A quiz question · medium
Approximately how long did the Lighthouse of Alexandria stand?
Built under Ptolemy II around 280 BC, the Pharos of Alexandria was already the tallest human structure in the world (over 100 metres) and stood as a working lighthouse through Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, and Islamic Alexandria. A series of earthquakes (956, 1303, 1323 AD) progressively destroyed it. The Mamluk Sultan Qaitbay used its stones to build a citadel on the same site in 1480.
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The Lighthouse That Outlived Its Own Civilization For sixteen hundred years the Pharos of Alexandria threw light over a sea. Three earthquakes finished what nothing else could.
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