Expert: Maria - 3/11/2009

Question
Hello I'm a student working on a project for school. I need to talk to an expert. I have many questions but here are some: Why does no one know if they really exist? What were some of the plants in the gardens? How were the plants watered? Did the king hire people to maintain the garden or did no one maintain it?

Answer
Hello,

actually the hanging gardens of Babylon, one of the Seven Wonders of the World, perhaps  built in the sixth century BC by Nebuchadnezzar for his wife, and destroyed by several earthquakes after the 2nd century BC, belong to the Babylonian history  which has nothing to do with Ancient Greek and Roman History that are my field of expertise, as you can see at my profile.

Anyway I can tell you that:

1- we know that the hanging gardens of Babylon really existed  thanks to two reliable  sources, i.e. DIODORUS SICULUS (Greek historian who flourished in the 1st century BC) and STRABO, Greek historian and  geographer (born 63/64 BC – died ca. AD 24).
It seems however that they both have elaborated  the information found in Berossus, a Chaldean priest who lived in the late 4th century BC.
Diodorus describes  the hanging gardens as a "series of superimposed terraces of reducing size, rising to a height of 75 feet (100 feet (30 m) long by 100 feet (30 m) wide , while Strabo says that  they  were much larger, with a  square base with each side 400 feet long.

2-both Diodorus and Strabo say that in the gardens there was every kind of trees and plants.

3-both Diodorus and Strabo say that the water was  brought from the Euphrates River to the garden by some conduits for the water which was raised by pumps.

Have a nice day,
Maria
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See at:
http://www.authenticwonders.com/Wonders/gardens.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanging_Gardens_of_Babylon#Greek_references