Editing Hanging Gardens of Babylon (section)

== Historical existence ==
It is unclear whether the Hanging Gardens were an actual construction or a poetic creation, owing to the lack of documentation in contemporaneous Babylonian sources. There is also no mention of Nebuchadnezzar's wife Amytis (or any other wives), although a political marriage to a Median or Persian would not have been unusual.<ref>Finkel (2008) p. 109.</ref> Many records exist of Nebuchadnezzar's works, yet his long and complete inscriptions do not mention any garden.<ref>Dalley (2013)</ref> However, the gardens were said to still exist at the time that later writers described them, and some of these accounts are regarded as deriving from people who had visited Babylon.<ref name="Reade2000"/> [[Herodotus]], who describes Babylon in his ''[[Histories (Herodotus)|Histories]]'', does not mention the Hanging Gardens,<ref>{{cite book|title=Herodotus and Hellenistic culture: Literary Studies in the Reception of the Histories|first=Jessica|last=Priestley|location=Oxford|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=2014|page=91|isbn=9780191510168|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IUbbAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA91}}</ref> although it could be that the gardens were not yet well known to the Greeks at the time of his visit.<ref name="Reade2000">{{cite journal|last1=Reade|first1=Julian|title=Alexander the Great and the Hanging Gardens of Babylon|journal=[[Iraq (journal)|Iraq]] |volume=62|year=2000|pages=195–217|issn=0021-0889|doi=10.2307/4200490|jstor=4200490|s2cid=194130782}}</ref>

To date, no archaeological evidence has been found at Babylon for the Hanging Gardens.<ref name="autogenerated1988"/> It is possible that evidence exists beneath the Euphrates, which cannot be excavated safely at present. The river flowed east of its current position during the time of Nebuchadnezzar II, and little is known about the western portion of Babylon.<ref>{{cite book |first=Joan |last=Oates |author-link=Joan Oates |title=Babylon |edition=Revised |publisher=Thames and Hudson |location=London |year=1986 |page=144 |isbn=0-500-27384-7 }}</ref> Rollinger has suggested that Berossus attributed the Gardens to Nebuchadnezzar for political reasons, and that he had adopted the legend from elsewhere.<ref>{{cite book |last=Rollinger |first=Robert |chapter=Berossos and the Monuments |editor-first=J. |editor-last=Haubold |display-editors=1 |editor2-first=Giovanni B. |editor2-last=Lanfranchi |editor3-first=Robert |editor3-last=Rollinger|author1-link=Robert Rollinger|title=The World of Berossos |location=Wiesbaden |year=2013 |page=151 |isbn=978-3-447-06728-7 }}</ref>