Ruins No. 8 · Monday, November 9, 2026

Where they stood

The day's five sites and where they are today.

Rano Raraku

1TodayEaster Island, Chile

2EraMoai quarry

3Most of the island's moai were carved from the tuff of this volcanic crater.

4Some 887 moai remain here, many of them incomplete.

5The largest unfinished statue here would have stood 21.6 meters tall.

1TodayMit Rahina, Egypt

2EraEarly Dynastic Period

3Tradition credits its founding to King Menes around 3000 BC.

4Its chief god was Ptah, the patron of craftsmen.

5The decree on the Rosetta Stone was issued at this city in 196 BC.

1TodayNagasaki, Japan

2EraUndersea coal mining island

3Its nickname Gunkanjima means Battleship Island.

4Japan's first large reinforced concrete building went up here in 1916.

5The mine closed in 1974 and the island was abandoned.

1TodayOsun State, Nigeria

2EraYoruba kingdoms

3Yoruba tradition holds that Oduduwa founded the first kingdom here.

4Workers found naturalistic brass heads at Wunmonije Compound in 1938.

5German ethnographer Leo Frobenius took note of its sculpture in 1910.

1Todaynear Tokmok, Kyrgyzstan

2EraKara-Khanid Khanate

3It was a capital of the Kara-Khanid Khanate.

4The poet Yusuf Balasaguni, author of Kutadgu Bilig, was born here.

5The Qara Khitai took the city in 1134.

Five new sites every day at midnight.