city has eight gates, the north gate of which is the famous Isdal Gate. The surface is decorated with blue glazed tiles, on which there are many bulls and mythical monsters. The city of Babylon was built very magnificently. It was not until 100 years later that Herodotus, a Greek historian known as the "father of history", came to Babylon and still called it the most magnificent city in the world.
The Euphrates River runs through the city from north to south. The main buildings in the city, the temples of Esajina and Etmelenkita, are 965,438+0 meters high. Each side of the base is 965,438+0.4m long, and there are 7 floors on it. Each floor is made of glazed tiles of different colors. At the top of the tower, there is a glazed tile temple dedicated to the golden statue of Mark. It is said that this is the language used by the Lord to confuse people in the Bible, so that people failed to create the Tower of Babel. Goddess Gate, one of the essences of urban ancient buildings, is12m high and nearly 20m wide. The doors and walls are inlaid with vivid glazed animal patterns, as well as the "Hanging Garden" known as the Seven Wonders of the World, and the striking stone carvings of people fighting lions.
Babylon's "Hanging Garden", which is listed as one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, is also called "Hanging Garden". It is located beside the Euphrates River. King Nebuchadnezzar II (604-562 BC) of the new kingdom of Babylon is famous for building magnificent cities and palaces. He presided over the construction of this famous garden when he was in office. According to legend, he married Semiramis, a Persian princess. The princess misses her lush homeland day and night and is unhappy. In order to please his beloved princess, the king ordered a 25-meter-high garden to be built in the capital Babylon. The garden adopts the way of three-dimensional overlapping gardens. On a high platform, layers are stacked, exotic flowers and grasses are everywhere, and irrigation water sources and water pipes are buried. The garden is surrounded by high walls inlaid with many colorful lions. The princess is very happy to see her. Seen from a distance, this garden is also called "Hanging Garden".
In order to develop tourism, during the period of 1978, the Iraqi government formulated and implemented a plan to build Babylonian ruins. Some walls and buildings were copied on the ruins, and a museum was built in the city to display the unearthed Babylonian cultural relics. Among them, a replica of a black and green stone tablet more than 2 meters high is the most precious. The upper part of the stone tablet is a beautiful relief engraved with the scene where the sun god conferred the title of Hammurabi, and the lower part is a cuneiform record. The original stone tablet of the world's first code was made under the leadership of King Hammurabi of Babylon (about BC 1792 ~ BC 1750) and is now kept in the Louvre Museum in France. In addition, the Iraqi government rebuilt the Nimmak Temple and the Hanging Garden on the ruins of Babylon and Baghdad, and restored the pale blue wall of a new ancient city with a height of several tens of meters, thus recreating the charm of the old city.
hanging garden
The ancient Babylonian kingdom was once prosperous under the famous King Hammurabi (BC 1792~ 1750). But it was not until the new Babylonian dynasty that Mesopotamian civilization reached its peak. It is believed that the legendary Hanging Garden was built by Nebuchadnezzar II (604-562 BC). It is said that Nebuchadnezzar built the hanging garden to please his queen or concubine who grew up in Medea and had deep feelings for mountain scenery.
Although the most detailed description of this garden was written by Greek historians Bellows and Diodor Rus West Gullers, the historical records of Babylon do not mention it. Although descriptions of his palace, the city of Babylon and the walls of Babylon were found on various writing boards left over from the period of Nebuchadnezzar, there was no mention of the hanging garden on these writing boards. Even historians who have described the hanging gardens in detail have never witnessed them. Modern historians believe that when Alexander's soldiers arrived in rich Mesopotamia and saw Babylon, they were deeply shocked. When they later returned to their rugged hometown, they brought back the amazing gardens and coconut trees in Mesopotamia ... the palace of Nebuchadnezzar ... and all kinds of stories about Babel and Golden Pagoda. It is the imagination of poets and ancient historians that combines all these elements and creates one of the wonders of the world.
It was not until the twentieth century that some secrets around the hanging garden were uncovered. Archaeologists are still trying to collect enough evidence to draw a final conclusion about the geographical location, irrigation system and real appearance of the garden.
Like the colossus of Rhodes, archaeologists have not found the remains of the hanging garden so far. In fact, many ancient people mentioned hanging gardens in their works, but they only heard of them from others and never really saw them. Is the hanging garden purely a legend?
Of course, the hanging gardens in Babylon have never hung in the air. The origin of this name is purely due to people's misinterpretation of the Greek word "kremastos" and the Latin word "pensilis", which originally meant "hanging" and "protruding".
It is generally believed that the Hanging Garden was built by King Nebuchadnezzar (604- 562 BC) to comfort the homesick princess Amyitis, and it was modeled after her hometown in the mountains.
This hanging garden was built in 600 BC. It is a pyramid with four corners. The building made of asphalt and bricks is supported by arched columns. Green trees are planted on the steps all year round. The river looks like a hill from a distance under the artificial river next to the hanging garden.
The most magical part of the hanging garden is the water supply system. Because there is not much rain in Babylon, and the ruins of the hanging garden are thought to be far away from the Euphrates River, the researchers believe that there should be many water conveyance facilities in the hanging garden, as shown in the figure. The slaves kept pushing the handle with gears to transport the groundwater to the storage tank on the top floor and then return to the ground through the artificial river. Another problem is maintenance, because it is impossible for ordinary buildings to resist the erosion of the river for many years without falling down. Because there are not many stones in Mesopotamia, researchers think that the bricks used in hanging gardens are different. They added reeds, asphalt and tiles, and there are even documents that the stone was covered with lead to prevent the river from infiltrating into the foundation.
Ancient Babylon-cultural achievements
The Tigris River and the Euphrates River, which flow through Iraq, have produced world-renowned two-river civilizations and bred dazzling Babylonian culture, which once stood on a par with ancient China civilization, Indian civilization and Egyptian civilization in Hui Qi.
In Babylonian times, mathematics and astronomy were the most developed sciences, and decimal and hexadecimal methods were used for counting. Hexadecimal method is used to calculate the degree and timing of the day of the week, which is still used all over the world. In the field of algebra, the Babylonians could solve ternary equations. In astronomy, we know how to distinguish stars from planets, and we also name known stars. At that time, the lunar calendar divided a year into 12 months, a day and night into 12 hours and a year into 354 days. In order to adapt to the difference of the earth's revolution, it is well known to set up a leap month. The Babylonians' long-term accumulation in astronomical observation enabled the later Babylonians to predict solar eclipses and planetary collisions, and further calculated that a year is 6: 06 in 365 days, 15 minutes 4 1 second, only 26 minutes and 55 seconds more than the modern calculation.
The multiplication table was not unique to China in ancient times, but also found on the ancient Babylonian clay tablets. But the monosyllabic pronunciation of Chinese characters (including numbers) is catchy to read; The abacus formula developed later also inherited this feature, which played a certain role in improving the operation speed and algorithm.
By the 8th century BC/KLOC-0, during the reign of Hammurabi (BC 1792-BC 1750), a code called code of hammurabi was compiled. This is considered to be the first code in the history of human society, carving cuneiform characters and portraits on 2.25-meter-high stone pillars. This code specifies in detail the class relations among kings, slave owners, freemen and slaves, and also provides for the protection of widows and orphans. This is not only of progressive historical significance, but also a pioneering work in the field of human social code.
On the banks of the Euphrates River near Sheila, about 90 kilometers south of Baghdad, there is a ruin of Babylon. From the unification of the two river basins by the Kingdom of Babylon in 19 BC to the 6th century BC, Babylon has been the most prosperous and spectacular city in West Asia. Especially in the dynasty of Nebuchadnezzar II (604-562 BC), the new town of Babylon entered its heyday. According to historical records, the new Babylonian city expanded by Nebuchadnezzar II is square, each side is about 20 kilometers long, and there are moats and high walls outside. The main wall has a tower every 44 meters. There are more than 300 towers and 65,438+000 bronze doors in the city. There are broad avenues paved with stone slabs in the city, as well as the Marduk Temple, which is more than 90 meters high. The Euphrates River runs through the city, with bridges, roads and docks built by stone piers on both sides. Its grandeur can be seen. The palace is extremely luxurious. Its walls are decorated with colorful tiles and exquisite lion statues. The palace is also decorated with "Hanging Gardens", which was called "Hanging Gardens" in ancient times. This square "hanging garden" is more than 500 meters in circumference and built on a 23-meter-high man-made mountain. The garden is full of exotic flowers and grasses, just like a fairyland on earth. The "Hanging Garden" of the New Babylon Palace is listed as one of the seven wonders of the world.
Historically, the birthplace of civilization has always been closely related to rivers. Like two vines of life, the Euphrates and Tigris rivers extend in the desolate and arid desert areas. Today, the Iraqi generation has joined hands to shape the rich Mesopotamian plain. Here gave birth to the oldest civilization of the two river basins in human history, which is what people used to call "Babylonian civilization".
Archaeological excavations have proved that Babylonian civilization is the general name of a series of urban civilizations in the two river basins from 6000 to 500 BC. On the banks of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, cities with similar or different styles dot the Mesopotamian plain. On this historical stage, Sumerians and later Sumerian invaders played the leading role in creating civilization in turn like lanterns, and jointly played the glorious movement of Mesopotamian civilization. When we open the history again, the tragedy of history will appear in front of us.