There is evidence that the ancient city of Palmyra, also known as Tadmor, was in existence as far back as the 19th century B.C. Its importance grew around 300 B.C. as trading caravans began using it as a way station between Mesopotamia and Persia. Palmyra's strategic location and prosperity attracted the interest of the Romans, who took control of the city in the first century A.D.
The city of Tanis is relatively unknown among Egypt's wealth of historical sites, though it yielded one of the greatest archeological troves ever found. Once the capital of all Egypt, Tanis's royal tombs have yielded artifacts on par with the treasures of Tutankhamun.
Once thought (erroneously) to be a city of the biblical Queen of Sheba, Great Zimbabwe stands as the most important archaeological site yet found in sub-Saharan Africa. Though historians are still seeking answers about the origin and purpose of the city, evidence suggests the Shona, ancestors of the modern Bantu, built it beginning around A.D. 1250 and that it served as a spiritual center.
Nimrud in northern Iraq was once the capital of the Assyrian empire. Feared as bloodthirsty and vicious, the Assyrians arose around the 14th century B.C. and dominated the Middle East for a thousand years.
Nimrud and the Assyrian Empire declined rapidly around 612 B.C., after Nimrud's sister city, Nineveh, fell to the Babylonians.
The ancient city of Persepolis in modern-day Iran was one of four capitals of the sprawling Persian Empire. Built beginning around 520 B.C., the city was a showcase for the empire's staggering wealth, with grand architecture, extravagant works of silver and gold, and extensive relief sculptures such as this one portraying envoys with offerings for the king.
The height of Persian rule lasted from about 550 B.C. until 330 B.C., when Alexander the Great overthrew the ruling Archaemenid dynasty and burned Persepolis to the ground.
Over centuries of study, archaeologists have discovered many truths about the famed Stonehenge monument in southern England. But despite these advances, the basic questions of who built this iconic structure and why have remained unanswered.
More than 600 cliff dwellings made by the ancestral Pueblo people, also known as the Anasazi, are scattered throughout Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado (shown here).
The Anasazi arrived in the region as early as A.D. 550, building their homes and cultivating crops on the soaring mesa tops. Around 1150, though, they began to move their dwellings to the alcoves within the canyon walls. Most houses were quite small, but a few reached enormous proportions, housing up 250 people.
