ARCHAEOLOGY: ABU SIMBEL, 50 YEAR OLD EPIC RESCUE


ANSAmed) - CAIRO - A photography exhibit apparently like many others reopened in recent days on the premises of the renovated Sama'Khana, a medieval school and theatre of Mevlev dervishes in the heart of Islamic Cairo. But its historic and emotional content make it singular and unique: efforts to save the two temples of Abu Simel, built approximately in date 1250 BC at the bottom of Egypt on the order of pharaoh Ramses II, from the rising waters of lake Nasser which rose unstoppably after the construction of the Assuan Dam. In 1964, following a warning by Unesco,2,000 workers led by a team of engineers, archaeologists, and architects who knew their history (many Italians, including some marble workers from the Apuan Alps and Vagli Sotto (Lucca)) gave way to the epic enterprise of transferring the Major Temple and the Minor Temple in which 3200 years earlier the pharaoh had his image portrayed in four gigantic statues along with that of queen Nefertari, to whom he dedicated the only temple ever built for a queen in ancient Egypt. The purpose of the impressive construction was that, according to historians, of intimidating the neighbouring Nubians and commemorating the historic battle of Qadesh. On the fiftieth anniversary of the end of work on the colossal operation, the photo exhibit (managed by Rome's Chamber of Commerce in cooperation with cultural association World Wide Artists Gallery, which premiered in Assuan in March 2009), was again presented in Cairo before being moved to Paris and thence to other European capitals during the year. The subdivision of monuments into 1042 blocks, each weighing 20 to 30 tonnes, documented in detail by the pictures on display, allowed for the massive operation of raising the temples 65 metres higher up and 280 metres further in from the original shores of the Nile, whose level in the meantime was rising. All was done without the aid of modern technologies (gps, earth moving equipment and other computerised machinery, electronic apparatus). In order to guarantee the avoidance of any mistake in the re-positioning of the temples compared to their original location, the engineers used a star as a point of reference. (ANSAmed).


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gracias por el artículo, semíramis