Various lists of the Wonders of the World have been compiled from antiquity to the present day, in order to catalogue the world's most spectacular natural features and human-built structures.
The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World is the oldest known list of this type, documenting the most iconic and remarkable human-made creations of classical antiquity; the canonical list was established in the 1572 Octo Mundi Miracula, based on classical sources which varied widely. The classical sources only include works located around the Mediterranean rim and in the ancient Near East. The number seven was chosen because the Greeks believed it represented perfection and plenty, and because it reflected the number of planets known in ancient times (five) plus the Sun and Moon.
The canonical Seven Wonders established in the 1572 Octo Mundi Miracula are:
In the 19th and early 20th centuries, some writers emulated the classical list by creating their own lists with names such as "Wonders of the Middle Ages", "Seven Wonders of the Middle Ages", "Seven Wonders of the Medieval Mind", and "Architectural Wonders of the Middle Ages". It is unlikely that any of these lists actually originated in the Middle Ages since the concept of a "Middle Age" did not become popular until at least the 16th century and the word "medieval" was not invented until the Enlightenment era. Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable refers to them as "later list[s]", suggesting the lists were created after the Middle Ages.
Many of the structures on these lists were built much earlier than the Middle Ages but were well known throughout the world. Typically representative of such lists are:
Other structures sometimes included on such lists include:
Following in the tradition of the classical list, modern people and organizations have made their own lists of wonderful things, both ancient and modern, natural and artificial. Some of the most notable lists are presented below.
In 1994, the American Society of Civil Engineers compiled a list of Seven Wonders of the Modern World, paying tribute to the "greatest civil engineering achievements of the 20th century".
In November 2006, the American national newspaper USA Today and the American television show Good Morning America revealed a list of the "New Seven Wonders", both natural and human-made, as chosen by six judges. The Grand Canyon was added as an eighth wonder on November 24, 2006, in response to viewer feedback.
Similar to the other lists of wonders, there is no consensus on a list of seven natural wonders of the world. One of many existing versions of this list was compiled by CNN in 1997:
In 2001, an initiative was started by the Swiss corporation New7Wonders Foundation to choose the New 7 Wonders of the World from a selection of 200 existing monuments through online votes. The Great Pyramid of Giza, the only remaining wonder of the traditional Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, was not one of the winners announced in 2007 but was added as an honorary candidate.
A similar contemporary effort to create a list of seven natural (as opposed to human-made) wonders chosen through a global poll, called the New 7 Wonders of Nature, was organized from 2007 to 2011 by the same group as the New 7 Wonders of the World campaign.
New 7 Wonders Cities, a third list organized by New7Wonders and determined by another global vote, includes entire cities:
The list of "Seven Wonders of the Underwater World" was drawn up by CEDAM International, an American-based non-profit group for divers that is dedicated to ocean preservation and research. In 1989, CEDAM brought together a panel of marine scientists, including Eugenie Clark, to choose underwater areas which they considered worthy of protection. The results were announced at The National Aquarium in Washington, D.C., by actor Lloyd Bridges, star of TV's Sea Hunt:
British author Deborah Cadbury wrote Seven Wonders of the Industrial World, a book telling the stories of seven great feats of engineering of the 19th and early 20th centuries. In 2003, the BBC aired a seven-part docudrama exploring the same feats, with Cadbury as a producer.
In a 1999 article, Astronomy magazine listed the "Seven Wonders of the Solar System". This article was later made into a video.
Many authors and organizations have composed lists of the wonders of the world that have been published in book or magazine form.
Seven Wonders of the World is a 1956 film in which Lowell Thomas searches the world for natural and artificial wonders and invites the audience to try to update the ancient Wonders of the World list.