Prussia: 58 wonders
I played a game with Prussia to try this challenge out with a later civ. Obviously, it involves a lot of conquering, since most wonders are already built. In fact, only a single turn I was at war with no-one passed in the entire game (the first one).
The Holy Roman Empire was already destroyed when I spawned, their lands controlled by the Dutch (Frankfurt, which had the only wonder I started with, the protestant shrine), Swedish, and Polish (vassals of the Swedes). Fortunately, none of them had rifles, nor anyone else in the world. My flip made me go to war with all three, so I razed Amsterdam, Krakow, Kopenhagen, and Wien and conquered Kiev (Sistine Chapel and Versailles) and Budapest (nice city). I wanted to conquer Lulea, where the Swedes had built the Leaning Tower, but Peter refusing to open borders prevented me. This later turned out lucky, as they also built the Brandenburg Gate there and I was able to get both wonders with a quick invasion around 1910.
I signed defensive pacts with Russia (no wonders) and Spain (only the Notre Dame in Milan, which I was able to get by congress a few turns later). They remained my allies through the entire game, though they were usually annoyed or cautious. France was weakened by Spanish Marsella and had the San Marco in Brest, so I conquered it quickly. While doing this, Turkey decided to attack me while my attention was away and nearly took Budapest. However, I was able to secure it and slowly build up my army to strike back, as Athens and Constantinople were both packed with wonders. I was able to get Assembly Line quickly and use the marvelous Prussian UP to instantly turn my entire army into Infantry. The turks had only just reached Rifling and were slowly upgrading their army, so you can imagine how quickly it went after that.
I capitulated Turkey, as Ankara, Trabzon, and Jerusalem all had wonders but would've been a drain on my stability. I should mention I was at war with half the world by now, including a very strong Mongolia, an almost as strong Mughals, and Iran. With Turkey capitulated, I harassed Iran for a while until they too capitulated so they could serve as a save path to India, where a dozen wonders stood. A few troops went into Africa to take Luxor (Pyramids) and independent Aksum (Theodosian Walls), and Egypt too capitulated. Meanwhile, my European holdings were busy pumping out the modern wonders one by one. I only lost the Statue of Liberty to America.
Tanks arrived on the scene, and a major army of them invaded the strong, but unstable Mughal empire. Fortunately for my own stability, they had built all their wonders in Delhi, Varanasi, and Azimabad, allowing me to ignore most of India and just grab these three (and raze Lahore, which was in the way). Naturally, this collapsed the Indians and brought my total up to 45 wonders.
Except for Mexico-City's Floating Gardens and Milwaukee's Statue of Liberty, all the remaining wonders were in China (or not built yet), which was controlled by powerful Mongolia, which was using Infantry too now. Fortunately, I had got Modern Armours and nukes by now. I barely used the nukes though. The Chinese wonders were all in Xi'an, Wuzhou, and a Manchurian city controlled by Japan, Mongolia's ally, so I conquered only these cities to avoid stability disaster. This went well for the most part thanks to waves upon waves of Modern Armours, but since Khanbaliq harrassed my armies as they passed it and I didn't want the stability hit of conquering it, I did have to nuke it. Meanwhile, a small group of tanks conquered Timbuktu for the University of Sankore. (I had left Mali alone until then, as they had been my ally Spain's vassal. But having broken away, they were free game)
With all eastern hemisphere wonders under my control, only the Floating Gardens and the Statue of Liberty remained. I sent a big army of Modern Armours to english Canada to get ready to strike at Milwaukee, while a fleet went to Miami to invade Mexico. At this point, I did unleash my nukes to get rid of the Mexican armies and took Mexico City, capitulating them instantly. Unfortunately, I hadn't counted on the ongoing war with Colombia I had standing and the chain of defensive pacts that caused Mexico's capitulation to get me in war with America and England. Fortunately, it didn't matter that much anyway: my army in Canada got teleported to a Spanish colony and attacked Milwaukee from the south instead of the north. I had more than enough nukes to make sure America and England weren't much of a problem, and quickly made peace with them when the Statue of Liberty was in my hands.
A single wonder remained: the Space Elevator, which was still under contstruction. The Fusion great engineer finished it and left me with every wonder on the map. Yet I only got to 58. Unfortunately, it seems the barbs went on a razing spree. I had suspected as much the moment I realised Carthage was called Tunis and Babylon Baghdad. They were presumably razed and rebuilt. They were loaded with wonders, judging by the amount of them that just disappeared.
The wonders I missed:
Sphynx, Oracle, Hanging Gardens, Ishtar Gate, Statue of Zeus, Mausoleum, Cothon, Colossus, Colosseum - I suspect these were in Carthage or Babylon and got destroyed with them.
Temple of Kukulkan and Machu Picchu - Likely destroyed by barbs along with Yax.
Adur Farnbag - Likely never built. By the time I realised this, generating a prophet was pretty much impossible with all the wonders polluting my GP pool.
Apostolic Palace - The Palace's absence from my world puzzled me for a long time, as cities almost never get razed after the Europeans spawn, and Orthodoxy was present so the palace had to have existed at one point. I've concluded it was almost certainly in Brandenburg, Magdeburg, or Stettin and auto-deleted when I spawned. Whoops.
The save
