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Tikal
Tikal , ruined city of the Classic Period of the Maya , N central Petén, Guatemala. The largest and possibly the oldest of the Maya cities, Tikal consists of nine groups of courts and plazas built on hilly land above surrounding swamps (which may have been lakes in former times) and intercon...
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Paestum
Paestum , ancient city of Lucania, S Italy. It was a colony of the Greek city of Sybaris (c.600 BC) and was first named Posidonia. It flourished with the rest of Magna Graecia through the 6th cent. BC The Romans took the city in 273 BC; they called it Paestum. The ruins, near the present Pesto, in...
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Borobudur
Borobudur or Boroboeder , ruins of one of the finest Buddhist monuments, in central Java, Indonesia. Built by the Sailendras of Sumatra, this magnificent shrine dates from about the 9th cent. It is a huge, truncated pyramid covered with intricately carved blocks of stone that illustrate the life...
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Glendalough
Glendalough , wooded valley, Co. Wicklow, E Republic of Ireland, W of Wicklow. It is noted for the ruins of several churches of the 11th and 12th cent. (part of the center of Irish Christianity that St. Kevin founded). Also of interest are a round tower and Kevin's Cross (a granite monolith). A ledg...
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South Shields
South Shields city (1991 pop. 86,488), South Tyneside, NE England, at the mouth of the Tyne River. It is a significant port. Shipbuilding and marine engineering are the main industries; chemicals and paints are manufactured. Within the vicinity are large parks, and the ruins of a Roman fort rest on...
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Golconda
Golconda , ruined city, Andhra Pradesh state, SE India. It was the capital (c.1364-1512) of the Bahmani kingdom, but after 1512 it became the capital of the Muslim sultanate of Golconda. The legions of Aurangzeb, the Mughal emperor, captured the city in 1687, after which Golconda gradually fell into...
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Hierapolis
Hierapolis , ancient city of Phrygia, W Asia Minor, 7 mi (11.3 km) N of Laodicea and on a plateau 500 ft (152 m) above the Lycus valley (in present-day Turkey). Devoted to the worship of Leto in ancient times, it became an early seat of Christianity (Colossians 4.13). The Romans greatly enlarged and...
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Angkor
Angkor , site of several capitals of the Khmer Empire , north of Tônlé Sap, NW Cambodia, for about five and a half centuries (9th to 15th), the heart of the empire. Extending over an area of 120 sq mi (323 sq km), the ruins contain some of the most imposing monuments in the world, incl...
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nave
nave , in general, all that part of a church that extends from the atrium to the altar and is intended exclusively for the laity. In a strictly architectural sense, however, the term indicates only the central aisle, excluding side aisles. The floor plan of a wide central portion with narrower aisle...
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mirage
mirage , atmospheric optical illusion in which an observer sees in the distance a nonexistent body of water or an image, sometimes distorted, of some object or of a complete scene. Examples of mirages are pools of water seen over hot desert sand or over hot pavement; at sea, an inverted image of a s...
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