Nebuchadnezzar II built them, apparently for his Median queen Amytis, who found the flat Babylonian countryside disappointing and longed for the trees and hilly terrain of her native land. The Hanging Gardens consisted of a series of manmade terraces joined by marble staircases and possibly rising to heights of 75 to 300 feet above the plain. On the earth-covered terraces grew many flowers, shrubs and trees. It is said that slaves worked in shifts turning screws of some sort that lifted water from the Euphrates to the gardens. From cisterns on the highest terrace, the water was piped to fountains that provided for needed irrigation. Extraordinary though they were, however, those famed Hanging Gardens (rated one of the seven wonders of the world) no longer exist.
