The Colossi of Memnon are the imposing stone guardians of antiquity, two monumental statues depicting the warrior pharaoh Amenhotep III, one of the most powerful rulers of the 18th Dynasty. Erected around 1360 BCE, they once marked the entrance to the king’s gigantic mortuary temple, now almost entirely vanished, swallowed by time and the floods of the Nile.
These two colossi of quartzite sandstone, quarried at Gabal el-Ahmar near Cairo and transported hundreds of kilometres, stand around 18 metres tall today, though they originally reached 21 metres. Each weighs nearly 1,300 tonnes, a striking technical feat for its time.
Facing the rising sun, the colossi once welcomed pilgrims who came to honour the deified pharaoh. Today, only these silent giants remain, standing amid the fields of Luxor, the last witnesses to a colossal temple and a bygone grandeur.