Türkçe ansiklopedi, sözlük, genel başvuru ve bilgi sitesi   
  		  Yardım
  Rastgele    

Colossus Of Rhodes

“The Colossus of Rhodes” redirects here. For the film by Sergio Leone, see Il Colosso di Rodi.
For other uses, see Colossus.
Enlarge picture
This drawing of Colossus of Rhodes, which illustrated The Grolier Society's 1911 Book of Knowledge, is probably fanciful, as it is unlikely that the statue stood astride the harbour mouth.
Enlarge picture
Colossus of Rhodes, imagined in a 16th-century engraving by Martin Heemskerck, part of his series of the Seven Wonders of the World.
The Colossus of Rhodes was a huge statue of the Greek god Helios, erected on the Greek island of Rhodes by Chares of Lindos between 292 and 280 BC. It was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Before its destruction, the Colossus of Rhodes stood over 30 meters (100 ft) high, making it the tallest statue of the ancient world.[1]

Siege of Rhodes

Main article: Siege of Rhodes
Alexander III of Macedon died at an early age in 323 BC without having time to put into place any plans for his succession. Fighting broke out among his generals, the Diadochi, with four of them eventually dividing up much of his empire in the Mediterranean area. During the fighting Rhodes had sided with Ptolemy, and when Ptolemy eventually took control of Egypt, Rhodes and Ptolemaic Egypt formed an alliance which controlled much of the trade in the eastern Mediterranean.

Antigonus I Monophthalmus, was upset by this turn of events. In 305 BC he had his son Demetrius Poliorcetes, also a general, invade Rhodes with an army of 40,000; however, the city was well defended, and Demetrius—whose name "Poliorcetes" signifies the "besieger of cities"—had to start construction of a number of massive siege towers in order to gain access to the walls. The first was mounted on six ships, but these were capsized in a storm before they could be used. He tried again with a larger, land-based tower named Helepolis, but the Rhodian defenders stopped this by flooding the land in front of the walls so that the rolling tower could not move.

In 304 BC a relief force of ships sent by Ptolemy arrived, and Demetrius's army abandoned the siege, leaving most of their siege equipment. To celebrate their victory, the Rhodians sold the equipment left behind for 300 talents[2] (roughly US$150 million in today's money) and decided to use the money to build a colossal statue of their patron god, Helios. Construction was left to the direction of Chares, a native of Lindos in Rhodes, who had been involved with large-scale statues before. His teacher, the sculptor Lysippos, had constructed a 30 meter (100 ft) high[3] bronze statue of Zeus at Tarentum.

Construction

Ancient accounts, which differ to some degree, describe the structure as being built around several stone columns (or towers of blocks) forming the interior of the structure, which stood on a fifteen-meter-high (fifty-foot) white marble pedestal near the Mandraki harbor entrance. Other sources place the Colossus on a breakwater in the harbor. The statue itself was 30 meters (100 feet) tall. Iron beams were embedded in the brick towers, and bronze plates attached to the bars formed the visible skin of the sculpture. Much of the iron and bronze was reforged from the various weapons Demetrius's army left behind, and the abandoned second siege tower was used for scaffolding around the lower levels during construction. Upper portions were built with the use of a large earthen ramp. During the building the builders would pile mounds of dirt on the sides of the colossus. To an observer it may have looked like a volcano-like sculpture. Upon completion all of the dirt was moved and the colossus was left to stand alone. After twelve years, in 280 BC, the statue was completed.

Destruction

The statue stood for only 54 years until Rhodes was hit by an earthquake in 226 BC. The statue snapped at the knees and fell over on to the land. Ptolemy III offered to pay for the reconstruction of the statue, but the oracle of Delphi made the Rhodians afraid that they had offended Helios, and they declined to rebuild it. The remains lay on the ground as described by Strabo (xiv.2.5) for over 800 years, and even broken, they were so impressive that many traveled to see them. Pliny the Elder remarked that few people could wrap their arms around the fallen thumb and that each of its fingers was larger than most statues.

In 654 an Arab force under Muawiyah I captured Rhodes, and according to the chronicler Theophanes the Confessor,[4] the remains were sold to a traveling salesman from Edessa. The buyer had the statue broken down, and transported the bronze scrap on the backs of 900 camels to his home. Pieces continued to turn up for sale for years, after being found along the caravan route.

The harbor-straddling Colossus was a figment of later imaginations. Many older illustrations (above) show the statue with one foot on either side of the harbor mouth with ships passing under it: "...the brazen giant of Greek fame, with conquering limbs astride from land to land..." ("The New Colossus", the poem inscribed at the base of the Statue of Liberty). Shakespeare's Cassius in Julius Caesar (I,ii,136–38) says of Caesar:

Why man, he doth bestride the narrow world
Like a Colossus, and we petty men
Walk under his huge legs and peep about
To find ourselves dishonorable graves


Shakespeare alludes to the Colossus also in Troilus and Cressida (V.5) and in Henry IV, Part 1 (V.1).

While these fanciful images from poetry feed the misconception, simple reflection on the mechanics of the situation reveal that the Colossus could not have straddled the harbor as described in Lemprière's Classical Dictionary. (a) If the completed statue straddled the harbor, the entire mouth of the harbor would have been effectively closed during the entirety of the construction, nor would the ancient Rhodians have had the means to dredge and re-open the harbor after construction. (b) The statue fell in 224 BC: if it straddled the harbor mouth, it would have entirely blocked the harbor, nor would the ancients have had the ability to remove the entire statue from the harbor so it would be visible on land for the next 800 years, as discussed above. Even neglecting these objections, the statue was made of bronze, and an engineering analysis proved that it could not have been built with its legs apart without collapsing from its own weight.

Modern times

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

The Colossus of Rhodes in modern fiction

Notes

1. ^ It was three-quarters the height of the Statue of Liberty (47 m).
2. ^ Pliny's Natural History xxxiv.18.
3. ^ Forty cubits high, according to Pliny the Elder (Natural History xxxiv.18).
4. ^ See also Constantine VII Porphyrogenitos, De administrando imperio xx-xxi.

See also

References

External links

Coordinates:
IMDb profile

Il Colosso de Rodi (English title: The Colossus of Rhodes) is a 1961 sword and sandal film directed by Sergio Leone. It was Leone's first work as a credited director, in a genre were he already had worked before (as a secondary
..... Click the link for more information.
Colossus may refer to:

Statues


..... Click the link for more information.
statue is a sculpture depicting a specific entity, usually a person, event, animal or object. Its primary concern is representational.

A small statue is called statuette. A statue of just a head and shoulders is a bust.
..... Click the link for more information.
HeliOS was a Unix-like operating system for parallel computers developed and sold by Perihelion Software. It was most commonly used on various Transputer systems, but also supported other architectures.
..... Click the link for more information.
Motto
Ελευθερία ή θάνατος
Eleftheria i thanatos  
..... Click the link for more information.
Rhodes
Ρόδο?

Palace of the Grand Master in the city of Rhodes
Geography

Island Chain: Dodecanese
Area:[1] 1,400.684 km (0 sq.mi.
..... Click the link for more information.
Chares of Lindos (fl. in 280 BC) was a Greek sculptor born in the island of Rhodes. He was pupil of Lysippus. Chares constructed for the Rhodians the Colossus of Rhodes, a bronze statue of Helios (Pliny, Natural History XXXIV.xviii.41).
..... Click the link for more information.
3rd century BC - 2nd century BC
320s BC  310s BC  300s BC - 290s BC - 280s BC  270s BC  260s BC 
295 BC 294 BC 293 BC - 292 BC - 291 BC 290 BC 289 BC

Politics
State leaders - Sovereign states

..... Click the link for more information.
3rd century BC - 2nd century BC
310s BC  300s BC  290s BC - 280s BC - 270s BC  260s BC  250s BC 
283 BC 282 BC 281 BC - 280 BC - 279 BC 278 BC 277 BC

Politics
State leaders - Sovereign states

..... Click the link for more information.
'Seven Wonders of the World' (or the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World) is a widely-known list of seven remarkable manmade constructions of classical antiquity. It was based on guide-books popular among Hellenic sight-seers and only includes works located around the
..... Click the link for more information.
Siege of Rhodes (305 BC/304 BC) is one of the most famous sieges in ancient history.

Demetrius, son of Antigonus I, besieged Rhodes supposedly in an attempt to break its alliance with Egypt.
..... Click the link for more information.
Alexander III, the Great
Basileus of Macedon, Hegemon of the Hellenic League, Shah of Persia, Pharaoh of Egypt

Alexander fighting Persian king Darius III. From Alexander Mosaic, from Pompeii, Naples, Museo Archeologico Nazionale.
..... Click the link for more information.
Macedon or Macedonia (Greek Μακεδονία Makedonía
..... Click the link for more information.
4th century BC - 3rd century BC
350s BC  340s BC  330s BC - 320s BC - 310s BC  300s BC  290s BC 
326 BC 325 BC 324 BC - 323 BC - 322 BC 321 BC 320 BC

Politics
State leaders - Sovereign states

..... Click the link for more information.
Diadochi, the plural of Diadochus, is the common Latin form of the Greek Διάδοχοι, transcripted Diadokhoi, which in general means "successors", such that the neoplatonic refounders of Plato's Academy in Late Antiquity
..... Click the link for more information.
Ptolemy I Soter (Greek: Πτολεμαῖος Σωτήρ, Ptolemaios Soter, i.e.
..... Click the link for more information.
Gumhūriyyat Miṣr al-ʿArabiyyah
Arab Republic of Egypt


Flag Coat of arms
Anthem
Bilady, Bilady, Bilady
..... Click the link for more information.
The Antigonid dynasty was a dynasty of Hellenistic kings descended from Alexander the Great's general Antigonus I Monophthalmus ("the One-eyed"). Antigonus himself ruled mostly over Asia Minor and northern Syria.
..... Click the link for more information.
Demetrius I (337-283 BC, Greek: Δημήτριος), surnamed Poliorcetes ("The Besieger"), son of Antigonus I Monophthalmus and Stratonice, was a king of Macedon (294 - 288 BC). He belonged to the Antigonid dynasty.
..... Click the link for more information.
siege tower (or in the Middle Ages a belfry[1]) is a specialized siege engine, constructed to protect assailants and ladders while approaching the defensive walls of a fortification.
..... Click the link for more information.
Helepolis (Greek: ἑλέπολις, lit. Taker of Cities) was an ancient siege engine invented by Demetrius I of Macedon and constructed by Epimachus of Athens for the unsuccessful siege of Rhodes, based
..... Click the link for more information.
HeliOS was a Unix-like operating system for parallel computers developed and sold by Perihelion Software. It was most commonly used on various Transputer systems, but also supported other architectures.
..... Click the link for more information.
Chares of Lindos (fl. in 280 BC) was a Greek sculptor born in the island of Rhodes. He was pupil of Lysippus. Chares constructed for the Rhodians the Colossus of Rhodes, a bronze statue of Helios (Pliny, Natural History XXXIV.xviii.41).
..... Click the link for more information.
Lysippos was a Greek sculptor of the 4th century BC. Lysippos, Skopas and Praxiteles are considered the three great sculptors of the Classical Greek era, bringing transition into the Hellenistic era.
..... Click the link for more information.
Zeus (in Greek: nominative: Ζεύς Zeús, genitive: Διός Diós
..... Click the link for more information.
Country Italy
Region Basilicata
Province Taranto (TA)
Mayor Ippazio Ezio Stefàno

Area km
Population
 - Total (as of 2001)
 - Density /km
Time zone CET, UTC+1

..... Click the link for more information.
Editing of this page by unregistered or newly registered users is currently disabled due to vandalism.
If you are prevented from editing this page, and you wish to make a change, please discuss changes on the talk page, request unprotection, log in, or .
..... Click the link for more information.
3rd century BC - 2nd century BC
250s BC  240s BC  230s BC - 220s BC - 210s BC  200s BC  190s BC 
229 BC 228 BC 227 BC - 226 BC - 225 BC 224 BC 223 BC

Politics
State leaders - Sovereign states

..... Click the link for more information.
Ptolemy III Euergetes, (Greek: Πτολεμαίος Ευεργέτης, reigned 246 BC–222 BC) is sometimes called Ptolemy III Euergetes I.
..... Click the link for more information.
Strabo[1] (Greek: Στράβων; 63/64 BC – ca. AD 24) was a Greek historian, geographer and philosopher. He is mostly famous for his 17-volume work Geographica
..... Click the link for more information.


This article is copied from an article on Wikipedia.org - the free encyclopedia created and edited by online user community. The text was not checked or edited by anyone on our staff. Although the vast majority of the wikipedia encyclopedia articles provide accurate and timely information please do not assume the accuracy of any particular article. This article is distributed under the terms of GNU Free Documentation License.