Introduction

On a small island in the harbor of New York stands an immense statue of a robed woman, holding a book and lifting a torch to the sky. At almost thirty-six and a half meters from foot to crown, it is sometimes referred to as the "Modern Colossus." ¹

The original

This awe-inspiring statue was a gift from France to America.² What many visitors to this shrine to freedom don't know is that the Statue of Liberty is the echo of another statue, the original Colossus that stood over two thousand years ago at the entrance to another busy harbor on the Island of Rhodes. Like the Statue of Liberty, this colossus was also built as a celebration of freedom. This amazing statue, standing the same height ³ from toe to head as the modern colossus, was one of the World's Seven Wonders.

The Island of Rhodes

The island of Rhodes was an important economic center in the ancient world. As one of the Greek islands⁴ it's located off the southwestern tip of Asia Minor where the Aegean Sea meets the Mediterranean. Throughout most of its history, ancient Greece was comprised of city-states which had limited power beyond their boundary. On the small island of Rhodes were three of these: Ialysos, Kamiros, and Lindos. In 408 BC, the cities united to form one territory, with a unified capital, Rhodes. The city Rhodes was designed to take advantage of the island's best natural harbor on the northern coast.

Background

In 357 B.C. the island was conquered by Mausolus of Halicarnassus, ⁵ fell into Persian hands in 340 B.C., and was finally captured by Alexander the Great in 332 B.C.. When Alexander died of a fever at an early age, his generals fought bitterly among themselves for control of Alexander's vast kingdom. Three of them, Ptolemy, Seleucus, and Antigous⁶, succeeded in dividing the kingdom among themselves.

The Rhodians supported Ptolemy⁷ in this struggle. This angered Antigous who sent his son Demetrius to capture and punish the city of Rhodes

The war was long and painful. Demetrius brought an army of 40,000 men. This was more than the entire population of Rhodes. He also augmented his force by using Aegean pirates.

City under siege

The city was protected by a strong, tall wall, and the attackers were forced to use siege towers to try and climb over it. Siege towers were wooden structures often armed with catapults that could be moved up to a defender's walls to allow the attackers to scale them. While some were designed to be rolled up on land, Demetrius used a giant tower mounted on top of six ships lashed together to make his attack. This tower, though, was turned over and smashed when a storm suddenly approached. The battle was won by the Rhodians.

Demetrius had a second supertower built. This one stood almost forty-six meters high and some twenty-three meter square at the base. It was equipped with many catapults and skinned with wood and leather to protect the troops inside from archers. It even carried water tanks that could be used to fight fires started by flaming arrows. This tower was mounted on iron wheels and could be rolled up to the walls.

When Demetrius attacked the city, the defenders stopped the war machine by flooding a ditch outside the walls and miring the heavy monster in the mud. By then almost a year had gone by and a fleet of ships from Egypt arrived to assist the city. Demetrius withdrew quickly leaving the great siege tower where it was.

Building a god

To celebrate their victory and freedom, the Rhodians decided to build a giant statue of their patron god Helios. They melted down bronze from the many war machines Demetrius left behind for the exterior of the figure and the super siege tower became the scaffolding for the project. According to Pliny, a historian who lived several centuries after the Colossus was built, construction took 12 years. Other historians place the start of the work in 304 B.C.

The statue was thirty-three and a half meters high and stood upon a fifteen meter pedestal near the harbor mole. Although the statue has been popularly depicted with its legs spanning the harbor entrance so that ships could pass beneath, it was actually posed in a more traditional Greek manner: nude, wearing a spiked crown, shading its eyes from the rising sun with its right hand, while holding a cloak over its left.

No ancient account mentions the harbor-spanning pose and it seems unlikely the Greeks would have depicted one of their gods in such an awkward manner. In addition, such a pose would have meant shutting down the harbor during the construction, something not economically feasible.

The statue was constructed of bronze plates over an iron framework⁸ The Statue of Liberty, roughly of the same size, weighs 204 000 kilogram. According to the book of Pilon of Byzantium, 13 600 kilogram of bronze were used and 8 160 kilograms of iron, though these numbers seem low. The Colossus, which relied on weaker materials, must have weighed at least as much and probably more.

Ancient accounts tell us that inside the statue were several stone columns which acted as the main support. Iron beams were driven into the stone and connected with the bronze outer skin. Each bronze plate had to be carefully cast then hammered into the right shape for its location in the figure, then hoisted into position and riveted to the surrounding plates and the iron frame.

The architect

The architect of this great construction was Chares of Lindos, a Rhodian sculptor who was a patriot and fought in defense of the city. Chares had been involved with large scale statues before. His teacher, Lysippus, had constructed a 18,5 meters high likeness of Zeus. Chares probably started by making smaller versions of the statue, maybe three feet high, then used these as a guide to shaping each of the bronze plates of the skin.

It is believed Chares did not live to see his project finished. There are several legends that he committed suicide. In one tale he has almost finished the statue when someone points out a small flaw in the construction. The sculptor is so ashamed of it he kills himself.

In another version the city fathers decide to double the height of the statue. Chares only doubles his fee, forgetting that doubling the height will mean an eightfold increase in the amount of materials needed. This drives him into bankruptcy and suicide.

There is no evidence that either of these tales are true.

Short-time wonder

The Colossus stood proudly at the harbor entrance for some fifty-six years. Each morning the sun must have caught its polished bronze surface and made the god's figure shine.⁹ Then an earthquake hit Rhodes and the statue collapsed. The Delphic Oracle warned the Rhodians not to restore the Colossus, and the
crumpled bronze lay where it had fallen for 900 years.

"Even as it lies," wrote Pliny, "it excites our wonder and admiration. Few men can clasp the thumb in their arms, and its fingers are larger than most statues. Where the limbs are broken asunder, vast caverns are seen yawning in the interior. Within it, too, are to be seen large masses of rock, by the weight of which the artist steadied it while erecting it."

It is said that an Egyptian king¹⁰ offered to pay for its reconstruction, but the Rhodians refused. They feared that somehow the statue had offended the god Helios, who used the earthquake to throw it down.

In the middle of the seventh century A.D. the Arabs conquered Rhodes and broke the remains of the Colossus up into smaller pieces, and sold it as scrap metal to a Jewish merchant from Syria. Legend says it took 900 camels¹² to carry away the statue. A sad end for what must have been a majestic work of art.