Great Temple of Ramses II

Great Temple of Ramses II

c. 1275-1225 BCE

1662

built works

Egypt (nation)

Abu Simbel (ruins)

Nineteenth Dynasty

temples (buildings)

colossi

Bird's-eye view of the Great Temple of Ramses, II. "These rock-cut temples are located in the ancient Wawat (or the legendary Ybsambul) in Nubia, near the borders of Sudan, about 300 kilometers from Aswan. Earlier temples in Nubia had been located within forts, but here the confidence of Ramses II, whose reign may have lasted as many as 67 years, is illustrated; these temples, probably once brightly colored, were cut into the natural rock and lapped by the Nile. After eleven centuries of oblivion, these temples were rediscovered in 1813 when Johann Ludwig Burckhardt saw by accident the upper parts of the colossal figures. In 1817 Giovanni Battista Belzoni found the entrance, partially freed from the sand. In the following years these temples were often partially covered by shifting sands. Today visitors see the reconstructed temples now relocated on higher ground (60 meters directly above their earlier position) after the heroic international rescue efforts to save these treasures from Lake Nasser," by Mary Ann Sullivan, Bluffton University.

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