Stone blocks from the Lighthouse of Alexandria recovered from seafloor

https://archaeologymag.com/2025/07/lighthouse-of-alexandria-rises-again/

by gnabgib • 1 year ago

130 32 1 year ago

dang2• 1 year ago

We changed the URL from https://greekreporter.com/2025/07/01/lighthouse-alexandria-g... to an article that it appears to have been cribbed from, although it's not entirely clear.

dang2• 1 year ago

[stub for offtopicness]

[original URL was https://greekreporter.com/2025/07/01/lighthouse-alexandria-g... - see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44598029]

lapetitejort• 1 year ago

Interpretation of the Lighthouse of Alexandria. Credit: Midjounrey / Open Domain / Free Use

In addition to not paying artists for interpretations, they also apparently do not pay editors to proofread.

richwater• 1 year ago

A human artist rendering would not have changed how anyone consumes this article. In fact it may even be less realistic given how artists are not experts in every field and more often than not take wide liberties (see dinosaurs)

jaysonelliot2• 1 year ago

Using Midjourney to visualize a historical structure like this is not just lazy, it's very misleading.

Especially when there are actual digital recreations, available for free use under Creative Commons, based on historical information and modern surveys: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:PHAROS2013-3000x2250...

IG_Semmelweiss• 1 year ago

I dont understand your comment

Your comment implies that (some) article images are somehow the result of LLMs. I don't think that is the case at all based on the articles' source attributions.

dr_dshiv2• 1 year ago

It was the tallest building in the world? And it survived till the 1300s?? Wild.

pgreenwood• 1 year ago

This seems like an odd error for the article to make. The great pyramid in Giza is nearly 50% taller, was built nearly 2500 years earlier, and still stands today.

hansvm2• 1 year ago

A pyramid stretches the limits of what it means to be a "building" though. I don't know that it's a crazy thing to ignore it.

dr_dshiv2• 1 year ago

Wikipedia on Pharos says “height estimated at between 115 and 145 meters (384 – 469 ft)”

At the upper bound, it was (almost) taller than the great pyramid (146m originally).

echelon_musk• 1 year ago

Seems like there's a gulf between the artist's computer rendering and the mosaic.

ekaryotic• 1 year ago

i dare say archaeologists have multiple depictions of the lighthouse, considering how famous it was.

jaysonelliot2• 1 year ago

It wasn't a rendering by an artist, it's just an autogenerated Midjourney image.

wolfd• 1 year ago

Are you talking about the 3D rendering in the article? The source is linked, and it was uploaded to Wikimedia in 2013.

Edit: Oh! I see, the article URL was changed after you made your comment and before I made mine.

m3kw9• 1 year ago

Was the point of light houses to attract trade?

foobar19622• 1 year ago

To help ships navigate. Being 100 meters tall it would be visible from quite a distance off shore, something like 36km or 22 miles, before land itself could be seen.

The Lighthouse, or Pharos of Alexandria... stood more than 100 meters tall above the island of Pharos, guiding ships safely through Alexandria’s treacherous coastal waters

Note that making navigation safer would also benefit trade. Given the choice of landing in a port that was difficult to find and one that had such a lighthouse as a guide...

mcmoor2• 1 year ago

It's only a 1 bit signal that says "don't come here" isn't it? I've seen claims that lighthouse helps ships somehow navigate difficult waves and I'm always curious how exactly one high lamp do that. Saying that it "guides" is a bit of an overstatement isn't it? Like saying that a road sign saying "dangerous hole here" guides riders navigate the road.

labster• 1 year ago

Lighthouses fulfill roughly the same purpose as hazard signs on freeways — everyone makes more money when ordered goods actually arrive. Rocks on the sea are more dangerous than falling rocks on the roads.

Monument lighthouses have an extra purpose: they project power and wealth. Merchants know this place is Important. Like modern day monuments, whether people need a giant expensive building/statue/obelisk to learn this or it’s just a vanity project for the ruler is a matter of opinion. People aren’t really all that different over the last 2000 years.

dochne• 1 year ago

One place I would love to visit is the Tower of Hercules which was built in the first century and based on the original plans of the Lighthouse of Alexandria.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tower_of_Hercules

evolve2k• 1 year ago

This being to mind the open source game 0AD (https://play0ad.com).

I could be misremembering but I’m pretty sure the lighthouse is one of the wonders you can build in the game.

  Check it out if you’ve never given it a go. Built by a tonne of volunteers who aim for historically accurate soldiers and buildings in this Age of Empires like RTS game.

Stone blocks from the Lighthouse of Alexandria recovered from seafloor

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