🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Hopeton Earthworks
Middle Woodland Hopewell 100 BCE–500 CE · Hopewell tradition
Hopewell 22 ha circle-square with 321 m Great Circle, UNESCO 2023 unit-of-measure type-site.
🇨🇷 Costa Rica · Megalith
Diquís Stone Spheres
Chiriquí period (~600–1500 CE; peak Aguas Buenas 800–1350 CE) · Diquís (Chiriquí, Isthmo-Colombian)
Costa Rica's Diquís Delta preserves over 300 near-perfect spheres of gabbro up to 2.66 m diameter and 16 tonnes, shaped by pecking and grinding until calipers verify sphericity within 2 cm.
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Hopewell Culture National Historical Park (Mound City Group)
Hopewell 1–500 CE (Middle Woodland, peak 100–400 CE) · Hopewell tradition (Scioto Hopewell)
Finest Hopewell enclosure: 13-acre (5.3 ha) flat-topped earthen-walled enclosure (1,211 m perimeter, 1–1.8 m high) near Scioto River enclosing 24 conical, elongated and effigy mounds.
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Newark Earthworks
Hopewell culture 100 BCE–500 CE · Hopewell (Adena descended, Algonquian? cohort)
Hopewell giant geometric enclosures marking 18.6-yr lunar cycle.
🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Earthwork
Silbury Hill South Spur — Waden Hill Causeway
Late Neolithic (2400–2300 BCE) · Beaker / Late Neolithic
Southern approach terraces excavated by Atkinson 1968–70, linking Silbury to West Kennet causewayed enclosure, view from 800 m.
🇺🇸 United States · Archaeological wonder
Chaco Culture National Historical Park
Pueblo II–III 850–1250 CE (Chacoan fluorescence 1020–1140) · Ancestral Puebloan (Anasazi) / Chacoan
Chacoan canyon with 15 monumental Great Houses (Pueblo Bonito 650 rooms, 35 kivas) and engineered roads, built 850–1150 CE by Ancestral Puebloans as ritual and trade center for San Juan Basin,…
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Fort Ancient Earthworks
Hopewell 1–450 CE · Hopewell tradition
Largest hilltop enclosure: 40 ha with 67 gateways, Hopewell 1–450 CE, UNESCO 2023.
🇱🇦 Laos · Megalith
Plain of Jars
Iron Age 500 BCE – 500 CE (some lids to 800 CE) · Unknown Austroasiatic? Ancestors of Lao-Tai
Megalithic landscape of >90 sites with >2,100 large carved sandstone jars (1–3 m tall, up to 14 t) scattered across Xiangkhouang plateau, carved 500 BCE–500 CE, associated with mortuary rites and…
🇲🇽 Mexico · Geoglyph
Paquimé (Casas Grandes) Desert Lines & Adobe Geoglyphs
Medio period (Casas Grandes, 1060–1340 CE) · Mogollon–Paquimé (Casas Grandes)
60+ adobe and rubble geoglyphs (1060–1340 CE) surrounding the Mogollon city of Paquimé — acolyte owl and avenues.
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Poverty Point Mound B Summit
Formative to Mississippian (1500 BCE–1500 CE) · Woodland–Mississippian
Poverty Point Mound B Summit in Louisiana, West Carroll Parish, United States is a Formative to Mississippian (1500 BCE–1500 CE) earthwork attributed to Woodland–Mississippian.
🇵🇪 Peru · Geoglyph
Nazca Palpa Geoglyph Star Figure North Plateau
Formative (800 BCE–800 CE) · Formative–Classic geoglyph
Nazca Palpa Geoglyph Star Figure North Plateau in Ica, Palpa, Peru is a Formative (800 BCE–800 CE) geoglyph attributed to Formative–Classic geoglyph.
🇸🇪 Sweden · Earthwork
Eketorp Ringfort — Öland
Iron Age to Medieval (c.400–1300 CE) · Scandinavian Migration/Vendel and Medieval Gotlandic–Swedish
Eketorp, on southeastern Öland's Stora Alvaret limestone plain, is the only fully excavated of Öland's 19 Iron Age ringforts, a concentric limestone-walled fortress 70 m diameter with 53…
🇲🇽 Mexico · Pyramid
Uxul — Pyramid M1 and Acropolis Pyramid (Calakmul Biosphere, Campeche, Mexico)
Preclassic to Late Classic (100 BCE–900 CE) · Maya (Kaan polity satellite)
Hugely sprawling 4 km² Late Classic centre (250–900 CE) between Tikal and Calakmul, dominated by Pyramid M1 (30x25 m, 14 m high with roof comb) and K2 double pyramid acropolis (two 12 m pyramids on…
🇨🇦 Canada · Archaeological wonder
Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump
Archaic to Protohistoric 3600 BCE–1850 CE (use from 5700 years BP) · Plains Indigenous (Blackfoot / Niitsitapi – Peigan, Kainai, Siksika; earlier Besant, Avonlea)
UNESCO World Heritage buffalo jump (1981) used continuously 5,700 years: 300 m cliff with 10 m drop onto bone bed 11 m deep of bison skeletons, drive lanes marked by 240 cairns stretching 20 km to…
🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Hillfort
Eildon Hill North — Ancillary Rampart Enclosure
Early Iron Age (800–400 BCE) · Hallstatt / Early Iron Age
Eildon Hill North — Ancillary Rampart Enclosure in Scotland, Scottish Borders, Melrose, United Kingdom is a Early Iron Age (800–400 BCE) hillfort attribute…
🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Earthwork
Stonehenge Cursus
Early Neolithic 3800–3600 BCE · Early Neolithic Britons
2.7-km Neolithic processional enclosure predating Stonehenge by 500 years.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Hillfort
Pediment-Spur Hill Fort
Classical Antiquity (800 BCE–500 CE) · Classical
Pediment-Spur Hill Fort in Central Anatolia, Turkey is a Classical Antiquity (800 BCE–500 CE) hillfort attributed to Classical culture.
🇺🇸 United States · Buried city
Cahokia Mounds
Emergent Mississippian to Stirling phase · Mississippian (Illinoian)
Largest Mississippian centre (650–1400 CE) with 120 mounds including Monks Mound (30 m, 1000x700 ft base, largest earthen platform north of Mexico).
🇱🇾 Libya · Geoglyph
Forge Geoglyph
Late Bronze Age (1550–1050 BCE) · Late Bronze Age
Forge Geoglyph in Fezzan, Libya is a Late Bronze Age (1550–1050 BCE) geoglyph attributed to Late Bronze Age culture.
🇦🇺 Australia · Archaeological wonder
Budj Bim Cultural Landscape
Gunditjmara continuous 6,600–6,000 BCE to present (dated 6,700 BP Muldoon trap) · Gunditjmara Aboriginal Australian
Gunditjmara aquaculture over 6,600 years on Budj Bim basalt lava flow (30,000-year-old volcano) with 750 m of stone channels, weirs and eel traps (kooyang) manipulating Lake Condah wetlands.
🇨🇳 China · Archaeological wonder
Great Wall of China (Ancient Segments)
Warring States to Han Dynasty 7th c BCE – 220 CE (early segments); Ming 1368–1644 (classic brick) · Han Chinese (Qin, Han dynasties)
World's longest wall system (21,196 km including branches) with earliest rammed-earth frontier walls from Warring States and Han (7th c BCE–2nd c CE) preserved in Gansu corridor (Han Dunhuang walls),…
🇬🇧 United Kingdom · Earthwork
Silbury Hill — Avebury Landscape
Late Neolithic · Late Neolithic Wessex
Largest prehistoric artificial mound in Europe (c. 2400 BCE), 39.3 m high conical chalk mound in Avebury World Heritage Site.
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Seip Earthworks
Hopewell 1–500 CE · Hopewell tradition
121-acre Hopewell circle-square with 335 m Great Circle and Seip-Pricer mound, UNESCO 2023.
🇺🇸 United States · Earthwork
Poverty Point (Monumental Earthworks of Poverty Point)
Late Archaic 1700–1100 BCE (peak 1500–1200 BCE) · Poverty Point culture
Late Archaic earthwork complex (1700–1100 BCE) with six concentric C-shaped ridges (1.2 km outer diameter) and six mounds, including 22 m-high Mound A – one of largest Archaic earthworks in North…