Ancient Tomb (Original Art)

Ancient Tomb is one of the most explosive mana sources in Magic’s history. It effectively trades life for tempo, letting you produce two colorless mana on turn one. The two points of self-damage are almost irrelevant in the decks that want it. When you’re dropping a Chalice of the Void for one or a Trinisphere on turn one, your opponent’s deck often can’t function long enough to punish you. Ancient Tomb is the backbone of “Sol Land” strategies (lands that tap for two mana, like City of Traitors), enabling absurdly fast openings that define entire archetypes. Legacy is Ancient Tomb’s true home, and it’s one of the most important nonbasic lands in the format. It appears in multiple archetypes, typically ones that play colorless or artifact-heavy threats and want to deploy lock pieces. Eldrazi Stompy / Colorless Eldrazi uses fast mana (e.g. Ancient Tomb, Eye of Ugin, Eldrazi Temple) to play enormous creatures ahead of curve (e.g. Thought-Knot Seer, Reality Smasher) and to cast Chalice of the Void and The One Ring. Mono-Red Prison (“Dragon Stompy”) uses Ancient Tomb to power out cards like Chalice of the Void (X=1), Trinisphere, Blood Moon, Magus of the Moon, Fable of the Mirror-Breaker, and The One Ring. Painter / Stompy Combo decks use Ancient Tomb to accelerate the Painter’s Servant + Grindstone combo and to cast cards like Karn, the Great Creator and The One Ring. Older Legacy decks like MUD (Metalworker) made use of Ancient Tomb’s early acceleration to cast cards like Metalworker, Sundering Titan, Wurmcoil Engine, and Kuldotha Forgemaster. Since recently, Mystic Forge combo has been one of the top decks in Legacy, which uses Ancient Tomb to cast cards like Grim Monolith, Karn, the Great Creator, Kozilek’s Command, The One Ring, and Tezzeret, Cruel Captain. In Commander (EDH), Ancient Tomb is an absolute staple in many colorless and artifact-heavy decks (e.g. Karn, Silver Golem and Kozilek, the Great Distortion). Ancient Tomb is not on the Reserved List.