What do Civilization 5 Wonders look like in the real world?

I’m dedicating this post to all Civilization enthusiasts and globetrotters, nerds and travelers of the world. You’re both? Even better! Also it’s for lovers of great photography!

I traveled around the world for many times. Virtually. With Civilization (the real world is still in progress). I gained a lot of trivia knowledge from it – knowledge of wonders, history, well… civilization! (Also I learned that the German word “Viehzucht” is “husbandry” in English. Why the heck does that word contain “husband”???)

While writing my post about Antiquity sites achievements, I mentioned some of the cultural wonders in Civilization 5. I realized I knew about all those wonders of the world, except for the Uffizi. So I looked it up and also searched for nice photographs. Striking it rich, I looked for more photographs of world wonders until I had the epiphany of creating a blog post about it! And here we are:

Traditionally Civilization covers most of the classic Wonders of the World. Civ 5 even covers all of them:	Civilization 5 goes even beyond that, also covering 6 of the New 7 Wonders of the World:
Great Pyramid of Giza Hanging Gardens of Babylon Statue of Zeus (not since Civ1) Temple of Artemis (not since Civ1) Mausoleum at Halicarnassus (not since Civ1) Colossus of Rhodes Lighthouse of Alexandria	Great Wall of China Petra Christ the Redeemer Machu Picchu Chichen Itza Colosseum (not a wonder in Civ5) Taj Mahal

Stop talking! Bring on the Wonders!

Civilization 5 Wonders	Real Wonders of the World
Alhambra, Granada, Spain	Golden Alhambra by redgreenblue on 500px
Angkor Wat, Cambodia (Civ: Khmer)	Sunrise Angkor Wat by Suwit Gamolglang on 500px
Big Ben, London, England	London lights by Tom Jeavons on 500px
Borobudur, Central Java, Indonesia	Beyond Borobudur \|\| Java Indonesia by Elia Locardi on 500px
Brandenburg Gate, Berlin, Germany	Berlin Brandenburg gate by redgreenblue on 500px
Broadway, New York, USA	Times Square, NYC by Colin Buckley on 500px
Chichen Itza, Yucatán, Mexico	Look at me by Paul Olsson on 500px
CN Tower, Toronto, Canada	Purple Skyline by Joseph Qiu on 500px
Colossus, Rhodes, Greece	Destroyed in an earthquake 226 BC.
Cristo Redentor, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil	Christo Redentor by Toby Seifinger on 500px
Eiffel Tower, Paris, France	Eiffel Tower – Paris by Sebdows Photography on 500px
Forbidden Palace, Beijing, China	Forbidden City by Jarrod Castaing on 500px
Globe Theatre, London, England	The Shakespeare’s Globe, South Bank, London, England by Joe Daniel Price on 500px The Shakespeare’s Globe is a reconstruction of the Globe Theatre, originally built in 1599, burned down in 1613, rebuilt in 1614, and eventually demolished in 1644.
Great Firewall	Only exists in Civilization 5.The Great Firewall grants a 99.9% reduction in effectiveness of enemy spies in the city in which it is built. All other cities in the civilization get a 25% reduction in enemy spy effectiveness.We (meaning Europe except the UK) might need this, too, nowadays.
Great Library, Alexandria, Egypt	Destroyed by men.
Great Lighthouse, Alexandria, Egypt	Badly damaged by 3 earthquakes between the 10th and 14th century and eventually replaced by a citadel in 1480 AD.
Great Mosque of Djenne, Djenné, Mali	The Great Mosque in Djenné, Mali by Roy Zipstein on 500px
Great Wall, China	Great Wall Dawn by Rami Niazy on 500px
Hagia Sophia, Istanbul, Turkey	Bosphorus Evenings by Baki Karacay on 500px
Hanging Gardens, Iraq (Civ: Babylon)	Hanging Gardens by Mirela Waterlander on 500px The location of the real Hanging Gardens has never been 100% confirmed. They don’t exist anymore, but there’s no definite ruins to be found. The above is a picture of “modern” hanging gardens near Luxembourg.
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg, Russia Only being a national wonder in Civilization there’s no concept art available. But it’s one of two national wonders that really exist (physically), so it deserves a place here.	Hermitage Museum by Aleks Zhorro on 500px
Himeji Castle, Himeji, Japan	Fantasy or reality? by Giacomo Cattaruzzi on 500px
Hubble Space Telescope, Orbit, Earth	Hubble in orbit on www.spacetelescope.org
International Space Station, Orbit, Earth	Time Without End by Brad Goldpaint on 500px
Kremlin, Moscow, Russia	Night Moscow by Alexander Novikov on 500px
Leaning Tower of Pisa, Pisa, Italy	Pisa II by Itamar Campos on 500px
Louvre, Paris, France	Louvre. Paris by Viktor Korostynski on 500px
Machu Picchu, Cusco, Peru (Civ: Inca)	Land of Incas III by Robert Hajdu on 500px
Mausoleum of Halicarnassus, Bodrum, Turkey (Civ: Greece) While being a World Wonder in previous versions of Civilization, and even in the vanilla version of Civilization 5, it has been removed from the game by now.	Destroyed, probably by an earthquake.Here’s a picture of a miniature at Miniatuk Istanbul: Mausoleum of Halicarnassus – Miniature by Ayhan Duran on 500px
Neuschwanstein, Füssen, Germany	Neuschwanstein Castle by Cindy Scholz on 500px
Notre Dame, Paris, France	Real Wet Reflection Notre Dame Paris by Loïc Lagarde on 500px
Oracle, Delphi, Greece	Oracle of Delphi, the navel of the earth by Dimitris Koutsoulaftis on 500px
Oxford University, Oxford, England Only being a national wonder in Civilization there’s no concept art available. But I started looking for real world pictures of Civilization 5 wonders with the Oxford University, while writing the Archeology blogpost, so it deserves being in here.	Oxford University under the winter Milky Way by Yunli Song on 500px
Parthenon, Athens, Greece Anecdote: Built by Kallikrates	Parthenon on the Acropolis in Athens, Greece by Christian Delbert on 500px
Pentagon, Washington, USA	Pentagon by Eric on 500px
Petra, Jordan	Time Stands Still \| Petra By Night by Elia Locardi on 500px
Porcelain Tower, Nanjing, China	Destroyed by men in 1856.
Prora, Rügen, Germany	Colossus of PRORA by Harald Wagener on 500px
Pyramids, Giza, Egypt	Stand like an Egyptian by xflo : w on 500px
Red Fort, Dehli, India	Red Fort by Jeffrey Rubin on 500px
Sistine Chapel, Vatican City	Sistine Chapel by Vladimir Popov / Uhaiun on 500px
Statue of Liberty, New York, USA	Statue of Liberty by Shaan Majumdar on 500px
Statue of Zeus, Olympia, Greece	Temple of Olympian Zeus by nck multimedia on 500px Destroyed during the 5th century.
Stonehenge, England (Civ: Celts)	Stonehenge by Bob Hoppenbrouwers on 500px
Sydney Opera House, Sydney, Australia	Sydney Opera House clair-obscur by Cristian Mitran on 500px
Taj Mahal, Agra, India	Fabulous Taj Mahal by Seb on 500px
Temple of Artemis, Ephesus, near Selcuk, Turkey (Civ: Greece) While being a World Wonder in previous versions of Civilization, and even in the vanilla version of Civilization 5, it has been removed from the game by now.	Destroyed and rebuilt several times, before finally being destroyed in 401.
Terracotta Army, Xi’an, China	Terracotta by Haiwei Hu on 500px
Uffizi, Florence, Italy	The golden gallery by Giuseppe Torre on 500px