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Ever thought about a great lost civilisation — the Maya of Central America, say, or the Indus of South-East Asia — and thought: what does that ancient site look like now?
Google's got you covered.
A new feature from the tech giant, called Lost Civilisations, lets you explore, using Google Earth technology, those parts of the world in the present day.
Some, like the Nabaya Playa — home to a small community 10,000 years ago in what is now the Egyptian Sahara — are little more than empty expanses of desert.
Other places are still occupied. Collinsville, in suburban Illinois, was a thriving Indigenous community known as Cahokia between 600 and 1400AD. Google's tool lets you explore what remains (spoiler: not much).
Here are a few of the other lost civilisations, and how those locations look today.
Niya, China, a city on the Silk Road 1,600 years ago
Cahokia, United States, a city of earthen mounds built before Europeans arrived
Angkor Wat, Cambodia, a massive urban centre during the Khmer Empire, 1000-1200AD
The Minaret of Jam, Afghanistan, built in the 1100s
The Maya, Mexico, a thriving empire in the first millennium AD
Catalhoyuk, central Turkey, was a community without roads 7,000-9,000 years ago
Indus or Harappan, Pakistan, a major population centre abandoned 3,000 years ago
Gobekli Tepe, Turkey, a nest-like structure of walls more than 10,000 years old
Nabta Playa, Egypt, a community between 7,000 and 6,500 BC
Topics: history, internet-technology, human-interest, united-states, egypt, china, afghanistan, cambodia, mexico, turkey, pakistan
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