Leptis Magna

Leptis Magna is in Libya, a country in North Africa.

Long ago, it was a big city with a harbor for ships. Now it is a place of old stone ruins.

Leptis Magna is an ancient city in Libya, in North Africa. Its ruins stand beside a harbor at the mouth of the Wadi Lebda, and the old town covered about 400 hectares.

UNESCO calls it one of the most beautiful cities of the Roman Empire, with grand public buildings, a harbor, a market, storehouses, shops and neighborhoods where people lived. A ruin is what is left of a building after a very long time.

UNESCO describes Leptis Magna as one of the most splendid cities of Roman North Africa, and says its ruins give a vivid and full picture of life in a Roman provincial city in the early and middle periods of the empire. The urban area, about 400 hectares, holds arches, gates, two forums, temples, baths, a theater, a circus, an amphitheater and fortifications, along with the everyday market, warehouses and workshops.

The name Leptis, ICOMOS noted in 1982, is the Latin form of the city's Phoenician name; it is also spelled Lepcis, and the city is also known as Lebda.

The city had a market with two round halls and many shops.

It had a theater, and a harbor where ships came in.

The market, built in 8 BCE, had rows of columns and two circular halls, and most of it still survives. The city also has a theater from about 1–2 CE. An amphitheater, an arena with seats all around, was built into a quarry in 56 CE.

The harbor had a basin dug by people, nearly 102,000 square meters in size, and a dam and canal to control the Wadi Lebda. UNESCO calls it one of the outstanding works of Roman technology.

EBSCO dates the colonnaded macellum, with its two circular halls, to 8 BCE and the theater to 1–2 CE; ICOMOS noted that the Augustan market was transformed and embellished under Septimius Severus. The amphitheater was cut into a quarry in 56 CE and linked to the circus by a cutting.

The harbor, ICOMOS wrote, was dug under Nero and organized under Severus, with a barrage and a canal to regulate the Wadi Lebda; UNESCO says the outline of its artificial basin of nearly 102,000 m² can still be traced, with traces of its warehouses. EBSCO adds that Severus's grand harbor scheme apparently did not succeed because the basin silted up.

In the photo, tall stone columns stand in two rows.

Broken stones lie all around. At the far end is a high wall with arches.

The photo, taken in August 2012, looks along two rows of tall stone columns. Some still have carved tops, called capitals. At the far end is a high wall of stone blocks with arched openings and carved pillars, and pieces of columns and stones lie on the ground in front.

UNESCO says wind-blown sand from the interior covered Leptis Magna and protected it for 800 years. Travelers found the ruins again in the 1600s and 1700s, and excavations in the first half of the 20th century brought buildings back to light.

The photo (2 August 2012) looks down a stone-paved space between two colonnades; capitals survive on several of the left-hand columns, and the far wall of large blocks has arched openings and carved pilasters, with column drums, bases and capitals scattered in the foreground. The building is not named in the photo's record.

UNESCO credits a cover of wind-blown sand from the interior with protecting the city for 800 years. Travelers such as Durand and Lemaire rediscovered it in the 17th and 18th centuries, and it played a major role in the Neoclassical revival of ancient styles. Structures uncovered in the first half of the 20th century have since been consolidated and restored, and, UNESCO says, a local antiquities office set up in 2019 also oversees the museums that hold a large collection of finds, including mosaics and frescoes.