Friday, October 11 | 6:30pm | Little Theater

No Registration Required

Join us for an AIA (Archaeological Institute of America) Toledo Society lecture: “The Egyptian Colossus: Ramesses II's Giant Statues and the Worship of the God-King by his People” Dr. Brand will give the 3rd Annual Mohamed El-Shafie Memorial Lecture on Ancient Egypt.

This lecture explores how Ramesses II built and transported dozens of giant royal statues and their political and religious function in his regime. Among the hundreds of royal statues Ramesses II commissioned, the dozens of giant colossi stand out as among his signature achievements that earned him the distinction Ramesses the Great. His name brings to mind the shattered wreck of the Ozymandias in the Ramesseum that Shelley immortalized, and the majestic giants enthroned in the cliff face at Abu Simbel that moved the world to save all the archaeological heritage of Nubia in the UNESCO salvage campaign of the 1960s. In his own day, quarrying and transporting these monoliths, ranging in weight from a few hundred to over a thousand tons, took skill, ingenuity, and back-breaking work of clever engineers and tireless workmen toiling in difficult conditions. Once they were set up in the courtyards and esplanades of temples across the realm and the sculptors had applied the finishing touches, the true purpose of these mighty statues became apparent. Neither commemorative nor “guardians” of the temple, they were instead mammoth cult-images of the divine Ramesses II that now received adoration from a cross section of Egyptian society from royal sons and high officials to average Egyptians of modest means. Dozens of small votive stelae pious worshipers of the deified king left in homage testify to this cult of royal colossi. We even see images of pharaoh himself adoring his own colossal alter ego.