When we talk of the Seven Wonders of the World, we usually mean seven specific man-made constructions from before the birth of Christ. (Pliny the Elder)
1. The Pyramid: the great pyramid of king Cheops in Egypt. The first Dynasty is held to have begun around 3100 BC. The famous pharaoh Tutankhamen was one of the 18 Dynasty in the 14th century BC. (2600 BC)
2. The Hanging Gardens of Babylon east of the Euphrates in present-day Iraq (600 BC)
3. The Statue of Zeus at Olympia, in present-day southern Greece (500 BC)
4. The Temple of Artemis (sometimes called Diana) at Ephesus in Asia Minor. She was the goddess of fertility
5. The Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, just 50 miles to the south (350 BC)
6. The Colossus at Rhodes not far from Halicarnassus, off the coast of Asia Minor. We know that the origin of the Colossus stems from a conflict at the end of the fourth century BC. This was the chaotic period following the death of Alexander the Great when his empire was devided up amongst three of his generals: Ptolemy, Seleucus and Antigonus. The completed statue was of their Sun God Helios. It would be a giant named after an old word for a statue, a word that would subsequently be applied only to statues on the huge scale - Colossus. (400 BC)
7. The Pharos at Alexandria, situated across that Mediterranean from Rhodes. It served as a lighthouse in the city founded by Alexander the Great in 332 BC. After Alexander's detath, Egypt became the responsibility of Ptolemy and his successors. We know that it stood on the island of Pharos. On the very top, possibly as high as 400 feet, stood a statue representing Zeus, the protector, or possibly Poseidon. We cannot be certain.
For the most remarkable aspect of the story, however, we must surely journey south from Alexandria back to the great Pyramid of Cheops. A pyramid constructed, as we're seen, 4700 years ago. That this single wonder predated all the other six by some 2000 years and has outlasted all the others by at least 500 years, it's simply remarkable. This is surely the greatest of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.
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Most of assumptions are based on Pliny the Elder because they have been destoried by the earthquake or the war. If Pliny the Elder is a fairy tale, they are the wonders only existing in the mind, I think.
The introduction on Pliny the Elder: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pliny_the_Elder
