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British Museum

Climbing the steps to the platform supporting the Temple of Artemis, supplicants would first see huge column bases adorned with life-size relief carvings. Found by the British engineer John T. Wood, who excavated at Ephesus from 1863 to 1874, this column base was shipped to the British Museum, where it remains today. It is the only column relief (of the original 36) found so far, though archaeologists have uncovered one of the temple’s ordinary fluted columns and parts of its altar.

The 360-foot-long Temple of Artemis at Ephesus was the largest Greek temple in antiquity and one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world. From numismatic and literary evidence, scholars believe that the temple roof was supported by 127 columns about 6 feet in diameter and 65 feet tall.