26 obelisks researched · 9 countries · updated Aug 2026
An independently researched guide to the ancient obelisks of Egypt and Rome — where each one stands today, how it got there, and exactly how tall it really is next to the others.
Explore by region
Most obelisks left Egypt centuries ago. Rome alone holds more than anywhere else on Earth — including Egypt itself.
More ancient obelisks than any other city in the world — Egyptian originals and Roman-made copies side by side in its piazze.
6 obelisksThe pieces that never left — from the world's oldest standing obelisk to the giant that was never even finished.
3 obelisksParis, London, and Munich — 19th-century gifts, purchases, and one piece of Napoleonic war loot.
3 obelisksIstanbul's Hippodrome, a Roman hippodrome in Caesarea, and Central Park, New York.
3 fragmentsNot every obelisk survived whole — broken, buried, or split across two museums a century apart.
3 structuresAxum, Washington, Buenos Aires — deliberately kept separate from the ancient dataset, but worth knowing.
Featured obelisk
Cut for Tuthmosis III and IV at Karnak, shipped to Rome under Constantius II in 357 CE, toppled, and lost to the ground for centuries — the Lateran Obelisk is the tallest ancient obelisk standing anywhere in the world today, and the tallest structure Rome had for over a thousand years.
The dataset so far
Every entry is cross-checked against museum records, UNESCO listings, and academic references — never copied from any single existing obelisk site.