Exterior View of the Two Temples at Ybsambul

Category

Library Item

Item no

31086

Title

Exterior view of the two Temples at Ybsambul

Artist / maker

Aglio, A.

Date

1820

Size

41.6 x 54.7 cm

Type

Lithograph

Location

Reference Library

Giovanni Battista Belzoni was an Italian explorer and archaeologist, born in Padua (Padova). In 1803 he was working in England as a circus strong man, and exhibiting models of hydraulic engines. In 1815 he went to Cairo to try and sell his hydraulic engines to Muhammad 'Ali Pasha, and within two years had begun a new career, excavating Egyptian tombs and temples.

Not only are the two temples at Abu Simbel - The Temple of Re - Harakhte (The Sun Temple of Ramisis 11) and Nefertari's Temple of Hathor (Abu -Simbel Small Temple) among the most magnificent monuments in the world but their removal and reconstruction was an historic event in itself. When the temples (280 km from Aswan) were threatened by submersion in Lake Nasser, due to the construction of the High Dam, the Egyptian Government secured the support of UNESCO and launched a world wide appeal. During the salvage operation which began in 1964 and continued until 1968, the two temples were dismantled and raised over 60 metres up the sandstone cliff where they had been built more than 3,000 years before. Here they were reassembled, in the exact same relationship to each other and the sun, and covered with an artificial mountain. Most of the joins in the stone have now been filled by antiquity experts, but inside the temples it is still possible to see where the blocks were cut.

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