Top Ten Lost Cities Of The World
The popular imagination is that lost cities were real, Many cities have been destroyed by natural disasters and rebuilt. A city becomes lost when it is abandoned by its inhabitants and left to decay.Machu Picchu
Machu Picchu was built around 1450, at the height of the Inca Empire. It was abandoned just over 100 years later, in 1572, as a belated result of the Spanish Conquest.It is often called as The Lost City of Incas .An American historian, archaeologist of Yale University Hiram Bingham in the year 1911 brought this city into light and from then it has become one of the attractive places for the tourists.
Atlantis
Scholars dispute whether and how much Plato’s story or account was inspired by older traditions. Some scholars argue Plato drew upon memories of past events such as the Thera eruption or the Trojan War, while others insist that he took inspiration from contemporary events like the destruction of Helike.
Pompeii
The city of Pompeii is a partially buried Roman town-city near modern Naples in the Italian region of Campania, in the territory of the comune of Pompei. The name “Pompeii” in Latin is a second declension plural (Pompeii, -orum). According to Theodor Kraus, “The root of the word Pompeii would appear to be the Oscan word for the number five, pompe, which suggests that either the community consisted of five hamlets or, perhaps, it was settled by a family group (gens Pompeia).” Along with Herculaneum, its sister city, Pompeii was destroyed and completely buried during a long catastrophic eruption of the volcano Mount Vesuvius spanning two days in 79 AD. The eruption buried Pompeii under 4 to 6 meters of ash and pumice, and it was lost for over 1,500 years before its accidental rediscovery in 1599. Since then, its excavation has provided an extraordinarily detailed insight into the life of a city at the height of the Roman Empire. Today, this UNESCO World Heritage Site is one of the most popular tourist attractions of Italy, with approximately 2,500,000 visitors every year.
Amphitheatre in Pompeji / Italy
Angkor
The ruins of Angkor are located amid forests and farmland to the north of the Great Lake and south of the Kulen Hills, near modern day Siem Reap, and are a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The temples of the Angkor area number over one thousand, ranging in scale from nondescript piles of brick rubble scattered through rice fields to the magnificent Angkor Wat, said to be the world’s largest single religious monument.
Memphis
EL, Dorado
One of the most famous of all the legendary cities, El Dorado was a mythical empire supposedly found in the jungles of South America.El Dorado is applied to a legendary story in which precious stones were found in fabulous abundance along with gold coins. The concept of El Dorado underwent several transformations, and eventually accounts of the previous myth were also combined with those of the legendary city. The resulting El Dorado enticed European explorers for two centuries.
Among the earliest stories was the one told by Diego de Ordaz's lieutenant Martinez, who claimed to have been rescued from shipwreck, conveyed inland, and entertained by "El Dorado" himself (1531).
In 1540 Gonzalo Pizarro, the younger half-brother of Francisco Pizarro, was made the governor of the provenance of Quito in northern Ecuador. Shortly after taking lead in Quito, Gonzalo learned from many of the natives of a valley far to the east rich in both cinnamon and gold. He banded together 340 soldiers and about 4000 natives in 1541 and led them eastward down the Rio Coca and Rio Napo. Francisco de Orellana, Gonzalo’s nephew, accompanied his uncle on this expedition. Gonzalo quit after many of the soldiers and natives had died from hunger, disease, and periodic attacks by hostile natives. He ordered Orellana to continue downstream, where he eventually made it to the Atlantic Ocean, discovering the Amazon (named Amazon because of a tribe of female warriors that attacked Orellana’s men while on their voyage.)
Other expeditions include that of Philipp von Hutten (1541–1545), who led an exploring party from Coro on the coast of Venezuela; and of Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada, the Governor of El Dorado, who started from Bogotá (1569).Sir Walter Raleigh, who resumed the search in 1595, described El Dorado as a city on Lake Parime far up the Orinoco River in Guyana. This city on the lake was marked on English and other maps until its existence was disproved by Alexander von Humboldt during his Latin-America expedition (1799–1804).
Muisca raft, representation of the initiation of the new Zipa in the lake of Guatavita, possible source of the legend of El Dorado. It was found in a cave in Pasca, Colombia in 1856, together with many other gold objects. It is 19.5 cm long, 10.1 cm wide and 10.2 cm high. Dated between 1200 and 1500 BC. It is made of an alloy of gold (80%), silver and copper, by using the lost wax method. The cacique in the center is surrounded by attendants and oarsmen. Colombia Official Tourism Portal
Petra
The lost city of Z
Troy
Plan of the archeological site of Troy
Legend:
* 1: Gate
* 2: City Wall
* 3: Megarons
* 4: FN Gate
* 5: FO Gate
* 6: FM Gate and Ramp
* 7: FJ Gate
* 8: City Wall
* 9: Megarons
* 10: City Wall
* 11: VI. S Gate
* 12: VI. H Tower
* 13: VI. R Gate
* 14: VI. G Tower
* 15: Well-Cistern
* 16: VI. T Dardanos Gate
* 17: VI. I Tower
* 18: VI. U Gate
* 19: VI. A House
* 20: VI. M Palace-Storage House
* 21: Pillar House
* 22: VI. F House with columns
* 23: VI. C House
* 24: VI. E House
* 25: VII. Storage
* 26: Temple of Athena
* 27: Entrance to the Temple (Propylaeum)
* 28: Outer Court Wall
* 29: Inner Court Wall
* 30: Holy Place
* 31: Water Work
* 32: Parliament (Bouleuterion)
* 33: Odeon
* 34: Roman Bath
The Lost City of the Caesar
Most of the descriptions of the city talk about the city as a prosperous and rich city full of gold, silver and diamonds. At least one description, also says it was located in between two mountains, one of gold and another of diamonds.[1] Sometimes it is described as an enchanted city that appears in certain moments. Said to have been founded by survivors from the shipwreck of a Spanish ship, and full of riches such as gold and silver. The alleged inhabitants of the city have been described as consisting of people of European descent who shipwrecked in the Strait of Magellan, survivors in exile of the Disaster of Curalaba, survivors of the Inca Empire, ghosts and Patagonian giants.
