Known as the Imago Mundi, this Babylonian world map, carved into clay over 2,600 years ago, ... Rome, and Jerusalem, also viewed their cities as the center of the universe. ...

The Babylonian Map of the World was found in a box related to Rassam’s 1881 excavation at Sippar in present-day Iraq around 40 kilometers (25 miles) southwest of modern Baghdad.

Maps during the Middle Ages (around 500 to 1500 A.D.) served less as navigational aids and more as “a visual summary of all human knowledge,” says cartographer Peter Barber.

Investigators say they have figured out how bronze statues from a shrine built 2,000 years ago in Asia Minor to venerate the emperors of Rome ended up in museums around the world.