The Seven Wonders of Britain

The Seven Wonders of Britain

Windsor Castle

• Windsor Castle in Windsor is the largest inhabited castle in the world, and dating back to the time of William the Conqueror, is the oldest in continuous occupation.

Windsor Castle

• The castle's floor area is approximately 484,000 square feet.

• Together with Buckingham Palace in London and Holyrood Palace in Edinburgh, it is one of the principal official residences of the British monarch. Queen Elizabeth II spends many weekends of the year at the castle, using it for both state and private entertaining.

Windsor Castle

• Most of the Kings and Queens of England, later Kings and Queens of Great Britain have had a direct influence on the construction and evolution of the castle, which has been their fortress, home, official palace, and sometimes their prison.

Windsor Castle• A: The round tower• B: The Upper Ward, The

Quadrangle (as this courtyard is known)

• C: The State Apartments• D: Private Apartments,

overlooking the East terrace• E: South Wing, overlooking

The Long Walk• F: Lower Ward• G: St George's Chapel• H: Horseshoe Cloister• K: King Henry VIII Gate

(principal entrance)• L: The Long Walk• M: Norman Gate• N: North Terrace• O: Edward III Tower• T: The Curfew Tower

Windsor Castle: Visitor’s leaflet

Windsor Castle: Visitor’s leaflet

Windsor Castle: a video

The Stonehenge

• Stonehenge is a prehistoric monument located in the English county of Wiltshire, about 3.2 kilometres (2.0 mi) west of Amesbury and 13 kilometres (8.1 mi) north of Salisbury.

The Stonehenge

• One of the most famous sites in the world, Stonehenge is composed of earthworks surrounding a circular setting of large standing stones and sits at the centre of the densest complex of Neolithic and Bronze Age monuments in England, including several hundred burial mounds.

The Stonehenge

• Archaeologists had believed that the iconic stone monument was erected around 2500 BC.

• However one recent theory has suggested that the first stones were not erected until 2400-2200 BC, whilst another suggests that bluestones may have been erected at the site as early as 3000 BC.

The Stonehenge

• New archaeological evidence found by the Stonehenge Riverside Project indicates that Stonehenge served as a burial ground from its earliest beginnings. The dating of cremated remains found that burials took place as early as 3000 B.C, when the first ditches were being built around the monument.

The location of Stonehenge

The Plan of Stonehenge

The Plan of the Central Stone Structure

The Stonehenge in the Arthurian Legend

The Stonehenge in the 17th century

An early photo of The Stonehenge

The Stonehenge: a video

The Orkney Islands

• Orkney is an archipelago in northern Scotland, situated 10 miles (16 km) north of the coast of Caithness. Orkney comprises over 70 islands; around 20 are inhabited. The largest island, known as "Mainland”.

• The largest settlement and administrative centre is Kirkwall.

The Orkney Islands

• Orkney has been inhabited for at least 5,500 years. Originally inhabited by neolithic tribes and then by the Picts, Orkney was invaded and finally annexed by Norway in 875 and settled by the Norse. It was subsequently re-annexed to the Scottish Crown in 1472.

Skara Brae

• Skara Brae is a large stone-built Neolithic settlement, located on the Bay of Skaill on the west coast of mainland Orkney, Scotland. It consists of ten clustered houses, and was occupied from roughly 3100-2500 BC.

• It is Europe's most complete Neolithic village.

The map of Skara Brae

The Orkney Islands and Skara Brae: a video

The York Minster

• York Minster is a Gothic cathedral in York, England and is one of the largest of its kind in Northern Europe alongside Cologne Cathedral. The Minster is the seat of the Archbishop of York.

The York Minster• It has a very wide Decorated

Gothic nave and chapter house, a Perpendicular Gothic choir and east end, and Early English north and south transepts. The nave contains the West Window, constructed in 1338, and over the Lady Chapel in the east end is the Great East Window, (finished in 1408), the largest expanse of medieval stained glass in the world. In the north transept is the Five Sisters Window, each lancet being over 16 metres (52 ft) high. The south transept contains the famous Rose window.

The Plan of the York Minster

The York Minster: a video

The British Museum

• The British Museum is a museum of human history and culture situated in London. Its collections, which number more than 7 million objects and they originate from all continents, illustrating and documenting the story of human culture from its beginning to the present.

The British Museum

• The British Museum was established in 1700, largely based on the collections of the physician and scientist Sir Hans Sloane. The museum first opened to the public on 15 January 1759 in Montagu House in Bloomsbury.

The British Museum

• Until 1997, when the current British Library building opened to the public, replacing the old British Museum Reading Room, the British Museum was unique in that it housed both a national museum of antiquities and a national library in the same building.

The Plan of the British Museum

The Plan of the British Museum

The Plan of the British Museum

The British Museum: a video

The Giant’s Causeway

• The Giant's Causeway (or Irish: Clochán na bhFómharach) is an area of about 40,000 interlocking basalt columns, the result of an ancient volcanic eruption. It is located on the northeast coast of Ireland, about two miles (3 km) north of the town of Bushmills.

The Giant’s Causeway

• It was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1986, and a National Nature Reserve in 1987 by the Department of the Environment for Northern Ireland. In a 2005 poll of Radio Times readers, the Giant's Causeway was named as the fourth greatest natural wonder in the United Kingdom.

The Giant’s Causeway

• The tops of the columns form stepping stones that lead from the cliff foot and disappear under the sea. Most of the columns are hexagonal, although there are also some with four, five, seven and eight sides. The tallest are about 12 metres (36 ft) high, and the solidified lava in the cliffs is 28 metres thick in places.

The Giant’s Causeway: a video

The Seven Sisters

• The Seven Sisters are a series of chalk.

• They form part of the South Downs in East Sussex, between the towns of Seaford and Eastbourne in southern England, and are within the Seven Sisters Country Park. They are the remnants of dry valleys in the chalk South Downs gradually being eroded by the sea.

The Seven Sisters The cliff peaks and the dips

between them are individually named. Listed below, the peaks are in bold:

• Haven Brow • Short Bottom• Short Brow• Limekiln Bottom• Rough Brow• Rough Bottom• Brass Point• Gap Bottom• Flagstaff Point • Flagstaff Bottom• Flat Hill• Flathill Bottom• Baily's Hill• Michel Dean• Went Hill Brow .

The Seven Sisters: a video