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CategoriesTemple complexes
Sacred precincts, sanctuaries and the architecture of ritual.
🇨🇳 China · Rock-cut
Early Medieval Central Asian (Tocharian B) · Tocharian Buddhist (Kucha Kingdom) with Gandhara influence
Kucha Tocharian western 42-cave valley 400–700 CE diamond ceilings and lapis blue, German-removal archive.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Hellenistic to Roman · Seleucid, Pergamene, Carian
Maeander university city with Apollo temple, bouleuterion-library of Strabo and 100-m theatre tunnel, Hellenistic.
🇸🇩 Sudan · Pyramid
Kerma Classic to Napatan (2500–300 BCE) · Kerma / Egyptian / Kushite
Strategic Nile island town with Kerma tumuli and Napatan small pyramids — Egyptian fortress-temple city 1550 BCE on 12 km Sai Island between 2nd–3rd cataracts.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Classical to Roman (Carian to Lycian) · Carian, Lycian, Hellenistic Rhodian
Kaunos Dalyan Demeter terrace with 4th BCE altar and 6 Lycian temple-tombs, Carian-Greek border sanctuary.
🇵🇪 Peru · Pyramid
Late Preceramic – Initial Period (c.2500–1000 BCE) – Casma-Sechín · Casma-Sechín (Preceramic to Initial)
Las Aldas is a monumental U-shaped temple-plaza on a coastal eolian terrace at Casma, Ancash, at 30 m above the Pacific.
🇲🇱 Mali · Temple complex
Medieval Songhai (9th–17th c; peak Imperial 1464–1591) · Songhai / Tuareg (Songhai Empire)
Songhai Empire capital's 17 m pyramidal earthen tomb of Askia Mohammad I (1495) east-bank Niger assembly ground.
🇮🇳 India · Rock-cut
Early Medieval (Rashtrakuta) · Rashtrakuta Shaivite Brahminical (Kannarid influence)
Urban Deccan basalt 8th-c Shiva quarry-temple 40×28 m with circular Nandi mandapa, unfinished Rashtrakuta.
🇮🇳 India · Temple complex
Mauryan 3rd c BCE → Sunga 2nd c BCE → Gupta 5th c · Mauryan Buddhist sangha → Sunga
Sanchi mandala outlier 10 km SW — 8 stupas (Stupa 2 relic casket, Brahmi) on Betwa ridge.
🇦🇲 Armenia · Temple complex
Early Christian Armenian (301–650 CE) · Early Armenian Apostolic; Urartian–Hellenistic pagan predecessor
301 CE Gregory the Illuminator's cathedral over Tir temple — world's oldest state church, Hripsime 618 tetraconch.
🇬🇹 Guatemala · Ancient city
Middle to Late Preclassic 700 BCE–150 CE (Preclassic fluorescence, collapsed c.150 CE Mirador hiatus) · Maya (Preclassic Mirador Basin state, Late Preclassic centralized polity)
Second-largest Preclassic Maya city after El Mirador (700 BCE–400 CE, 30 km southeast of Mirador): 250 m-high-adjacent Henequén pyramid (60 m high ×190×165 m, seventh-tallest Maya pyramid), Mano de…
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Roman Imperial (Antonine) · Cilician Greek and Roman Pompeiopolis
Pompey's pirate-resettlement port Corinthian 6×12 beside 480-m colonnaded street to harbour.
🇮🇳 India · Temple complex
Gupta Classical (Chandragupta II to Kumaragupta) 320–550 CE · Gupta
Gupta’s open-air bible — 20 sandstone caves with Varaha (402 CE) and Durga, Chandragupta II's inscriptions on Udayagiri Hill.
🇧🇿 Belize · Ancient village
Early Preclassic – Classic (c.1200 BCE–900 CE) Preclassic Maya · Maya (Lowland Preclassic)
Cuello lies on the Cuello estate adjacent to the Cuello rum distillery 2 km west of Orange Walk, north Belize, at 30 m.
🇬🇷 Greece · Temple complex
Late Classical (Peloponnesian War) · Classical Athenian
421–405 BCE asymmetric Ionic with Caryatids, housing Athena Polias and Poseidon-Erechtheus on Mycenaean terrace.
🇪🇬 Egypt · Buried city
Middle Kingdom to Late Roman (1800 BCE – 350 CE) · Egyptian / Greco-Roman Fayum
Crocodile temple quarter of Narmouthis 1–2 m buried at Medinat Ghoran — Renenutet birth-house and sacred lake 40×30 m.
🇪🇬 Egypt · Buried city
Middle Kingdom to Late Roman (1800 BCE – 350 CE) · Egyptian / Greco-Roman Fayum
Crocodile temple quarter of Narmouthis 1–2 m buried at Medinat Ghoran — Renenutet birth-house and sacred lake 40×30 m.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Hellenistic (Lysimachus to Seleucid) · Hellenistic Macedonian-Anatolian
29-m Diadochi mausoleum 14 km NE Ephesus for Lysimachus/Antiochus II with 28 columns and griffin coffers, 301–246 BCE.
🇲🇱 Mali · Ancient city
Medieval Sudanic (11th–17th c; peak 14th–16th c under Mali-Songhai) · Tuareg / Soninke / Malinke / Songhai / Berber / Moroccan (Arma)
Scholar caravan metropolis on Niger Bend with three 14th-c earthen Sudano-Sahelian mosques and 600,000-manuscript university Sankore.
🇬🇷 Greece · Temple complex
Archaic to Hellenistic · Dorian Rhodian
NW Rhodes hilltop Doric Athena Polias above Hellenistic fountain agora with 200-m aqueduct, 6th BCE–408 synoecism.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Classical (Hekatomnid Carian) · Carian-Hellenic dynastic
Podium terrace of Aristotle's pupil Satrap Mausolus' wonder-tomb 353 BCE in Bodrum, 45-m wonder with 36 Ionic columns.
🇮🇷 Iran · Temple complex
Sassanian Empire (224–651 CE), late Sassanian zenith · Sassanian Zoroastrian (Ahura Mazda, Anahita, Mithra) court art
Sassanian Zagros spring iwans: Shapur II/III small and Khosrow II great with boar hunt and armored cavalry.
🇲🇽 Mexico · Ancient city
Classic – Epiclassic (c.400–850 CE) Chalchihuites – Coyotlatelco frontier · Chalchihuites – Canutillo / Teuchitlán-related frontier
Alta Vista Chalchihuites in northern Zacatecas is Mesoamerica's far-northern Venus frontier town at 2,190 m on the Tropic of Cancer.
🇦🇫 Afghanistan · Temple complex
Mauryan 3 c. BCE → Kushan 1–4 c. → Hepthalite 5–6 c. → Turk Shahis 7–9 c. · Gandharan Buddhist → Kabul Shahi Buddhist with metallurgic substrate
Copper-and-Buddhist hill city 40 km SE Kabul (3 c. BCE–9 c. CE) — 400 Buddha statues and 100 ha monasteries atop world's copper shafts.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Archaic to Late Antiquity (1000 BCE – 600 CE) · Ionian Greek and Roman / Artists of Dionysus guild
Hermogenes' canonical Dionysus temple 208 BCE — largest Dionysac sanctuary and theatre guild capital.
