The Colossus of Rhodes
Around 304 B.C. the citizens of Rhodes a Greek island in the Aegean Sea, began to build a giant statue of the Helios, in thanks for the ending of a long war. They melted down bronze form the war machines invaders had left behind for the exterior of the figure, and when it was finished a dozen years later, the Colossus of Rhodes was about 120 feet high, approximately the hight of the Statue of Liberty and stood on a fifty foot pedestal. It might have been near the harbor, but certainly did not span the harbor entrance with its legs (though it is often pictured that way). The giant figure was nude, wore a spiked crown, held a cloak over its left arm, and shaded its eyes from the rising sun with its right hand. After fifty six years, the colossus collapsed in a earthquake, and huge pieces of the figure lay along the shore till the seventh century A.D. When Arabs who had conquered Rhodes sold the remains as scrap metal.
Around 304 B.C. the citizens of Rhodes a Greek island in the Aegean Sea, began to build a giant statue of the Helios, in thanks for the ending of a long war. They melted down bronze form the war machines invaders had left behind for the exterior of the figure, and when it was finished a dozen years later, the Colossus of Rhodes was about 120 feet high, approximately the hight of the Statue of Liberty and stood on a fifty foot pedestal. It might have been near the harbor, but certainly did not span the harbor entrance with its legs (though it is often pictured that way). The giant figure was nude, wore a spiked crown, held a cloak over its left arm, and shaded its eyes from the rising sun with its right hand. After fifty six years, the colossus collapsed in a earthquake, and huge pieces of the figure lay along the shore till the seventh century A.D. When Arabs who had conquered Rhodes sold the remains as scrap metal.
