Herodotus describes Babylon as a square city with sides of 120 stadia

Herodotus describes Babylon as a square city with sides of 120 stadia. One stadium is about 175 metres, so the area of Babylon, according to Herodotus, was 441 square kilometres, the size of 4 modern Parises or half of New York. Quite an enormous city to have in the desert.

Modern researchers, however, give a figure of 4-10 square kilometres. As for the Tower of Babel, with its square base of 90 metres per side, its height was 91 metres.

Report a translation error

At the close of the Strugatskys' "Roadside Picnic" the Golden Sphere is asked for this: "Happiness for everybody, free, and let nobody go away unsatisfied!" I do not promise to leave no one aggrieved, but the digest really does come free

At the close of the Strugatskys' "Roadside Picnic" the Golden Sphere is asked for this: "Happiness for everybody, free, and let nobody go away unsatisfied!" I do not promise to leave no one aggrieved, but the digest really does come free. So, here is the

Frederic Leighton

Frederic Leighton. “Daedalus and Icarus”, 1869 Daedalus warns his son not to climb too high: the heat of the sun may melt the wax, but Icarus is already gazing into the distance, and the lamentations of a foolish old man interest him not in the least

Herodotus describes Babylon as a square city with sides of 120 stadia

Read more

At the close of the Strugatskys' "Roadside Picnic" the Golden Sphere is asked for this: "Happiness for everybody, free, and let nobody go away unsatisfied!" I do not promise to leave no one aggrieved, but the digest really does come free

Frederic Leighton

Attempts to resolve the problems of many years of uncontrolled mass migration

Characters from Gogol's "Petersburg Tales" on the pedestal of the monument to Nikolai Gogol on Nikitsky Boulevard, photograph of the 1960s