Minecraft 1.19 Ancient City Survival Guide

Ancient Cities are now available for exploration in Minecraft 1.19 version. This new structural area is currently considered the most dangerous in the game due to a powerful mob known as the Warden.

Our guide will help you conquer the Ancient City in Minecraft 1.19. You will learn how to find it, explore it without being detected, and loot everything, including the secret Redstone lab.

How to Find Ancient City in Minecraft 1.19

Ancient Cities spawn deep underground, in the negative Y coordinates between -30 and -50. These giant structures often cover hundreds of blocks, and they may generate at spawn. If you’re particularly lucky, you may find one pretty quickly.

Ancient Cities tend to generate under the new mountain biomes, such a Jagged Peaks or Snowy Slopes. But if you have no time for searching, then you can use these seeds, where Ancient Cities appear at spawn:

• -2354936348104741050 at coordinates 100, -50, 70 (Java)
• 70885 at coordinates 150, -50, 150 (Bedrock)

Try to approach an Ancient City from the same level as its bedrock, or even below it, so you could climb into it rather than falling from the ceiling, which could easily kill you.

You will need the following equipment for Ancient City exploration:

• Lots of food.
• Lots of wool.
• Potions of Night Vision.
• A sword and a bow, or any other viable weapons.
• A pickaxe, a hoe with Silk Touch, and other tools.
• An armor, preferably Protection IV.
• Healing items, such as golden apples.
• A bed for quick respawn.

Ancient City: Rules of Engagement in Minecraft 1.19

The Ancient City is very dangerous and inhabited by Wardens, which are extremely powerful hostile mobs. These mobs don’t appear right away, but they can be summoned by Sculk Shriekers, if your presence is detected by Sculk Sensors in an Ancient City.

How to Avoid Sculk Sensors

Sculk Sensors are special blocks that react to vibrations, movement, and light sources in an Ancient City. If any of these get registered by the sensors, they start emitting redstone signals. This will cause Sculk Shriekers to summon a Warden, who will chase and defeat the intruder.

Note that you will have three levels of alert before a Sculk Shrieker summons a Warden in an Ancient City. If you manage to avoid alerting a Sculk Shrieker, every 10 minutes a Sculk Shrieker will remove one level of alert.

Here are some essential tips on how to avoid Sculk Sensors and Sculk Shriekers:

• Do not approach or break Sculk blocks.
• Keep a distance to them of at least 10 blocks.
• Move around only in crouching position.
• Use wool to reduce vibrations.
• Use Potions of Night Vision instead of torches.

How to Break Sculk Shriekers

It’s recommended not to touch or even approach the Sculk Shriekers in an Ancient City, but you may find yourself so busy looting that at one point activating a Sculk Shrieker is almost inevitable, which will eventually summon a Warden.

So in order to prevent this from happening, it would be wise to break Sculk Shriekers, if you plan on staying inside an Ancient City for longer periods of time.

Follow these tips, if you want to safely get rid of the Sculk Shriekers:

• The best tool for breaking a Sculk Shrieker is a simple hoe.
• Be fast about it, you will have no more than 4-5 seconds to do it.
• Break all the Shriekers in close vicinity, or they will trigger each other.
• Be aware of an exit point from an Ancient City at all times in case a Warden appears.

How to Deal With Warden

Despite all the precautions, you may still experience the summoning of the Warden. When this happens, you will hear a loud noise, and the hostile mob will rise from the ground.

Here are the most important tips you simply must know on how to deal with the Warden:

• Do not attempt to defeat Warden!
• Don’t make any noises, or he will detect you.
• Keep sneaking and crouching, when moving to the exit point.
• If he doesn’t see you, wait 60 seconds and the Warden will despawn.

How to Enter the Redstone Lab in the Ancient City

Besides all the great loot that you can collect in the Ancient City, you can also enter the secret Redstone lab. The Redstone lab can be found under a giant monument resembling the head of the Warden in the center of the city.

Follow these steps, if you want to know how to enter an Ancient City’s Redstone lab:

1. Find and open a chest in front of the central monument.
2. Pick up a golden carrot from the chest, but don’t eat it.
3. Go to the bridge near the monument.
4. Locate two walls under the bridge made of deepslate blocks.
5. Approach the wall made of chiseled deepslate blocks.
6. When standing in front of it, eat the golden carrot.
7. Once the doors open, collect all the loot inside the lab.

Typically, you will find lots of Redstone blocks there, and on top of that you will be able to obtain the following loot from the Ancient City:

• Sculk Blocks
• Basalt Blocks
• Soul Blocks
• Skeleton Skulls
• Various Enchantments
• Echo Shards
• Reinforced Deepslate
• Gold and Diamond items

Related guides

• How to Dye Armor
• How to Craft and Use Candles
• How to Hatch a Dragon Egg

For more Minecraft guides, check out our dedicated Minecraft guides page, and if you were looking for Minecraft seeds, head over to this page.