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Building type · c. 2200–500 BC in Mesopotamia

Ziggurat

A mountain of mud brick in the middle of the plain, with stairs climbing towards the sky. The ziggurat is Mesopotamia's temple tower – and perhaps the model for the Tower of Babel.

How to spot it Find it in the app

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  1. Zigguratc. 2200–500 BC
  2. Ancient Greek architecturec. 700–30 BC
  3. Roman architecturec. 500 BC–AD 400
  4. Nabataean architecturec. 300 BC–AD 106
  5. Byzantine architecturec. 330–1453 in the Eastern Roman Empire
  6. Moorish architecture8th–15th century in al-Andalus and North Africa
  7. Carolingian architecturec. 780–900 in the Frankish Empire
  8. Novgorod and Pskovc. 1045–1600 in north-western Russia
  9. Norman architecturec. 1050–1200
  10. Romanesquec. 1050–1250
  11. Mudéjarc. 1100–1600
  12. Gothicc. 1235–1530
  13. Brick Gothicc. 1250–1530
  14. Late Gothicc. 1400–1530
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  16. Renaissancec. 1520–1650
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  18. Dutch Renaissancec. 1560–1650 in the Netherlands and Flanders
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  21. Georgian architecture1714–1830
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  23. Neoclassicismc. 1750–1850
  24. Gustavianc. 1772–1810
  25. Karl Johan stylec. 1810–1850
  26. Victorian architecture1837–1901
  27. Gothic Revivalc. 1840–1910
  28. Historicismc. 1840–1900
  29. Industrial architecturec. 1850–1950
  30. Neo-Renaissancec. 1850–1900
  31. Swiss chalet stylec. 1850–1900
  32. Landshövdingehus1875–1945
  33. Neo-Baroquec. 1880–1910
  34. Beaux-Artsc. 1830–1920
  35. National Romanticismc. 1890–1920
  36. Art Nouveauc. 1896–1914
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  38. 1910s Neoclassicismc. 1910–1920
  39. Bauhaus1919–1933
  40. Swedish Gracec. 1920–1930
  41. Functionalismc. 1930–1950
  42. Socialist classicismc. 1933–1955
  43. Post-war Swedish modernismc. 1940–1960
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  56. Sámi goahtiFrom prehistory to the present day
  57. Seljuk architecturec. 1040–1300
  58. Persian architectureIran
  59. British Colonialc. 1700–1950 in the British Empire

01. A mountain for the gods

Mesopotamia is flat. The rivers flood, and everything is built of clay. So people make their own mountain.

A ziggurat is a massive stepped pyramid. The core is sun-dried mud brick; the outside is faced with fired brick laid in bitumen – natural asphalt. There are no rooms inside. It is not a tomb. Everything is about the top, where the god is believed to live, and only the priests may go.

The best known stands at Ur. Around 2100 BC King Ur-Nammu has it built for the moon god Nanna, and his son Shulgi completes it. Three stairways meet at a gate halfway up. Almost fifteen hundred years later it is a ruin – and the Babylonian king Nabonidus rebuilds it in the 6th century BC.

In Babylon stands Etemenanki, "the house of the foundation of heaven and earth". Nebuchadnezzar II restores it, and scholars link it to the story of the Tower of Babel. Nothing remains.

Then they are forgotten. Clay turns back into clay. Only when Leonard Woolley digs at Ur in 1922–1934 does the ziggurat emerge from the rubble.

02. How to spot it

  • 1.A massive, solid body in several stages, narrowing upwards
  • 2.Mud brick in the core, fired brick in bitumen outside
  • 3.Long, straight stairways leading up towards the top
  • 4.Vertical niches and buttresses breaking up the walls
  • 5.No chamber inside – the shrine sat at the very top

03. The giveaway

The stairs. Three long stairways meeting at one point halfway up a tower-mountain of brick – only a Mesopotamian ziggurat looks like that.

04. Where to see it

  • Ziggurat of Ur, Iraqc. 2100 BC, partly reconstructed in the 1980s
  • Chogha Zanbil, Iranc. 1300 BC, World Heritage Site
  • Aqar Quf (Dur-Kurigalzu), near BaghdadKassite ziggurat
  • Babylon, Iraqthe site of Etemenanki

05. Often confused with

Egyptian pyramids. Both are tall and stepped. But a pyramid is a stone tomb with chambers inside; a ziggurat is a solid temple mountain of brick, with the shrine on top.

Sources

  • Wikipedia (en): "Ziggurat"
  • Wikipedia (en): "Ziggurat of Ur"
  • Wikipedia (en): "Etemenanki"

Text: Pontus Bovin · Last updated 9 November 2026

Ziggurat around the corner

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