In the second place, the attitude traditionally ascribed to the Rhodian Colossus—an attitude neither graceful nor dignified—is also a pure conceit of comparatively modern times. It is, however, more ancient than the former, since it dates from the sixteenth century, when Blaise de Vigenère, the translator of Philostratus, transformed the masterpiece of Chares, the pupil of Lysippus, into a fantastic impossibility. Where he, too, obtained his information, no one can ascertain; for on this important point he preserved the prudent silence of Chevreau.
In an interesting paper, published by the French Académie des Inscriptions, the Comte de Caylus proves—1st, That the Rhodian Apollo was not constructed at the mouth of the harbour; and 2nd, That no ships ever passed between its legs. He did not satisfy everybody, however, and reference was made to the pages of the geographer Strabo. It was found that he made no mention of the remarkable circumstance narrated by Vigenère. He cites a fragment of an epigram in iambic metre, in which the name of the sculptor, Chares of Lindos, is mentioned, and the dimensions of his work—namely, seventy cubits—are given. Strabo adds that the Colossus, in his time, lay prostrate on the ground—overthrown by an earthquake, and with shattered knees; and that the Rhodians had not restored it to its position because forbidden by an oracle.
IMAGINARY RESTORATION OF THE COLOSSUS OF RHODES.
Turning to Pliny, we find that he confirms all the statements of Strabo, and fixes the date of the fall of the statue at fifty-six years after its erection. Though overthrown, he says, it is still a marvel. Few men can embrace its thumb; its fingers are larger than those of statues. Its disfigured limbs appear so many vast caverns; and in the interior the enormous stones are seen with which they had been weighted. It cost, says Pliny, 300 talents; being exactly the sum of money which the Rhodians plundered from the war-ships abandoned before their city by Demetrius, when he raised the siege, after protracting it for many months.
Philo of Byzantium, a mechanician who lived about the end of the third century B.C., and to whom is attributed a brief treatise on the “Seven Wonders of the World,” describes at some length the Rhodian Colossus, but makes no allusion to its supposed straddling attitude, or to its employment as a pharos. The same silence is preserved by another historian of the Seven Wonders, Lucius Ampellius. But as he possessed, like Chevreau and Vigenère, an inventive faculty, this author says: “At Rhodes is the colossal statue of the Sun, placed on a marble column, with a chariot drawn by four horses.”
Putting aside the embellishments of tradition, let us inquire what this monument really was:—