The Parthenon belongs to the years before the Common Era — dated here to c. 447 BCE at Athens, Greece. The date is a scholarly centre of gravity, not a foundation-stone timestamp.
Ictinus and Callicrates, with Phidias overseeing sculpture, built Athena’s Doric masterpiece with optical refinements in every line.
How it was made
Curved stylobate, inward-leaning columns, and a 12-metre chryselephantine Athena inside. Pentelic marble was the budget and the brand.
Why it still counts as a wonder
It never needed a Greek list to be a wonder: the labour, the alignment, or the survival is enough.
Explosion in 1687 CE, then a global argument over sculpture. The ruin is still the definition of a classical wonder.
On dating
BCE in this series means years before the traditional birth of Christ, counted backward. A monument listed as c. 447 BCE may have been founded earlier, rebuilt later, or famous only in one phase. Where ancient writers disagree — as they do for Babylon’s gardens — we say so.
This is story 52 of 100 in The Trend Ledger’s illustrated desk on world wonders raised before the Common Era.