The Colossi of Memnon are two giant seated statues of King Amenhotep III on the West Bank of Luxor. Each is about 18 meters (60 feet) high and carved from a single block of quartzite. They have sat here, facing the sunrise, for about 3,400 years.
A lost temple
The statues once guarded the gate of Amenhotep III’s memorial temple, the largest ever built on the West Bank, larger even than Karnak in its day. Floods and later builders who took its stone destroyed almost all of it. Archaeologists are still excavating the site behind the statues and putting fallen statues back on their feet.
Why “Memnon”?
After an earthquake in 27 BC cracked the northern statue, it began to make a sound at dawn, perhaps as the stone warmed and dried. Greek and Roman visitors believed it was Memnon, a hero of the Trojan War, greeting his mother Eos, the dawn. Tourists carved their names and poems on its legs. The sound stopped after the Roman emperor Septimius Severus had the statue repaired around 200 AD.
Visiting
The statues stand beside the main road and there is no ticket. A short stop of 15 to 20 minutes is enough for photos. They are usually the first or last stop on a West Bank tour with the Valley of the Kings and the Temple of Hatshepsut, included in our Luxor tours.
