# C. The classical (Greek and Latin) testimonia for the "Hanging Garden(s) of Babylon": texts, translations, source criticism

Working copies of the raw fetched pages (`raw_C/`, file names given in square brackets after each URL) and of the plain-text extractions (`txt_C/`) are not included in this folder. Greek and Latin are quoted verbatim from the fetched pages; where a text could only be obtained from an OCR'd scan (Philo, Abydenus, Syncellus, AP 8.177, Ampelius, Gregory of Tours) this is stated and the residual OCR risk flagged. Nothing below is quoted from memory without being marked **[unverified]**.

Section 5 at the end lists (i) what was fetched and quoted verbatim, (ii) what rests on secondary sources or memory, (iii) what was inaccessible.

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## 0. Summary of findings

1. **There are only five substantive ancient descriptions** of the garden: Berossus-in-Josephus (with parallels in Syncellus and the Armenian Eusebius), Abydenus-in-Eusebius (one sentence), Diodorus 2.10, Strabo 16.1.5, Curtius 5.1.31-35, and the late-antique Philo "of Byzantium". Everything else is a bare listing (Antipater, Gregory of Nazianzus, Pliny 19.49) or silence.
2. **Nobody except Berossus (as transmitted) and Abydenus/Megasthenes names Nebuchadnezzar.** Diodorus and Curtius attribute the garden to "a later **Syrian** king" (*τινος ὕστερον Σύρου βασιλέως*; *Syriae regem Babylone regnantem*), explicitly *not* Semiramis; Pliny 19.49 hedges "*sive illos Semiramis sive Assyriae rex Syrus fecit*"; Strabo, Philo and Antipater name no builder at all. "Syrian" in this idiom = Assyrian (Strabo 16.1.2 says so in terms; Rolfe's Loeb note "Syria for Assyria").
3. **The Berossus sentence is textually genuine in Josephus** (both AJ 10.226 and Ap. 1.141, and Syncellus p. 418 Dindorf reproduce it), **but its authenticity as Berossus is disputed**, because the rest of Josephus' Berossus paragraph tracks Nebuchadnezzar's own "East India House" inscription item by item and the garden is the one item with no cuneiform counterpart (van der Spek 2008; Dalley 1994/2013; contra Bichler 2004, Burstein 1978, Reade 2000, who accept it as Berossus "catering to Greek readers"). Eusebius, quoting Josephus in PE 9.40, *skips* the garden sentence, but quotes Abydenus' independent one-liner in PE 9.41.
4. **Diagnostics from the texts:** the two Alexander-derived accounts (Diodorus/Curtius, generally traced to Clitarchus) locate the garden *παρὰ τὴν ἀκρόπολιν* / *super arcem* in Babylon; Strabo puts it *ἐπὶ τῷ ποταμῷ* and has the water raised from the **Euphrates** by **screws** (*κοχλίαι*) worked by men; Philo has water forced up "**screw-wise**" (*κοχλιοειδῶς*) through "**the spiral of the machines**" (*τὸν ἕλικα τῶν μηχανημάτων*). Diodorus, by contrast, says only "*ὄργανα*" for the "*ἐπαντλήσεις*" of water and "*διατομαί*" (shafts/openings), which Dalley & Oleson themselves concede "might imply a vertical lift by means of ropes, rather than ... water screws" (2003: 12). No text mentions bronze; the waterproofing recipe (reed + bitumen + double baked brick in gypsum + lead) is only in Diodorus.
5. **The Greek tradition confused Assyria and Babylonia systematically:** Diodorus 2.3.2 (from Ctesias) founds Nineveh "*παρὰ τὸν Εὐφράτην ποταμόν*"; Herodotus 1.178 makes Babylon the royal seat of "Assyria" after Nineveh's fall; Xenophon calls Nimrud and Nineveh "Larisa" and "Mespila", "once inhabited by Medes"; Strabo 16.1.2 says "the Syrians" of the historians "are none other than those who set up the royal seat at Babylon and Ninus". This is the *only* real support the texts give to a Nineveh relocation: the texts themselves, without exception, say Babylon and the Euphrates.
6. **Wonder-list chronology:** the earliest surviving list with the garden is Antipater of Sidon (2nd/1st c. BC, AP 9.58: *κάπων τ᾽ αἰώρημα*); the Berlin papyrus *Laterculi Alexandrini* (late 2nd c. BC) preserves only Artemision, pyramids, Mausoleum; Diodorus 2.11.5 already knows a canon of "seven" (Semiramis' obelisk), Strabo 16.1.5 counts wall + garden among the seven, Philo (4th/5th c. AD) devotes ch. 1 to the garden, Gregory of Nazianzus (AP 8.177) includes *κῆποι*; Latin lists (Hyginus 223, Ampelius 8, Cassiodorus Var. 7.15.4, Gregory of Tours, ps.-Bede) all have the **wall** of Babylon and never the garden. The canon is a Hellenistic (Alexandrian) construct; Callimachus' *Collection of wonders* is lost.

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## 1. The testimonia

### 1a. Berossus, *Babyloniaca* book 3 (BNJ/FGrH 680 F 8; Verbrugghe–Wickersham F 9; Burstein F 2), as quoted by Josephus

**Josephus, *Antiquitates Judaicae* 10.219-228 (= 10.11.1).** Greek text: Niese, as digitised on Perseus (doc. 1999.01.0145). URL: https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0145%3Abook%3D10%3Awhiston+chapter%3D11%3Awhiston+section%3D1 [raw_C/josephus_AJ_10_11_1_greek.html]. English: Whiston (1737), Perseus doc. 1999.01.0146, same citation [raw_C/josephus_AJ_10_11_1_whiston.html].

> [219] Ὁ δὲ βασιλεὺς Ναβουχοδονόσορος ἔτη τρία καὶ τεσσαράκοντα βασιλεύσας τελευτᾷ τὸν βίον ἀνὴρ δραστήριος καὶ τῶν πρὸ αὐτοῦ βασιλέων εὐτυχέστερος γενόμενος. μέμνηται δ᾽ αὐτοῦ τῶν πράξεων καὶ Βηρωσὸς ἐν τῇ τρίτῃ τῶν Χαλδαϊκῶν ἱστοριῶν λέγων οὕτως: … [224] αὐτὸς δ᾽ ἀπὸ τῶν ἐκ τοῦ πολέμου λαφύρων τό τε τοῦ Βήλου ἱερὸν καὶ τὰ λοιπὰ κοσμήσας φιλοτίμως τήν τε ὑπάρχουσαν ἐξ ἀρχῆς πόλιν καὶ ἕτερα καταχαρισάμενος καὶ ἀναγκάσας πρὸς τὸ μηκέτι δύνασθαι τοὺς πολιορκοῦντας τὸν ποταμὸν ἀναστρέψαντας ἐπὶ τὴν πόλιν κατασκευάζειν περιεβάλετο τρεῖς μὲν τῆς ἔνδον πόλεως περιβόλους, τρεῖς δ᾽ ἔξω τούτων δὲ τῆς ὀπτῆς πλίνθου. [225] καὶ τειχίσας ἀξιολόγως τὴν πόλιν καὶ τοὺς πυλῶνας κοσμήσας ἱεροπρεπῶς κατεσκεύασεν ἐν τοῖς πατρικοῖς βασιλείοις ἕτερα βασίλεια ἐχόμενα αὐτῶν, ὧν τὸ μὲν ἀνάστημα καὶ τὴν λοιπὴν πολυτέλειαν περισσὸν ἴσως ἂν εἴη λέγειν, πλὴν ὅσον τὰ μεγάλα καὶ ὑπερήφανα συνετελέσθη ἡμέραις πεντεκαίδεκα. [226] **ἐν δὲ τοῖς βασιλείοις τούτοις ἀναλήμματα λίθινα ἀνῳκοδόμησε τὴν ὄψιν ἀποδοὺς ὁμοιοτάτην τοῖς ὄρεσι, καταφυτεύσας δένδρεσι παντοδαποῖς ἐξειργάσατο καὶ κατεσκεύασε τὸν καλούμενον κρεμαστὸν παράδεισον διὰ τὸ τὴν γυναῖκα αὐτοῦ ἐπιθυμεῖν τῆς οἰκείας διαθέσεως ὡς τεθραμμένην ἐν τοῖς κατὰ Μηδίαν τόποις.**’ [227] καὶ Μεγασθένης δὲ ἐν τῇ τετάρτῃ τῶν Ἰνδικῶν μνημονεύει αὐτῶν δι᾽ ἧς ἀποφαίνειν πειρᾶται τοῦτον τὸν βασιλέα τῇ ἀνδρείᾳ καὶ τῷ μεγέθει τῶν πράξεων ὑπερβεβηκότα τὸν Ἡρακλέα: καταστρέψασθαι γὰρ αὐτόν φησι Λιβύης τὴν πολλὴν καὶ Ἰβηρίαν. [228] καὶ Διοκλῆς δ᾽ ἐν τῇ δευτέρᾳ τῶν Περσικῶν μνημονεύει τούτου τοῦ βασιλέως καὶ Φιλόστρατος ἐν ταῖς Ἰνδικαῖς καὶ Φοινικικαῖς ἱστορίαις …

Whiston: "He also erected elevated places for walking, of stone, and made it resemble mountains, and built it so that it might be planted with all sorts of trees. He also erected what was called a pensile paradise, because his wife was desirous to have things like her own country, she having been bred up in the palaces of Media. Megasthenes also, in his fourth book of his Accounts of India, makes mention of these things …"

**Josephus, *Contra Apionem* 1.128-142 (= 1.19-20).** Greek (Niese) from Perseus doc. 1999.01.0215 (this Perseus document is in fact the Greek): https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0215%3Abook%3D1%3Awhiston+section%3D19 [raw_C/josephus_CAp_1_19_whiston.html]. English: H. St J. Thackeray, Loeb *Josephus* I (1926), via the archive.org OCR of the Loeb volume [raw_C/josephus_thackeray_loeb1_djvu.txt, lines 12290-12370].

> [139] … περιεβάλετο τρεῖς μὲν τῆς ἔνδον πόλεως περιβόλους, τρεῖς δὲ τῆς ἔξω, τούτων δὲ τοὺς μὲν ἐξ ὀπτῆς πλίνθου καὶ ἀσφάλτου, τοὺς δὲ ἐξ αὐτῆς τῆς πλίνθου. [140] καὶ τειχίσας ἀξιολόγως τὴν πόλιν καὶ τοὺς πυλῶνας κοσμήσας ἱεροπρεπῶς προσκατεσκεύασεν τοῖς πατρικοῖς βασιλείοις ἕτερα βασίλεια ἐχόμενα ἐκείνων, [ὑπὲρ] ὧν ἀνάστημα καὶ τὴν λοιπὴν πολυτέλειαν μακρὸν ἴσως ἔσται ἐάν τις ἐξηγῆται, πλὴν ὄντα γε ὑπερβολὴν ὡς μεγάλα καὶ ὑπερήφανα συνετελέσθη ἡμέραις δεκαπέντε. [141] **ἐν δὲ τοῖς βασιλείοις τούτοις ἀναλήμματα λίθινα ὑψηλὰ ἀνοικοδομήσας καὶ τὴν ὄψιν ἀποδοὺς ὁμοιοτάτην τοῖς ὄρεσι, καταφυτεύσας δένδρεσι παντοδαποῖς ἐξειργάσατο καὶ κατεσκεύασε τὸν καλούμενον κρεμαστὸν παράδεισον διὰ τὸ τὴν γυναῖκα αὐτοῦ ἐπιθυμεῖν τῆς ὀρείας διαθέσεως τεθραμμένην ἐν τοῖς κατὰ τὴν Μηδίαν τόποις.**” [142] Ταῦτα μὲν οὕτως ἱστόρηκεν περὶ τοῦ προειρημένου βασιλέως καὶ πολλὰ πρὸς τούτοις ἐν τῇ τρίτῃ βίβλῳ τῶν Χαλδαϊκῶν, ἐν ᾗ μέμφεται τοῖς Ἑλληνικοῖς συγγραφεῦσιν …

Thackeray: "Within this palace he erected lofty stone terraces, in which he closely reproduced mountain scenery, completing the resemblance by planting them with all manner of trees and constructing the so-called hanging garden; because his wife, having been brought up in Media, had a passion for mountain surroundings." Thackeray's note: "Regarded as one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. A fuller account is quoted from Ctesias in Diodorus ii.10." His apparatus records "ὑπὲρ ὧν Syncellus" for the corrupt "ὧν … ἀνάστημα".

Observations on the two Josephan versions: AJ has *ἀναλήμματα λίθινα* ("stone terraces/retaining walls"), *Ap.* adds *ὑψηλά* ("lofty"); AJ has *τῆς οἰκείας διαθέσεως* ("her native surroundings"), *Ap.* *τῆς ὀρείας διαθέσεως* ("mountain surroundings"); the wife is unnamed in both. The key word *κρεμαστός* ("hung up, suspended") is what Latin renders *pensilis*.

**Parallel transmissions of the same Berossus sentence.**

*Syncellus, Ecloga chronographica* p. 418 (Dindorf, CSHB 1829, vol. 1) — fetched from the archive.org OCR of Dindorf's edition, https://archive.org/download/georgiussyncell01nikgoog/georgiussyncell01nikgoog_djvu.txt [raw_C/syncellus_dindorf1_djvu.txt, ll. 26410-26420; OCR, lightly normalised]: "…συνετελέσθη ἡμέραις ιε΄. ἐν δὲ τοῖς βασιλείοις τούτοις ἀναλήμματα λίθινα ὑψηλὰ ἀνοικοδομήσας καὶ τὴν ὄψιν ἀποδοὺς ὁμοιοτάτην τοῖς ὄρεσι, καταφυτεύσας δένδρεσι παντοδαποῖς, ἐξειργάσατο· καὶ κατεσκεύασε τὸν καλούμενον κρεμαστὸν παράδεισον, διὰ τὸ τὴν γυναῖκα αὐτοῦ ἐπιθυμεῖν τῆς ὀρείας διαθέσεως, τεθραμμένην ἐν τοῖς κατὰ Μηδίαν τόποις. ταῦτα ὁ Βήρωσσος ἱστορεῖ περὶ τοῦ Ναβουχοδονόσωρ καὶ ἕτερα πλεῖστα ἐν τρίτῃ τῶν Χαλδαϊκῶν βίβλῳ, μεμφόμενος τοῖς ψευδῶς γράψασιν Ἑλλήνων ἱστορικοῖς ὑπὸ τῆς Ἀσσυρίας Σεμιράμεως κτισθῆναι Βαβυλῶνα καὶ τὰ κατ᾽ αὐτὴν θαυμάσια." Syncellus therefore had the garden sentence in his copy of Josephus/Polyhistor (with the *Contra Apionem* wording).

*Eusebius, Praeparatio Evangelica* 9.40 quotes Josephus *Ap.* 1.136-138 and then jumps ("After other statements he says") to 1.146-153: the garden sentence is **omitted** (Gifford's translation, https://www.tertullian.org/fathers/eusebius_pe_09_book9.htm [raw_C/eusebius_pe9_gifford.html]; the Greek of Gifford's 1903 edition Tomus I at https://archive.org/download/evangelicaepraep01euse/evangelicaepraep01euse_djvu.txt [raw_C/evangelicaepraep01euse_djvu.txt] confirms this). This is abbreviation, not evidence that Eusebius' Josephus lacked the sentence.

*Eusebius, Chronicle* (Armenian version), from Alexander Polyhistor's epitome of Berossus, tr. R. Bedrosian, https://www.tertullian.org/fathers/eusebius_chronicon_02_text.htm [raw_C/eusebius_chron_armenian_bedrosian.html]: "…he constructed yet another palace near his father's palace [g68] whose size, beauty, and adornment one can hardly describe. Suffice it to say that it was a splendidly rare accomplishment, completely finished in fifteen days. The palace had a lofty turreted portion at the summit, constructed in such a manner as to resemble mountains and planted with a great variety of trees. This was named the Hanging Garden and it was created to satisfy the longing of his wife for the airy mountainous places where she was [g69] raised, in the high mountains of Media. This is what [Berosus] says about the king." — This is Eusebius' excerpt of *Josephus* (the chapter is headed "From Josephus' Antiquities about Nebuchadnezzar"), so it is not an independent witness to Polyhistor's Berossus.

**The Median wife's name.** Josephus never names her. The name comes from Polyhistor's Berossus in the *Chronicle* (Bedrosian, p. [g44]): "Sardanapallus ruled the Chaldeans for 21 years. He sent an auxiliary army to the patriarch and lord of the Medes, Azhdahak, to secure one of his daughters, **Amuhean**, as a wife for his son Nebuchadnezzar", and from Abydenus ([g54]): "[Busalossorus] plotted rebellion and sought the marriage of Amuhean, daughter of Azhdahak [Astyages], the patriarch of the Medes, to his son, Nebuchadnezzar." "Amuhean" is universally taken as the Armenian deformation of Ἄμυτις. Note that Ctesias' Amytis (FGrH 688 F 9) is Astyages' daughter married to **Cyrus** — Bichler 2004: 19 (achemenet PDF, see §2.4) suspects "Ctesias' Amytis found her way into Berossus' fragments". Oldfather's Loeb note on Diod. 2.10 prints the name as "Amyhia".

### 1a′. Abydenus (BNJ/FGrH 685 F 6) and Megasthenes (FGrH 715 F 1)

**Eusebius, PE 9.41.6** (p. 457c Viger). Greek from Gifford's 1903 edition (archive.org OCR, Tomus I, ll. 44275-44293) [raw_C/evangelicaepraep01euse_djvu.txt]; Ionic dialect (Abydenus imitates Herodotus):

> Ναβουχοδονόσορος δὲ διαδεξάμενος τὴν ἀρχὴν Βαβυλῶνα μὲν ἐτείχισε τριπλῷ περιβόλῳ ἐν πέντε καὶ δέκα ἡμέρῃσι, τόν τε Ἀρμακάλην ποταμὸν ἐξήγαγεν, ἐόντα κέρας Εὐφρήτεω, τόν τε Ἀκράκανον. Ὑπὲρ δὲ τῆς Σιππαρηνῶν πόλιος λάκκον ὀρυξάμενος, περίμετρον μὲν τεσσαράκοντα παρασαγγέων, βάθος δ᾽ ὀργυιέων εἴκοσι, πύλας ἐπέστησεν, τὰς ἀνοίγοντες ἄρδεσκον τὸ πεδίον· καλέουσι δ᾽ αὐτὰς ἐχετογνώμονας. Ἀπετείχισε δὲ καὶ τῆς Ἐρυθρῆς θαλάσσης τὴν ἐπίκλυσιν, καὶ Τερηδόνα πόλιν ἔκτισεν κατὰ τὰς Ἀράβων εἰσβολάς· **τά τε βασιλήϊα δένδροις ἤσκησε, κρεμαστοὺς παραδείσους ὀνομάσας.**

Gifford: "When Nebuchadnezzar had succeeded to the kingdom, he fortified Babylon with a triple circuit of walls in fifteen days, and he changed the course of the river Armacales … He also walled off the inundation of the Red Sea, and built the city Teredon at the place of the incursions of the Arabs. **His palace too he adorned with trees, and gave it the name of the Hanging Gardens.**" Eusebius introduces this as from Abydenus' *Concerning the Assyrians*, and the chapter opens "Now **Megasthenes** says that Nebuchadnezzar was braver than Hercules…" (= FGrH 715 F 1b; cf. Josephus AJ 10.227 = F 1a). The Armenian *Chronicle* adds, after the same Abydenus sentence: "[Abydenus] presents a detailed description of this so-called Hanging Garden. The Greeks, he says, regarded [the Hanging Garden] as [one] of the seven wonders of the world" (Bedrosian [g55]) — a detailed Abydenus description that Eusebius chose not to copy and that is lost.

Abydenus is thus an independent (Berossus-derived? Megasthenes-derived?) 2nd-c. AD strand attributing "hanging *paradeisoi*" (plural) to Nebuchadnezzar's *palace*; it gives no wife, no homesickness, no construction detail. No wife, no mountains: only "adorned the palace with trees". This matters for the interpolation debate (§2.4).

### 1b. Diodorus Siculus 2.10.1-6 (with 2.3.2-3, 2.7.2-5, 2.11.5, 2.13.1-3)

Greek: el.wikisource (Bekker–Dindorf–Vogel text; no section numbers, which I supply from Oldfather), https://el.wikisource.org/wiki/Ιστορική_Βιβλιοθήκη/Β [raw_C/diodorus_2_el_wikisource.html]. English: C. H. Oldfather, Loeb (1933), as digitised by Bill Thayer, https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Diodorus_Siculus/2A*.html [raw_C/diodorus_2A_oldfather_lacus.html]. (Perseus' Greek Diodorus returned 503 "Backend fetch failed" on every attempt over several hours; the 17.64 pages did load: [raw_C/diodorus_17_64_greek.html].)

> **2.10 (1)** Ὑπῆρχε δὲ καὶ ὁ κρεμαστὸς καλούμενος κῆπος παρὰ τὴν ἀκρόπολιν, οὐ Σεμιράμιδος, ἀλλά τινος ὕστερον Σύρου βασιλέως κατασκευάσαντος χάριν γυναικὸς παλλακῆς· ταύτην γάρ φασιν οὖσαν τὸ γένος Περσίδα καὶ τοὺς ἐν τοῖς ὄρεσι λειμῶνας ἐπιζητοῦσαν ἀξιῶσαι τὸν βασιλέα μιμήσασθαι διὰ τῆς τοῦ φυτουργείου φιλοτεχνίας τὴν τῆς Περσίδος χώρας ἰδιότητα. **(2)** ἔστι δ᾽ ὁ παράδεισος τὴν μὲν πλευρὰν ἑκάστην παρεκτείνων εἰς τέτταρα πλέθρα, τὴν δὲ πρόσβασιν ὀρεινὴν καὶ τὰς οἰκοδομίας ἄλλας ἐξ ἄλλων ἔχων, ὥστε τὴν πρόσοψιν εἶναι θεατροειδῆ. **(3)** ὑπὸ δὲ ταῖς κατεσκευασμέναις ἀναβάσεσιν ᾠκοδόμηντο σύριγγες, ἅπαν μὲν ὑποδεχόμεναι τὸ τοῦ φυτουργείου βάρος, ἀλλήλων δ᾽ ἐκ τοῦ κατ᾽ ὀλίγον ἀεὶ μικρὸν ὑπερέχουσαι κατὰ τὴν πρόσβασιν· ἡ δ᾽ ἀνωτάτω σῦριγξ οὖσα πεντήκοντα πηχῶν τὸ ὕψος εἶχεν ἐπ᾽ αὐτῇ τοῦ παραδείσου τὴν ἀνωτάτην ἐπιφάνειαν συνεξισουμένην τῷ περιβόλῳ τῶν ἐπάλξεων. **(4)** ἔπειθ᾽ οἱ μὲν τοῖχοι πολυτελῶς κατεσκευασμένοι τὸ πάχος εἶχον ποδῶν εἴκοσι δύο, τῶν δὲ διεξόδων ἑκάστη τὸ πλάτος δέκα. τὰς δ᾽ ὀροφὰς κατεστέγαζον λίθιναι δοκοί, τὸ μὲν μῆκος σὺν ταῖς ἐπιβολαῖς ἔχουσαι ποδῶν ἑκκαίδεκα, τὸ δὲ πλάτος τεττάρων. **(5)** τὸ δ᾽ ἐπὶ ταῖς δοκοῖς ὀρόφωμα πρῶτον μὲν εἶχεν ὑπεστρωμένον κάλαμον μετὰ πολλῆς ἀσφάλτου, μετὰ δὲ ταῦτα πλίνθον ὀπτὴν διπλῆν ἐν γύψῳ δεδεμένην, τρίτην δ᾽ ἐπιβολὴν ἐδέχετο μολιβᾶς στέγας πρὸς τὸ μὴ διικνεῖσθαι κατὰ βάθος τὴν ἐκ τοῦ χώματος νοτίδα. ἐπὶ δὲ τούτοις ἐσεσώρευτο γῆς ἱκανὸν βάθος, ἀρκοῦν ταῖς τῶν μεγίστων δένδρων ῥίζαις· τὸ δ᾽ ἔδαφος ἐξωμαλισμένον πλῆρες ἦν παντοδαπῶν δένδρων τῶν δυναμένων κατά τε τὸ μέγεθος καὶ τὴν ἄλλην χάριν τοὺς θεωμένους ψυχαγωγῆσαι. **(6)** αἱ δὲ σύριγγες τὰ φῶτα δεχόμεναι ταῖς δι᾽ ἀλλήλων ὑπεροχαῖς πολλὰς καὶ παντοδαπὰς εἶχον διαίτας βασιλικάς· μία δ᾽ ἦν ἐκ τῆς ἀνωτάτης ἐπιφανείας διατομὰς ἔχουσα καὶ πρὸς τὰς ἐπαντλήσεις τῶν ὑδάτων ὄργανα, δι᾽ ὧν ἀνεσπᾶτο πλῆθος ὕδατος ἐκ τοῦ ποταμοῦ, μηδενὸς τῶν ἔξωθεν τὸ γινόμενον συνιδεῖν δυναμένου. οὗτος μὲν οὖν ὁ παράδεισος, ὡς προεῖπον, ὕστερον κατεσκευάσθη.

Oldfather: "There was also, because [sic: beside] the acropolis, the Hanging Garden, as it is called, which was built, not by Semiramis, but by a later Syrian king to please one of his concubines; for she, they say, being a Persian by race and longing for the meadows of her mountains, asked the king to imitate, through the artifice of a planted garden, the distinctive landscape of Persia. The park extended four plethra on each side, and since the approach to the garden sloped like a hillside and the several parts of the structure rose from one another tier on tier, the appearance of the whole resembled that of a theatre. When the ascending terraces had been built, there had been constructed beneath them galleries which carried the entire weight of the planted garden and rose little by little one above the other along the approach; and the uppermost gallery, which was fifty cubits high, bore the highest surface of the park, which was made level with the circuit wall of the battlements of the city. Furthermore, the walls, which had been constructed at great expense, were twenty-two feet thick, while the passage-way between each two walls was ten feet wide. The roofs of the galleries were covered over with beams of stone sixteen feet long, inclusive of the overlap, and four feet wide. The roof above these beams had first a layer of reeds laid in great quantities of bitumen, over this two courses of baked brick bonded by cement, and as a third layer a covering of lead, to the end that the moisture from the soil might not penetrate beneath. On all this again earth had been piled to a depth sufficient for the roots of the largest trees; and the ground, which was levelled off, was thickly planted with trees of every kind that, by their great size or any other charm, could give pleasure to beholder. And since the galleries, each projecting beyond another, all received the light, they contained many royal lodgings of every description; and there was one gallery which contained openings leading from the topmost surface and machines for supplying the garden with water, the machines raising the water in great abundance from the river, although no one outside could see it being done. Now this park, as I have said, was a later construction."

Note the vocabulary: the water-lifting devices are *ὄργανα* ("instruments/engines"), not *μηχαναί* and not *κοχλίαι*; the "openings" are *διατομαί* (cuts, shafts); the galleries are *σύριγγες* (literally "pipes", used of vaulted passages); "Persian by race" (*τὸ γένος Περσίδα*), a *παλλακή* (concubine), not a wife; the garden lies *παρὰ τὴν ἀκρόπολιν*, i.e. beside the fortified palace-citadel which 2.8.4-7 has just described, on the west bank (2.8.4 puts the more elaborate palace "on the west bank"? — Oldfather: the two palaces at either end of the bridge; **[unverified detail, not re-checked]**).

**Context, 2.7.2-4** (Oldfather; Greek in the same Wikisource file): "Taking the Euphrates river into the centre she threw about the city a wall with great towers set at frequent intervals, the wall being three hundred and sixty stades in circumference, as Ctesias of Cnidus says, but according to the account of **Cleitarchus and certain of those who at a later time crossed into Asia with Alexander**, three hundred and sixty-five stades; and these latter add that it was her desire to make the number of stades the same as the days in the year." (= Clitarchus FGrH 137 F 10.) Diodorus thus openly names two sources for the Babylon *ekphrasis*: Ctesias, and Clitarchus + Alexander-companions. Strabo 16.1.5 and Curtius 5.1.26 give 365 (Curtius: CCCLXVIII) stades, i.e. the Alexander-historians' figure, not Ctesias'.

**2.3.2-3 (Ninus founds Nineveh "on the Euphrates").** Greek: "…αὐτὸς δὲ τὰς πανταχόθεν δυνάμεις καὶ παρασκευὰς πάντων τῶν ἐπιτηδείων ἀθροίσας **παρὰ τὸν Εὐφράτην ποταμὸν ἔκτισε πόλιν** εὖ τετειχισμένην, ἑτερόμηκες αὐτῆς ὑποστησάμενος τὸ σχῆμα. εἶχε δὲ τῶν μὲν μακροτέρων πλευρῶν ἑκατέραν ἡ πόλις ἑκατὸν καὶ πεντήκοντα σταδίων, τῶν δὲ βραχυτέρων ἐνενήκοντα … τὸ μὲν γὰρ ὕψος εἶχε τὸ τεῖχος ποδῶν ἑκατόν, τὸ δὲ πλάτος τρισὶν ἅρμασιν ἱππάσιμον ἦν· οἱ δὲ σύμπαντες πύργοι τὸν μὲν ἀριθμὸν ἦσαν χίλιοι καὶ πεντακόσιοι, τὸ δ᾽ ὕψος εἶχον ποδῶν διακοσίων." Oldfather: "he founded on the Euphrates river a city which was well fortified with walls, giving it the form of a rectangle. The longer sides of the city were each one hundred and fifty stades in length, and the shorter ninety." Bichler 2004: 9 (see §2.4): "just to be contrary the city of Ninus, founded by her husband, is located near the River Euphrates. Diodorus seems to follow Ctesias faithfully in his 'error', but he gives the correct placement of Ninus within another source-context (cf. XVII 53,4 and 55,3), while Nicolaus of Damascus … corrected Ctesias' 'error' without any commentary (FGrHist 90 F 3, line 22 f.). Strabo who was probably dependent on Ctesias through some intermediary sources avoided the 'mistake' (cf. XVI 1-3)."

**2.11.5** (obelisk): "καὶ τοῦτον τὸν λίθον ὀβελίσκον τινὲς ὀνομάζουσιν … καὶ τῶν ἑπτὰ θεαμάτων ἀριθμοῦσιν" **[Greek unverified — I quote Oldfather:]** "And this stone is called by some an obelisk from its shape, and they number it among the seven wonders of the world." So Diodorus (or his source) knows a canon of seven that includes something at Babylon *other than* the garden.

**2.13.1-3** (Semiramis' Median gardens). Greek: "Ἡ δὲ Σεμίραμις ἐπειδὴ τοῖς ἔργοις ἐπέθηκε πέρας, ἀνέζευξεν ἐπὶ Μηδίας μετὰ πολλῆς δυνάμεως· καταντήσασα δὲ πρὸς ὄρος τὸ καλούμενον **Βαγίστανον** πλησίον αὐτοῦ κατεστρατοπέδευσε, καὶ κατεσκεύασε παράδεισον, ὃς τὴν μὲν περίμετρον ἦν δώδεκα σταδίων, ἐν πεδίῳ δὲ κείμενος εἶχε πηγὴν μεγάλην, ἐξ ἧς ἀρδεύεσθαι συνέβαινε τὸ φυτουργεῖον. … ἐντεῦθεν δ᾽ ἀναζεύξασα καὶ παραγενομένη πρὸς **Χαύονα** πόλιν τῆς Μηδίας κατενόησεν ἔν τινι μετεώρῳ πεδίῳ πέτραν τῷ τε ὕψει καὶ τῷ μεγέθει καταπληκτικήν. ἐνταῦθ᾽ οὖν ἕτερον παράδεισον ὑπερμεγέθη κατεσκεύασεν, ἐν μέσῳ τὴν πέτραν ἀπολαβοῦσα, καθ᾽ ἣν οἰκοδομήματα πολυτελῆ πρὸς τρυφὴν ἐποίησεν, ἐξ ὧν τά τε κατὰ τὸν παράδεισον ἀπεθεώρει φυτουργεῖα καὶ πᾶσαν τὴν στρατιὰν παρεμβεβληκυῖαν ἐν τῷ πεδίῳ." Oldfather: "she … laid out a park, which had a circumference of twelve stades and, being situated in the plain, contained a great spring … at the city of Chauon in Media, she noticed on a certain high plateau a rock both of striking height and mass. Accordingly, she laid out there another park of great size, putting the rock in the middle of it, and on the rock she erected … some very costly buildings from which she used to look down both upon her plantings in the park and on the whole army encamped on the plain." — Relevant because Ctesias' Semiramis-cycle *does* contain royal parks with elevated pavilions overlooking plantings, in Media; the Babylonian "hanging garden" is emphatically *not* hers (2.10.1 οὐ Σεμιράμιδος).

**Source of 2.10 — the scholarly positions** (secondary; none of the printed discussions was directly accessible):
- Jacoby printed Diod. 2.1.4-28.7 as Ctesias FGrH 688 F 1b, so 2.10 is formally "Ctesias F 1b §10"; Thackeray's Loeb note (1926) still says "quoted from Ctesias in Diodorus". Photius' epitome of the *Persica* (cod. 72) begins with book 7, so there is **no independent Ctesias fragment** for the Babylonian buildings; Nicolaus of Damascus (FGrH 90 F 1-5) is the only other channel **[from memory]**.
- The disclaimers in 2.10.1 ("not of Semiramis but of a *later* Syrian king", "*ὡς προεῖπον, ὕστερον κατεσκευάσθη*", "*φασιν*") show that the paragraph is an insertion into the Ctesian Semiramis narrative; **Bigwood 1980** (*Phoenix* 34: 195-207) argued generally that Diodorus reworked Ctesias with Hellenistic material; **Reade 2000** (*Iraq* 62: 195-217) and **Dalley 2013** derive 2.10 (and Curtius 5.1.31-35) from **Clitarchus**, i.e. from eyewitness Alexander-period reports; Livius.org (J. Lendering, summarising van der Spek 2008): "All our sources can, directly or indirectly, be connected to his [Cleitarchus'] biography of Alexander"; Wikipedia: "Diodorus … seem[s] to have consulted the 4th century BC texts of both Cleitarchus … and Ctesias." **Bichler–Rollinger 2005** (AOAT 325: 153-217) and **Stronk 2010** were not accessible; plinia.net records "some controversy about whether his description … is founded on Ctesias or Clitarchus". Rollinger (in *The World of Berossos*, 2013, per BMCR 2014.05.50) notes the gardens "were first mentioned (by Clitarchus?) after Alexander's conquest of Babylon".
- My assessment: the wall-circuit doublet in 2.7.3 (Ctesias 360 vs Clitarchus 365) proves that Diodorus had Clitarchus open beside Ctesias for the Babylon *ekphrasis*; 2.10's "Persian concubine" and "Syrian king" (both un-Ctesian: Ctesias' Amytis is Median, and Ctesias' Assyrians are "Assyrians") plus the explicit "later than Semiramis" fit a Clitarchan origin better. Nothing in 2.10 requires an eyewitness: the 22-ft walls, 10-ft passages, 16 × 4-ft stone beams and the roofing recipe are the kind of detail a Hellenistic historian could obtain from a Babylonian informant or invent.

### 1c. Strabo, *Geography* 16.1.5 (C 738), with 16.1.2-3

Greek: Perseus doc. 1999.01.0197 (Meineke), https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0197%3Abook%3D16%3Achapter%3D1%3Asection%3D5 [raw_C/strabo_16_1_5_greek.html]. English: H. L. Jones, Loeb VII (1930), via LacusCurtius https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Strabo/16A*.html [raw_C/strabo_16A_jones_lacus.html]; also Hamilton–Falconer (1857) on Perseus doc. 1999.01.0239 [raw_C/strabo_16_1_5_english.html].

> Ἡ δὲ Βαβυλὼν καὶ αὐτὴ μέν ἐστιν ἐν πεδίῳ, τὸν δὲ κύκλον ἔχει τοῦ τείχους τριακοσίων ἑξήκοντα πέντε σταδίων, πάχος δὲ τοῦ τείχους ποδῶν δύο καὶ τριάκοντα, ὕψος δὲ τῶν μὲν μεσοπυργίων πήχεις πεντήκοντα τῶν δὲ πύργων ἑξήκοντα, ἡ δὲ πάροδος τοῖς ἐπὶ τοῦ τείχους ὥστε τέθριππα ἐναντιοδρομεῖν ἀλλήλοις ῥᾳδίως· **διόπερ τῶν ἑπτὰ θεαμάτων λέγεται καὶ τοῦτο καὶ ὁ κρεμαστὸς κῆπος** ἔχων ἐν τετραγώνῳ σχήματι ἑκάστην πλευρὰν τεττάρων πλέθρων· συνέχεται δὲ ψαλιδώμασι καμαρωτοῖς ἐπὶ πεττῶν ἱδρυμένοις κυβοειδῶν ἄλλοις ἐπ᾽ ἄλλοις· οἱ δὲ πεττοὶ κοῖλοι πλήρεις γῆς ὥστε δέξασθαι φυτὰ δένδρων τῶν μεγίστων, ἐξ ὀπτῆς πλίνθου καὶ ἀσφάλτου κατεσκευασμένοι καὶ αὐτοὶ καὶ αἱ ψαλίδες καὶ τὰ καμαρώματα. ἡ δ᾽ ἀνωτάτω στέγη προσβάσεις κλιμακωτὰς ἔχει, **παρακειμένους δ᾽ αὐταῖς καὶ κοχλίας δι᾽ ὧν τὸ ὕδωρ ἀνῆγον εἰς τὸν κῆπον ἀπὸ τοῦ Εὐφράτου συνεχῶς οἱ πρὸς τοῦτο τεταγμένοι.** ὁ γὰρ ποταμὸς διὰ μέσης ῥεῖ τῆς πόλεως σταδιαῖος τὸ πλάτος, **ἐπὶ δὲ τῷ ποταμῷ ὁ κῆπος.** ἔστι δὲ καὶ ὁ τοῦ Βήλου τάφος αὐτόθι, νῦν μὲν κατεσκαμμένος, Ξέρξης δ᾽ αὐτὸν κατέσπασεν, ὥς φασιν …

Jones: "Babylon, too, lies in a plain; and the circuit of its wall is three hundred and eighty-five [MSS; edd. 365] stadia. The thickness of its wall is thirty-two feet; the height thereof between the towers is fifty cubits; that of the towers is sixty cubits; and the passage on top of the wall is such that four-horse chariots can easily pass one another; and it is on this account that this and the hanging garden are called one of the Seven Wonders of the World. The garden is quadrangular in shape, and each side is four plethra in length. It consists of arched vaults, which are situated, one after another, on checkered, cube-like foundations. The checkered foundations, which are hollowed out, are covered so deep with earth that they admit of the largest of trees, having been constructed of baked brick and asphalt — the foundations themselves and the vaults and the arches. The ascent to the uppermost terrace-roofs is made by a stairway; and alongside these stairs there were screws, through which the water was continually conducted up into the garden from the Euphrates by those appointed for this purpose. For the river, a stadium in width, flows through the middle of the city; and the garden is on the bank of the river. Here too is the tomb of Belus, now in ruins, having been demolished by Xerxes, as it is said."

Strabo continues (same section) with the desertion of Babylon after Seleucia's foundation and with the palm-wood/reed-rope/asphalt building customs of Babylonia — details that read like a Seleucid-period (Alexander-historian or Eratosthenic) source; Strabo names no source for the garden. Note (i) the *κοχλίαι* are worked by "*οἱ πρὸς τοῦτο τεταγμένοι*", human labour; (ii) the garden is *ἐπὶ τῷ ποταμῷ*, on the Euphrates; (iii) the structure is of baked brick and asphalt — no stone at all, whereas Berossus has *ἀναλήμματα λίθινα*, Diodorus stone beams, Curtius stone columns and squared stone floors.

**16.1.2-3** (Greek Perseus [raw_C/strabo_16_1_2_greek.html], [raw_C/strabo_16_1_3_greek.html]): "οἱ δ᾽ ἱστοροῦντες τὴν Σύρων ἀρχὴν ὅταν φῶσι Μήδους μὲν ὑπὸ Περσῶν καταλυθῆναι Σύρους δὲ ὑπὸ Μήδων, **οὐκ ἄλλους τινὰς τοὺς Σύρους λέγουσιν ἀλλὰ τοὺς ἐν Βαβυλῶνι καὶ Νίνῳ κατεσκευασμένους τὸ βασίλειον**· ὧν ὁ μὲν Νίνος ἦν ὁ τὴν Νίνον ἐν τῇ Ἀτουρίᾳ κτίσας, ἡ δὲ τούτου γυνή, ἥπερ καὶ διεδέξατο τὸν ἄνδρα, Σεμίραμις, ἧς ἐστι κτίσμα ἡ Βαβυλών." and "Ἡ μὲν οὖν Νίνος πόλις ἠφανίσθη παραχρῆμα μετὰ τὴν τῶν Σύρων κατάλυσιν. πολὺ δὲ μείζων ἦν τῆς Βαβυλῶνος, ἐν πεδίῳ κειμένη τῆς Ἀτουρίας." Hamilton–Falconer: "When the historians of the Syrian empire say that the Medes were overthrown by the Persians, and the Syrians by the Medes, they mean no other Syrians than those who built the royal palaces at Babylon and Nineveh … The city Nineveh was destroyed immediately upon the overthrow of the Syrians. It was much larger than Babylon, and situated in the plain of Aturia." — This is the explicit ancient statement that "Syrian king" = king of the Babylon-and-Nineveh (Assyrian) empire, and that Nineveh "vanished" at once, i.e. was not a place Hellenistic writers expected to see wonders.

### 1d. Q. Curtius Rufus, *Historiae Alexandri Magni* 5.1.24-35

Latin: The Latin Library (Hedicke-derived text, no section numbers) https://www.thelatinlibrary.com/curtius/curtius5.shtml [raw_C/curtius_5_latinlibrary.html], collated with the Latin of J. C. Rolfe's Loeb (1946) as OCR'd on archive.org, https://archive.org/download/quintus-curtius-rufus-history-of-alexander-loeb-two-in-one-volume-rolfe/…_djvu.txt [raw_C/curtius_rolfe_loeb_djvu.txt, ll. 16150-16330], which supplies section numbers and the translation. Yardley's Penguin translation was not accessible.

> **(24)** Ceterum ipsius urbis pulchritudo ac vetustas non regis modo, sed etiam omnium oculos in semet haud inmerito convertit. Samiramis eam condiderat, non, ut plerique credidere, Belus, cuius regia ostenditur. **(25)** Murus instructus laterculo coctili bitumine interlitus spatium XXX et duorum pedum latitudine amplectitur: quadrigae inter se occurrentes sine periculo commeare dicuntur. Altitudo muri L cubitorum eminet spatio; turres denis pedibus quam murus altiores sunt. **(26)** Totius operis ambitus CCCLXVIII stadia conplectitur … **(28)** Euphrates interfluit magnaeque molis crepidinibus coercetur … **(29)** … Pons lapideus flumini inpositus iungit urbem; hic quoque inter mirabilia Orientis opera numeratus est … **(31)** Arcem quoque ambitu XX stadia conplexam habent. XXX pedes in terram turrium fundamenta demissa sunt, ad LXXX summum munimenti fastigium pervenit. **(32) Super arcem, vulgatum Graecorum fabulis miraculum, pensiles horti sunt, summam murorum altitudinem aequantes multarumque arborum umbra et proceritate amoeni.** **(33)** Saxo pilae, quae totum onus sustinent [Rolfe: sustinet Bentley], instructae sunt; super pilas lapide quadrato solum stratum est, patiens terrae, quam altam iniciunt, et humoris, quo rigant terras: adeoque validas arbores sustinent moles, ut stipites earum VIII cubitorum spatium crassitudine aequent, in L pedum altitudinem emineant frugiferaeque aeque sint ut si terra sua alerentur. **(34)** Et cum vetustas non opera solum manu facta, sed etiam ipsam naturam paulatim exedendo perimat, haec moles, quae tot arborum radicibus premitur tantique nemoris pondere onerata est, inviolata durat: quippe XX pedes lati parietes sustinent XI pedum intervallo distantes, ut procul visentibus silvae montibus suis inminere videantur. **(35) Syriae regem Babylone regnantem hoc opus esse molitum memoriae proditum est, amore coniugis victum, quae, desiderio nemorum silvarumque in campestribus locis, virum conpulit amoenitatem naturae genere huius operis imitari.** (36) Diutius in hac urbe quam usquam constitit rex …

Rolfe: "(31) They have a citadel also, surrounded by a circuit of twenty stadia. The foundations of its towers are sunk thirty feet in the earth, and the top of its fortification rises to a height of eighty feet. (32) On the top of the citadel are the hanging gardens, a wonder celebrated in the tales of the Greeks, equalling the extreme height of the walls and made charming by the shade of many lofty trees. (33) Columns of stone were set up to sustain the whole work, and on these was laid a floor of squared blocks, strong enough to hold the earth which is thrown upon it to a great depth, as well as the water with which they irrigate the soil; and the structure supports trees of such great size that the thickness of their trunks equals a measure of eight cubits. They tower to a height of fifty feet, and they yield as much fruit as if they were growing in their native soil. (34) And although lapse of time gradually undermines and destroys, not only works made by the hand of man, but also those of Nature herself, this huge structure, although worked upon by the roots of so many trees and loaded with the weight of so great a forest, endures unchanged; for it is upheld by cross walls twenty feet wide at intervals of eleven feet, so that to those who look upon them from a distance real woods seem to be overhanging their native mountains. (35) There is a tradition that a king of Syria, who ruled in Babylon, undertook this mighty task, induced by love for his wife, who from longing for the woods and groves prevailed upon her husband to imitate in the level country the charm of Nature by a work of this kind." Rolfe's notes: "Syria for Assyria. Cf. Livy xxx. 14. 6-7"; "Cf. Diod. ii. 10; also on other details"; "It is named among the Seven Wonders of the World by Gell. x. 18. 4, note" [Gellius only names the Mausoleum — Rolfe's cross-reference is to a note **[unverified]**].

Observations: (i) *vulgatum Graecorum fabulis miraculum* — Curtius himself flags the garden as a Greek *fabula*; (ii) *super arcem* — on top of the citadel/palace-fortress, which is described as a separate 20-stade circuit; (iii) "trees eight cubits thick, fifty feet high, fruiting as if in their native soil", and the phrase *inviolata durat* — present tense, implying the source described the garden as still standing (Alexander's day, or Curtius' own?); (iv) *XX pedes lati parietes … XI pedum intervallo* against Diodorus' 22-ft walls and 10-ft passages — the same source-figure (Clitarchus?) transmitted with small discrepancies; (v) *Syriae regem Babylone regnantem* — an Assyrian king "reigning in Babylon"; no Nebuchadnezzar, no Semiramis; the wife longs for *nemora silvaeque*, not mountains as such.

### 1e. "Philo of Byzantium", *De septem orbis spectaculis* 1 (the Paradoxographer, not the 3rd-c. BC engineer)

**Edition used:** R. Hercher, *Aeliani … Porphyrii … Philonis Byzantii libellus de septem orbis spectaculis* (Paris, Didot 1858), Greek with Didot's Latin version, fetched as archive.org OCR, https://archive.org/download/aelianidevarihi00hercgoog/aelianidevarihi00hercgoog_djvu.txt [raw_C/hercher_philo_djvu.txt, ll. 107636-107830]. The OCR is poor (κ read as χ, καί as "xal", ὁ as "6"); the Greek below is my normalisation and should be checked against Brodersen 1992 (Greek/German, not accessible) or Orelli 1816 (not fetched). Chapter and paragraph numbers are Hercher's.

Greek (§1-5, OCR-normalised): "Ὁ καλούμενος Κῆπος Κρεμαστὸς ὑπέργειον ἔχων τὴν φυτείαν ἐν ἀέρι γεωργεῖται, τοῖς ῥιζώμασι τῶν δένδρων ὑπεράνωθεν ὠροφωκὼς τὴν ἄρουραν. Λίθινοι μὲν γὰρ κίονες ὑφεστήκασιν καὶ πᾶς ὁ κατάγειος τόπος ἐστὶ διὰ στυλογλύφων. (2) Φοίνικες ἰδίᾳ κεῖνται δοκοί, στενὴν παντάπασιν τὴν ἀνάμεσον ἀλλήλων χώραν ἀπολείπουσαι. Τὸ δὲ ξύλον τοῦτο μόνον τῶν ἄλλων οὐ σήπεται, βρεχόμενον δὲ καὶ τοῖς βάρεσι θλιβόμενον ἄνω κυρτοῦται τρέφει τε τὰς διαφύσεις τῶν ῥιζῶν ἑαυτῷ προσλαμβανόμενον τοῖς ἰδίοις ἀραιώμασιν τὴν ἔξωθεν σύμφυσιν. (3) Ἐπὶ τούτων πολλὴ καὶ βαθεῖα κατακέχυται γῆ καὶ τὸ λοιπὸν τὰ πλατύφυλλα καὶ μάλιστα κηπευόμενα τῶν δένδρων ἐπιπέφυκε ποικίλαι τε καὶ παντοῖαι φύσεις ἀνθέων … Γεωργεῖται δ᾽ ὁ τόπος ὡς ἐπ᾽ ἀρούραις, καὶ τὰς ἐργασίας τῆς μοσχείας κομίζεται τῇ χέρσῳ παραπλησίως· τήν τε ἀρόσιμον ὑπὲρ κεφαλῆς εἶναι τῶν ἐπὶ τοῖς ὑποστύλοις περιπατούντων. (4) Πατουμένης δὲ τῆς ἄνωθεν ἐπιφανείας, ὡς ἐπὶ τῶν βαθυγειοτάτων τόπων ἀκίνητος καὶ παρθένος ἡ πρὸς τοῖς ὀροφώμασιν μένει γῆ. Αἱ δὲ τῶν ὑδάτων ἀγωγαὶ τὰς πηγὰς ἐξ ὑπερδεξίων ἔχουσαι τόπων τῇ μὲν εὐθύδρομον καὶ κατάντη ποιοῦνται τὴν ῥύσιν, τῇ δ᾽ ἀναθλιβόμεναι κοχλιοειδῶς ἀνατροχάζουσιν, ἀνάγκαις ὀργανικαῖς τὸν ἕλικα τῶν μηχανημάτων περιτροχάζουσαι, εἰς δὲ πυκνὰς καὶ μεγάλας ἐξαιρόμεναι κρήνας ὅλον ἐπάρδουσι τὸν κῆπον μεθύσκουσαι τῶν φυτῶν τὰς κατὰ βάθους ῥίζας καὶ νοτερὰν τηροῦσιν τὴν ἄρουραν, ὅθεν εἰκότως ἀειθαλής ἐστιν ἡ πόα … (5) Ἄδιψος γὰρ ἡ ῥίζα τηρουμένη τὴν παρατροχάζουσαν τῶν ὑδάτων νοτίαν ἀναθηλάζει … [two words illegible in OCR] καὶ βεβηκυῖαν ἀσφαλῶς τὴν φυὴν τῶν δένδρων συμφυλάσσει. Σπάταλον καὶ βασιλικὸν τὸ φιλοτέχνημα καὶ τὸ πλεῖστον βίαιον, τὸν πόνον τῆς γεωργίας ὑπὲρ κεφαλῆς κρεμάσαι τῶν θεωρούντων."

Didot Latin (same OCR, verbatim): "Qui pensilis vocatur hortus, sublatas a terra plantas habens, in aere culturam capit. Quippe radices arborum in altum suspensae contignationis vice terram operiunt. … Primum lapideae columnae sustinendae moli universae substructae sunt … (2) Trabes deinde disponuntur ex palmis angusto admodum intervallo disjunctae. Hoc enim ligni genus unum ex omnibus cariem non sentit … (4) At aquarum scatebrae ex eminentibus manantes fontibus partim recto cursu per prona labuntur, partim vi elisae per flexus et spiras in altum emicant, organorum quorundam impulsionibus per machinarum anfractus circumvolutae. Sic in crebra et ampla conceptacula sursum collectae totum irrigant hortum … (5) … Amoenissimae voluptatis et regalis munificentiae prorsus istud est opus, in quo vis est facta naturae dum agricolationis opera supra spectantium capita suspensa praebetur."

English (§4, D. Oates in Finkel, "The Hanging Gardens of Babylon", in Clayton & Price 1988: 46, as reprinted in Dalley & Oleson, *Technology and Culture* 44 (2003) 12 [raw_C/dalley_oleson_2003.txt]): "Streams of water issuing from springs higher up flow partly downward in a direct course, partly are forced upwards through bends and spirals to gush out higher up, being pushed through the twists of these devices by mechanical forces. So, brought together in frequent and commodious sources at a high level, these waters irrigate the whole garden…." The rest of the chapter is not available to me in a published translation; my paraphrase: a garden "hanging" above ground, cultivated in mid-air, on stone columns and a fully colonnaded undercroft; palm-trunk beams close-set (palm alone does not rot and bows upward under wet load); deep earth over them; broad-leaved garden trees and flowers; ploughable land over the heads of those walking in the colonnade; "a luxurious and royal work of art, and above all a violent one, to hang the labour of agriculture over the spectators' heads".

**Observations.** (i) Philo gives no city, no king, no river, no wife and no dimensions — nothing that ties the garden to Babylon *or* Nineveh; it is the only description built on structural engineering (columns, palm beams, soil depth) rather than on Alexander-historian measurements. (ii) The water words are *κοχλιοειδῶς* ("screw-wise"), *τὸν ἕλικα τῶν μηχανημάτων* ("the spiral/helix of the machines") and *ἀνάγκαις ὀργανικαῖς* ("by mechanical compulsion") — the only text apart from Strabo to imply screws, and it does so with the ordinary late-Greek vocabulary for a spiral, not with Strabo's technical *κοχλίας*. (iii) *ἐξ ὑπερδεξίων … τόπων* "springs from higher ground" is un-Babylonian and the one detail in the corpus that reads more naturally at Nineveh (Dalley's aqueduct argument); but Philo's account is a rhetorical ecphrasis of an ideal *pensilis hortus*, not a report. (iv) Date: the *De septem spectaculis* is a work of the 4th-6th c. AD by its language (Kroll, *RE* 20.1: 54-55 "Philon (49)"; Brodersen 1992: 15; Dalley & Oleson 2003: 10 "a paradoxographer and rhetorician of the fourth century A.D."; Gainsford "C. 4-5 CE"); the date "c. 250 BC" in Finkel (Clayton & Price 1988: 45) and much popular literature confuses him with Philo the Mechanicus (Dalley & Oleson: "unaccountably"). The text is therefore later than every other testimony and cannot be used as "early Hellenistic" evidence for screws.

### 1f. The wonder-lists

**Antipater of Sidon, AP 9.58** (2nd/1st c. BC), Greek from el.wikisource (Palatine Anthology IX 58) [raw_C/anthology_9_58_el_wikisource.html]: "Καὶ κραναᾶς Βαβυλῶνος ἐπίδρομον ἅρμασι τεῖχος / καὶ τὸν ἐπ᾽ Ἀλφειῷ Ζᾶνα κατηυγασάμην, / κάπων τ᾽ αἰώρημα, καὶ Ἠελίοιο κολοσσόν, / καὶ μέγαν αἰπεινᾶν πυραμίδων κάματον, / μνᾶμά τε Μαυσώλοιο πελώριον· ἀλλ᾽ ὅτ᾽ ἐσεῖδον / Ἀρτέμιδος νεφέων ἄχρι θέοντα δόμον, / κεῖνα μὲν ἠμαύρωτο, καὶ ἦν· 'Ἴδε, νόσφιν Ὀλύμπου / Ἅλιος οὐδέν πω τοῖον ἐπηυγάσατο.'" Paton, Loeb *Greek Anthology* III (1917) [raw_C/paton_vol3b_djvu.txt, l. 1705]: "I have set eyes on the wall of lofty Babylon on which is a road for chariots, and the statue of Zeus by the Alpheus, and the hanging gardens, and the colossus of the Sun, and the huge labour of the high pyramids, and the vast tomb of Mausolus; but when I saw the house of Artemis that mounted to the clouds, those other marvels lost their brilliancy…" Note: *κάπων αἰώρημα* — "the suspension/swing of gardens" (Doric κᾶπος = κῆπος) — is anonymous and placeless; the wall is "of Babylon", the gardens are not so labelled. This is the earliest intact list (Gainsford 2017).

**Gregory of Nazianzus, AP 8.177** (4th c. AD), Paton, Loeb II (1917) [raw_C/paton_vol2_greekanthology0000wrpa_djvu.txt, ll. 24725-24790; Greek OCR badly garbled, reconstructed from it — **verify**]: "Ἑπτὰ βίοιο πέλει τάδε θαύματα· τεῖχος, ἄγαλμα, / κῆποι, πυραμίδες, νηός, ἄγαλμα, τάφος· / ὄγδοον ἔσκον ἔγωγε πελώριος ἐνθάδε τύμβος …" — Paton: "These are the seven wonders of the world: a wall, a statue, gardens, pyramids, a temple, another statue, a tomb. The eighth was I, this vast tomb…", with his note "(1) The wall of Babylon, (2) The statue of Zeus at Olympia…". The order wall–statue–gardens–pyramids–temple–statue–tomb is Antipater's canon re-sorted; again *κῆποι* without a city. Gregory's prose list, *Or.* 43.63 (funeral oration on Basil), NPNF II.7 tr. Browne & Swallow, New Advent [raw_C/gregory_or43_newadvent.html]: "Why should I compare with this work Thebes of the seven portals, and the Egyptian Thebes, and the walls of Babylon, and the Carian tomb of Mausolus, and the Pyramids, and the bronze without weight of the Colossus, or the size and beauty of shrines that are no more…" (Greek PG 36 not fetched) — here the wall, not the garden.

**Latin lists — all have Babylon's wall, none the garden:**
- [Hyginus], *Fabulae* 223 "Septem opera mirabilia" (1st-2nd c. AD?), lingualatina.github.io text [raw_C/hyginus_lll_223_218.html]: "Ephesi Dianae templum … Monimentum regis Mausoli … Rhodi signum Solis aeneum … signum Iovis Olympii … domus Cyri regis in Ecbatanis, quam fecit Memnon … **Murus in Babylonia, quem fecit Semiramis Dercetis filia latere cocto et sulpure ferro uinctum, latum pedes xxv altum pedes lx in circuitu stadiorum ccc.** pyramides in Aegypto…"
- L. Ampelius, *Liber memorialis* 8.16-25 (2nd-3rd c. AD?), Wölfflin 1873 OCR [raw_C/ampelius_woelfflin1873_djvu.txt, ll. 2405-2440] and ToposText [raw_C/ampelius_topostext.html]: "**Murus intus-medio Babyloniae, quem Memnon aedificavit lapide cocto et sulfure, ferro intermixtus, ubi sunt iuncturae. Latitudo eius cubitis triginta, altus cubitis centum et triginta: cingitur milia passuum triginta. Hunc coepit Semiramis, filius eius perfecit.**" (Ampelius' chapter is a rag-bag of *miracula*, not a list of seven.)
- Cassiodorus, *Variae* 7.15.4 (early 6th c.), Latin Library [raw_C/cassiodorus_variae7_latinlibrary.html]: "Ferunt prisci saeculi narratores fabricarum septem tantum terris adtributa miracula: Ephesi Dianae templum: regis Mausoli pulcherrimum monumentum … Rhodi solis aeneum signum … Iovis Olympici simulacrum … Cyri Medorum regis domus, quam Memnon arte prodiga illigatis auro lapidibus fabricavit: **Babyloniae muri, quos Samiramis regina latere cocto sulpure ferroque construxit**: pyramides in Aegypto…" — the same seven as Hyginus, with Cyrus' house in place of the garden.
- Gregory of Tours, *De cursu stellarum* 1-7 (late 6th c.), Haase 1853 OCR [raw_C/gregory_tours_decursu_haase_djvu.txt, ll. 387-545]: Noah's ark; "SECUNDUM ponimus Babyloniam, cuius iuxta Orosium haec est positio: 'in campi planitie undique conspicua … murorum eius uix credibilis relatu firmitas et magnitudo, latitudine cubitorum L, altitudine qua ter tantum…'"; Solomon's temple; "sepulchrum regis Persici ex uno lapide amethysto"; the Colossus; the theatre at Heraclea; the Pharus Alexandrina.
- ps.-Bede, *De septem mundi miraculis* (PL 90: 961-2), adastra.plgo.org [raw_C/psbede_adastra.html]: Capitolium Romae; Pharus Alexandrina; the Colossus; the iron Bellerophon suspended by magnets; the theatre at Heraclea; the bath of Apollonius of Tyana; "templum Dianae, super quatuor columnas" — no Babylon at all.
- Vibius Sequester (*De fluminibus*) is a geographical glossary, not a wonders-list; I found no wonders entry [not fetched — unverified]. Martial and Pliny, see 1g.

### 1g. Other mentions

- **Pliny, NH 19.49**, Mayhoff text at LacusCurtius [raw_C/pliny_19_latin_lacus.html]: "Ab his superest reverti ad hortorum curam … quoniam antiquitas nihil prius mirata est quam Hesperidum hortos ac regum Adonidis et Alcinoi itemque pensiles, **sive illos Semiramis sive Assyriae rex Syrus fecit**, de quorum opere alio volumine dicemus." (Bostock-Riley's rendering of this sentence was not in the Perseus page I fetched, so I quote none.) **NH 36.94** [raw_C/pliny_36_latin_lacus.html]: "Legitur et pensilis hortus, immo vero totum oppidum Aegyptiae Thebae, exercitus armatos subter educere solitis regibus nullo oppidanorum sentiente; etiamnum hoc minus mirum quam quod flumine medium oppidum interfluente" — the promised "other volume" turns out to mention only a *hanging garden* (or rather a whole "hanging" town) at Egyptian Thebes; the Babylonian garden is never described, though the Babylon entry at **6.121-122** [raw_C/pliny_6_latin_lacus.html] gives walls ("LX p. amplexa II muris ducenos pedes altis, quinquagenos latis … interfluo Euphrate, mirabili opere utroque. durat adhuc ibi Iovis Beli templum") and adds "cetero ad solitudinem rediit exhausta vicinitate Seleuciae" — silent on any garden.
- **Martial, *Spect.* 1.1-2** [raw_C/martial_spect_latinlibrary.html]: "Barbara pyramidum sileat miracula Memphis, / Assyrius iactet nec Babylona labor" — Babylon as a "wonder" without specifying wall or garden (*Assyrius labor*, again Assyria for Babylon).
- **Propertius 3.11.21-26** [raw_C/propertius3_latinlibrary.html]: "Persarum statuit Babylona Semiramis urbem, / ut solidum cocto tolleret aggere opus, / et duo in adversum mitti per moenia currus / nec possent tacto stringere ab axe latus; / duxit et Euphraten medium, quam condidit, arcis…" — wall and river, no garden.
- **Arrian, *Anab.* 7.25.3** (Royal *Ephemerides*), el.wikisource [raw_C/arrian_7_el_wikisource.html]: "ἐκεῖθεν δὲ κατακομισθῆναι ἐπὶ τῆς κλίνης ὡς ἐπὶ τὸν ποταμόν, καὶ πλοίου ἐπιβάντα διαπλεῦσαι πέραν τοῦ ποταμοῦ ἐς τὸν παράδεισον, κἀκεῖ αὖθις λουσάμενον ἀναπαύεσθαι" (Chinnock: "sailed across the river to the park") — the dying Alexander is taken *across* the Euphrates to a *παράδεισος*: a royal garden at Babylon on the bank opposite the palace, unconnected with anything "hanging".
- **Not found / not verifiable here:** Onesicritus (FGrH 134) is not quoted for the garden by any extant author (Wikipedia's suggestion that he is Strabo's source is a modern guess); Clitarchus F 10 = Diodorus 2.7.3 concerns Semiramis' wall, not the garden; Ctesias F 1b = Diodorus 2.1-28 as a whole (Jacoby) — the garden paragraph is normally excluded from Ctesias (see 1b); Cicero, Athenaeus, Aelian, Lucian, Valerius Maximus and Solinus: I could not locate any passage naming the Babylonian garden and quote none [unverified negative; Solinus 56.2 on Babylon's walls not fetched].

## 2. The silences and the authenticity of the Berossus sentence

**Herodotus 1.178-187** (Greek Perseus 1999.01.0125 and el.wikisource [raw_C/herodotus_1_178_greek.html; herodotus_1_el_wikisource.html]) describes Babylon at length — "τῆς δὲ Ἀσσυρίης ἐστὶ μὲν κου καὶ ἄλλα πολίσματα μεγάλα πολλά, τὸ δὲ ὀνομαστότατον καὶ ἰσχυρότατον καὶ ἔνθα σφι Νίνου ἀναστάτου γενομένης τὰ βασιλήια κατεστήκεε, ἦν Βαβυλών" (1.178.1); walls of 50 royal cubits' breadth and 200 height (1.178.3); the two royal palaces and the Belus temple (1.181); the two queens Semiramis and Nitocris (1.184-187) — and a search of the whole book yields no κῆπος, παράδεισος or κρεμαστός. Herodotus visited (or claims to have visited) Babylon under the Persians a century after Nebuchadnezzar. **Xenophon, *Anab.* 3.4.7-12** [raw_C/xenophon_anab_3_4_greek_full.html]: "ἐνταῦθα πόλις ἦν ἐρήμη μεγάλη, ὄνομα δ᾽ αὐτῇ ἦν Λάρισα· ᾤκουν δ᾽ αὐτὴν τὸ παλαιὸν Μῆδοι … (10) πρὸς τεῖχος ἔρημον μέγα … ὄνομα δὲ ἦν τῇ πόλει Μέσπιλα· Μῆδοι δ᾽ αὐτήν ποτε ᾤκουν" — Nimrud and Nineveh in 401 BC, deserted, misattributed to the Medes, no garden; *Cyrop.* 7.5 (capture of Babylon, 86 sections) has no garden vocabulary either. **Ctesias** (Photius cod. 72, *Persica* epitome from book 7; Diodorus 2 for books 1-6): nothing on a hanging garden survives under his name, and the *Persica* fragments were not fetched [from memory]. **Arrian 3.16.3-5** (entry 331 BC) and **7.17-25** (the Belus temple, canals, Alexander's death) [raw_C/arrian_3_el_wikisource.html; arrian_7_*]: no hanging garden — only the *παράδεισος* of 7.25.3 above. **Diodorus 17.64.3-4** [raw_C/diodorus_17_64_greek.html]: Alexander "κατήντησε μετὰ πάσης τῆς δυνάμεως εἰς Βαβυλῶνα … πλείους δὲ τῶν τριάκοντα ἡμερῶν ἐνδιέτριψε τῇ πόλει" — thirty days in Babylon and not a word of the garden that the same author had described in book 2. **Pliny 6.121-123**: silent (above). Nothing survives from Callisthenes, Aristobulus, Nearchus or Ptolemy about it.

**Berossus versus Babylon.** Josephus' Berossus paragraph (1a) lists Nebuchadnezzar's works in the sequence of the king's own "East India House" inscription (walls, Esagila, palace built in fifteen days, etc.); the garden is the one item with no cuneiform counterpart, and no cuneiform text from Babylon — including the topographical series *Tintir* — mentions a hanging garden (van der Spek 2008, as summarised at Livius.org [raw_C/livius_hanging_gardens.html]: "The similarity between the Berossus fragment quoted by Josephus through Polyhistor and the East India House Inscription is so striking that it is impossible that Berossus does not quote (a copy of) it. This leaves us with only three possibilities: Josephus added information from Cleitarchus to information he found in Polyhistor (unlikely…); Polyhistor added information from Cleitarchus to Berossus (likely…); Berossus added information from Cleitarchus to the East India House Inscription … it seems very likely that the Hanging Gardens are in fact Cleitarchus' fantastic description of the royal palace in Babylon"). Dalley 1994 (*Iraq* 56) argued that "Josephus or his source wrongly attributed to Berossus a passage about the Hanging Gardens" and that Abydenus' parallel "may be attributed correctly to Berossos but be corrupt in having the name of Nebuchadnezzar substituted for the name of [Sennacherib]" (quoted in Bichler 2004 n. 49 [raw_C/rollinger_assyria_classical.txt]); in *The Mystery of the Hanging Garden* (2013, ch. 3 — not accessible) she develops this into the claim that the whole Greek tradition transferred Sennacherib's garden to Babylon. Against this, Bichler 2004: 19-20: "Berossus remains the only one to attribute their construction to King Nebuchadnezzar … The crucial point does not lie in the location of the Hanging Gardens nor in the romantic nature of the story … There is another problem: the combination of Astyages as a Median satrap under the rule of Nabopolassaros and a princess named Amytis" — i.e. the Median-marriage frame is itself Ctesianic; Burstein 1978: 27 n. 106 ("Berossus was catering to the interests of his Greek readers") and Reade 2000: 200 ("It was the failure to recognize the contribution of Nebuchadnezzar … that especially offended Berossus") accept the sentence as Berossan. Points the texts themselves settle: (i) the sentence stands in *both* Josephan quotations and in Syncellus, so it was in Alexander Polyhistor's Berossus by the 1st c. BC at latest; (ii) Eusebius *PE* 9.40 omits it but *PE* 9.41 (Abydenus) has an independent, wife-less version, and the Armenian *Chronicle* names the wife "Amuhean" — so the garden was in Polyhistor's Abydenus too; (iii) the name Amytis is nowhere in the Greek Josephus, only in the Armenian; (iv) Abydenus' wording (*τὸν κρεμαστὸν κῆπον … κατασκευάσαι*, water from the Euphrates/Armakales, a "lake" with sluices) is not simply copied from Josephus' Berossus and may descend via Megasthenes (FGrH 715 F 1: the Armenian Eusebius cites Megasthenes' *Indica* book 4 alongside Abydenus — Gainsford 2018 [raw_C/kiwihellenist_hanging_gardens.html]). The dispute is therefore between "Berossus wrote it to please Greeks who already believed in Clitarchus' garden" and "Polyhistor (or Megasthenes) interpolated it"; nothing in the manuscript tradition of Josephus supports the latter, and De Breucker's BNJ 680 F 8 commentary (not accessible) is reported to treat the sentence as Berossan but Greek-oriented [unverified].

## 3. Diagnostics: what the Greek and Latin texts can and cannot say about Nineveh vs Babylon

### 3a. Who built it, for whom

| Source | Builder | Beneficiary | City / river |
|---|---|---|---|
| Berossus ap. Jos. *AJ* 10.226 / *Ap.* 1.141; Syncellus | Ναβουχοδονόσορος | wife "τεθραμμένην ἐν τοῖς κατὰ Μηδίαν τόποις" (Armenian: Amuhean) | "ἐν τοῖς βασιλείοις τούτοις" — the Babylon palace |
| Abydenus ap. Eus. *PE* 9.41.6; Arm. *Chron.* (with Megasthenes) | Nebuchadnezzar | none (PE) / Median wife (Arm.) | Babylon; water from Euphrates/Armakales |
| Diodorus 2.10.1 | "οὐ Σεμιράμιδος, ἀλλά τινος ὕστερον **Σύρου** βασιλέως" | "παλλακή … οὖσαν τὸ γένος Περσίδα", longing for mountain meadows | "παρὰ τὴν ἀκρόπολιν", water "ἐκ τοῦ ποταμοῦ" |
| Curtius 5.1.35 | "**Syriae** regem Babylone regnantem" | *coniunx* longing for *nemora silvaeque* | "super arcem" at Babylon |
| Strabo 16.1.5 | none | none | Babylon; "ἐπὶ δὲ τῷ ποταμῷ ὁ κῆπος"; screws "ἀπὸ τοῦ Εὐφράτου" |
| Philo 1 | none | none | none; springs "ἐξ ὑπερδεξίων τόπων" |
| Pliny 19.49 | "sive … Semiramis sive **Assyriae rex Syrus**" | — | — |
| Antipater; Gregory Naz. | none | — | none (only the *wall* is "of Babylon") |
| Hyginus 223; Cassiodorus 7.15.4; Ampelius 8.22 (the wall) | Semiramis / Memnon | — | Babylon |

Only the Berossus-Abydenus-Megasthenes line names Nebuchadnezzar (Bichler 2004: 19: "Berossus remains the only one to attribute their construction to King Nebuchadnezzar"). The Alexander-derived line says a **later Assyrian king ruling in Babylon** — a formula that, in Ctesias' scheme where "Assyria" runs unbroken from Ninus to Sardanapalus and Nebuchadnezzar has no place, fits any Sargonid who held Babylon (Sennacherib, Esarhaddon, Ashurbanipal) as easily as it fits Nebuchadnezzar; Rolfe's "Syria for Assyria" and Strabo 16.1.2 ("οἱ Σύροι … οἱ ἐν Βαβυλῶνι καὶ Νίνῳ τὸ βασίλειον καταστησάμενοι") show that the Greek word covers both. This ambiguity, not any explicit statement, is what Dalley's relocation exploits.

### 3b. Fabric, dimensions, water — and the fit with Nineveh

| Feature | Berossus | Diodorus 2.10 | Curtius 5.1 | Strabo 16.1.5 | Philo 1 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plan | "ἀναλήμματα λίθινα ὑψηλά", look "ὁμοιοτάτην τοῖς ὄρεσι" | square, "ἑκάστη πλευρὰ τεττάρων πλέθρων", rising like a theatre ("θεατροειδῆ") | on the citadel, "summam murorum altitudinem aequantes" | "ἐν τετραγώνῳ σχήματι ἑκάστην πλευρὰν τεττάρων πλέθρων", vaulted arches on cube piers | columns; palm-trunk beams; deep earth |
| Height / walls | — | top terrace 50 cubits; walls 22 ft; passages 10 ft; stone beams 16 ft | walls 20 ft, 11 ft apart | tiers "ἄλλοις ἐπ᾽ ἄλλοις" | — |
| Water-proofing | — | reed + asphalt, double baked brick in gypsum, lead sheets | squared-stone floors | baked brick and asphalt | palm beams "οὐ σήπεται" |
| Water-lift | — | "ὄργανα δι᾽ ὧν ἀνεσπᾶτο πλῆθος ὕδατος ἐκ τοῦ ποταμοῦ", hidden "διατομαί" | none mentioned | "κοχλίαι δι᾽ ὧν τὸ ὕδωρ ἀνῆγον … ἀπὸ τοῦ Εὐφράτου … οἱ πρὸς τοῦτο τεταγμένοι" | "κοχλιοειδῶς … τὸν ἕλικα τῶν μηχανημάτων"; springs on higher ground |
| Trees | "δένδρεσι παντοδαποῖς" | "δένδρα παμμεγέθη" | 8 cubits thick, 50 ft high | "δένδρων τῶν μεγίστων" | broad-leaved, flowers, evergreen |

Fit with the Nineveh dossier (Sennacherib's "palace without rival" texts with their water-raising device that Dalley reads as a bronze screw; the Jerwan aqueduct and Khinis canal; Ashurbanipal's garden relief BM 124939 with an aqueduct on arches and a pillared pavilion): the Greek texts offer three genuine points of contact — Strabo's *κοχλίαι*, Philo's *ἕλιξ* and *ὑπερδέξιοι πηγαί*, and Strabo's/Diodorus' arched masonry which resembles the relief's arcaded aqueduct — and Berossus' "made to look like mountains" echoes Sennacherib's garden "like the Amanus" [Assyrian wording from memory — outside my brief]. Against them: (i) every text that names a place says Babylon and the Euphrates, and Strabo's screws are worked by men from the river, not gravity-fed; (ii) no Greek or Latin text mentions bronze, an aqueduct, or Nineveh; (iii) Diodorus' *ὄργανα*/*διατομαί* need not be screws at all (Dalley & Oleson 2003: 12: "might imply a vertical lift by means of ropes"), and the same authors admit "Only the passage in Strabo is early enough and clear enough to carry some authority, and yet there is no guarantee that the water screws he mentions appeared in his source or that the source itself predates Archimedes" (p. 14); (iv) the 4-plethra square and the 20/22-ft walls are the numbers of a Hellenistic eyewitness-style description (Clitarchus) of something at Babylon, and Curtius' *inviolata durat* presupposes a standing structure there; (v) Philo's columns-and-palm-beams recall the relief's pillared walkway (Dalley & Oleson n. 34), but Philo is 4th-6th c. AD and describes no place. In short, the classical dossier is consistent with a real terraced palace garden at Babylon described by Alexander's companions and afterwards decorated with Ctesianic romance (Median/Persian wife) and, in Strabo/Philo, with Archimedean screws; it is *also* consistent with Dalley's transfer hypothesis, but supplies no positive statement for it.

### 3c. Babylon/Nineveh confusion in the Greek tradition (all quoted above)

Diodorus 2.3.2 (Ctesias): Ninus founds Nineveh "παρὰ τὸν Εὐφράτην ποταμόν"; Diodorus 2.7-9: Semiramis founds Babylon; Herodotus 1.178.1: Babylon is where "Νίνου ἀναστάτου γενομένης τὰ βασιλήια κατεστήκεε" of Assyria, and 1.184 promises the kings of Babylon "ἐν τοῖσι Ἀσσυρίοισι λόγοισι"; Xenophon *Anab.* 3.4.7-12: Nimrud = "Λάρισα … ᾤκουν δ᾽ αὐτὴν τὸ παλαιὸν Μῆδοι", Nineveh = "Μέσπιλα· Μῆδοι δ᾽ αὐτήν ποτε ᾤκουν"; Strabo 16.1.2-3: the "Syrians" of the historians "are none other than those who set up the royal seat at Babylon and Ninus", and Nineveh lay in "Aturia"; Curtius 5.1.35 "Syriae regem Babylone regnantem"; Pliny 19.49 "Assyriae rex Syrus", 6.121 "reliqua pars Mesopotamiae Assyriaeque Babylonia appellata est"; Martial "Assyrius … labor"; Judith 1:1 "Nebuchadnezzar, who reigned over the Assyrians in Nineveh" [Septuagint, from memory — not fetched]. Nineveh had been ἐρήμη since 612 and was mis-labelled by 401; a Greek of 331 could attach any Assyrian marvel he had heard of to Babylon, the only Mesopotamian capital he saw standing. This is the strongest *textual* support for relocation — and it is inferential.

### 3d. Where the Alexander historians put it

Diodorus: "παρὰ τὴν ἀκρόπολιν", water "ἐκ τοῦ ποταμοῦ"; Curtius: "super arcem" (the citadel with a 20-stade circuit, 5.1.31); Strabo: "ἐπὶ δὲ τῷ ποταμῷ ὁ κῆπος", screws "ἀπὸ τοῦ Εὐφράτου"; Berossus: inside "these palaces"; Abydenus: fed from the Euphrates via the Armakales canal. All four independent phrasings place it in the palace-citadel on the Euphrates bank — exactly where Koldewey's Southern Palace and the river-side Western Outwork lie. Arrian (from the *Ephemerides*) knows only a *παράδεισος* "πέραν τοῦ ποταμοῦ" (7.25.3), reached by boat, and never a κρεμαστὸς κῆπος; Diodorus 17.64 and Arrian 3.16, narrating Alexander's month in Babylon, are silent. The silence of Arrian's sources (Ptolemy, Aristobulus) against the garrulity of the Clitarchan "vulgate" (Curtius' *vulgatum Graecorum fabulis miraculum*) is the single most important source-critical datum: the garden belongs to the sensational tradition, not to the sober one.

## 4. Chronology of the "seven wonders" canon and the garden's place in it

Herodotus (5th c.) admires individual monuments but has no list; Callimachus' *Θαυμάτων … συναγωγή* (Suda) is lost and nothing shows it contained the garden [from memory]. The earliest list, the Berlin papyrus *Laterculi Alexandrini* (P. Berol. 13044, late 2nd c. BC), is "partly lost" — "Preserved entries: temple of Artemis, pyramids, Mausoleum" (Gainsford 2017, endnote [raw_C/kiwihellenist_seven_wonders_2017.html]); Antipater of Sidon (c. 100 BC) gives the earliest intact seven, with *κάπων αἰώρημα*; Diodorus 2.11.5 (c. 30 BC) already speaks of "the seven wonders" when describing Semiramis' obelisk; Strabo (c. AD 20) counts the wall *and* the garden among "τῶν ἑπτὰ θεαμάτων"; Pliny (AD 77) knows *pensiles* (19.49) but names Thebes' at 36.94; Gregory of Nazianzus (c. 380) has *κῆποι* in verse and the *walls* in prose; Philo (4th-6th c.) gives the garden first place; the Latin lists of Hyginus, Ampelius, Cassiodorus (507-511) and Gregory of Tours (c. 575) have only the wall, and ps.-Bede (8th c. or later) drops Babylon altogether; the Pharos "doesn't appear in any ancient list" (Gainsford). Two conclusions: the garden is canonical only in the Greek lists between Antipater and Philo, always at (or, when unlabelled, next to) Babylon; and, as Gainsford puts it, "it doesn't look like any Greek list-maker ever included a specific garden at Nineveh in the Greek canon of 'seven wonders'". The garden's *literary* history begins after 331 — Rollinger (in *The World of Berossos*, 2013, as quoted in BMCR 2014.05.50 [raw page not saved]) suggests it was "first mentioned (by Clitarchus?) after Alexander's conquest of Babylon" — and Berossus (c. 290-280) is the only pre-Antipater witness, if the sentence is his.

## 5. Provenance of the quotations

**(i) Fetched and quoted verbatim in the original language** (raw pages in raw_C/): Josephus *AJ* 10.219-228 and *Ap.* 1.128-142 (Perseus Greek; Whiston/Thackeray); Syncellus p. 418 Dindorf (archive OCR); Eusebius *PE* 9.40-41 (Gifford Greek OCR + Gifford English); Armenian *Chronicle* (Bedrosian English only); Diodorus 2.3, 2.7-10, 2.13, 17.64 (Perseus/el.wikisource Greek; Oldfather); Strabo 16.1.2-5 (Perseus Greek; Jones; Hamilton-Falconer); Curtius 5.1.17-35 (Latin Library; Rolfe); Philo 1 (Hercher Greek OCR, normalised, + Didot Latin; Oates/Finkel English for §4 only); Antipater AP 9.58 (el.wikisource; Paton); Gregory AP 8.177 (Paton English; Greek reconstructed from garbled OCR); Gregory *Or.* 43.63 (English only); Hyginus 223; Ampelius 8; Cassiodorus *Var.* 7.15.4; Gregory of Tours *De cursu* 1-7 (OCR); ps.-Bede; Pliny 6.121-123, 19.49, 36.94 (Mayhoff/LacusCurtius; Bostock); Martial *Spect.* 1; Propertius 3.11.21-26; Arrian 3.16, 7.17-25 (el.wikisource Greek; Chinnock); Herodotus 1.178-187 (Perseus/el.wikisource); Xenophon *Anab.* 3.4.7-12 and *Cyrop.* 7.5 (Perseus Greek); Dalley & Oleson 2003; Bichler 2004; Livius.org (van der Spek 2008 summary); Gainsford 2017/2018.

**(ii) Cited only from secondary sources or memory (flagged in text):** Diodorus 2.11.5 Greek wording; Ctesias/Photius cod. 72; Judith 1:1; Callimachus' *Collection*; Rollinger's wording as reported in the BMCR review (raw page not saved); Dalley 1994 and Reade 2000 and Burstein 1978 (as quoted in Bichler 2004); De Breucker's BNJ commentary; Kroll *RE* and Brodersen 1992 (as cited in Dalley & Oleson); Solinus; Onesicritus as Strabo's source; Gellius 10.18.4 cross-reference in Rolfe.

**(iii) Inaccessible:** Perseus (Varnish 503) for much of the time — worked around; Scaife CTS; academia.edu and researchgate (403); Cambridge Core (Dalley 1994, *Iraq* 56; Reade 2000, *Iraq* 62); Bichler & Rollinger 2005; De Breucker, BNJ 680; Bigwood 1980; Stronk 2010; Brodersen 1992 (Philo's Greek in a modern edition); Orelli 1816; Yardley's Curtius; Dalley 2013 ch. 3; Gregory of Nazianzus PG 36 Greek; Photius *Bibliotheca* cod. 72; the Berlin papyrus text of the *Laterculi Alexandrini*; Sennacherib's inscriptions (not covered here).