Quote Originally Posted by Enkidoh View Post
Qarn wasn't built by Belha'dia, it was already old before Belah'dia was even formed (the description for it in the Duty Finder mentions how it predated "this Sixth Astral Era civilization" and that generations of Belah'dian sultans added more and more of their own embelishments and modifications to the place, suggesting it was definetely at least pre-Sixth Astral Era, possibly even older.

My guess is something around Third Astral Era, aka, around the time of the rise of the Allagan Empire, as Allagan structures have always been part of Thanalan since 1.0, with the 'Royal Allagan Starway' and 'Royal Allagan Sunway' roads still in use in the present day, so an Allagan-era origin for Qarn is as good as any).

Also those minaret-like structures found partially buried in the sand in Southern Thanalan like at Byregot's Strike are very similar to the structures found near the Crystal Tower in Mor Dhona at Saint Coinach's Find, and also, Qarn's structure resembles the other ruins found in Eastern Thanalan around Highbridge and the appropriately named 'Invisible City' soooo... I'll leave you to draw your own conclusions.
Aye, that is true. My bad, then. I messed up civilizations.

It is true, though. In Southern Thanalan, did not one of the NPCs there said that they are digging Allagan ruins to the south of the Sagolii? I realized about the "Royal Allagan Sunway" and the "Royal Allagan Starway" the other day and my reaction was pretty much, "... dear Lord, Emet, did you name everything you built / helped to build after us?!"

But whatever the case, Qarn is definitely Ancient Egypt-inspired, from the statues to the monsters to the mummies, but besides that, some Allagan creatures are, too, Egyptian-like: see the Sphinxes in the Flagship in Azys Lla, the Shabti (which are the Anubys monsters from Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII... in fact, Allag is brimming with FFXIII stuff), and the second boss of Aetherochemical Research Facility, Harmachis, has one particular attack called "Ka"... So perhaps proto-Allag was Ancient Egyptian, and then it became what we know, but kept some of their original things.