National Geographic History - July 2019

24 JULY/AUGUST 2019

1

Once the blocks are in place, laborers remove

protective material that shielded the edges of the

faces of the statues of Ramses II from possible

damage while the blocks were being cut.

Blueprints show

the numbering

system for the

cut stone blocks,

enabling them to

be reassembled

later.

ALL

PHO

TOS

:^ GE

ORG

GER

STER

/NG

S

MOVING IN

Photographed

in January 1966,

laborers position

the first stone of the

Great Temple of Abu

Simbel at its new

location above

Lake Nasser. Reconstructing the temple complex took

place between 1966 and 1968. Blocks were

transported to the new site, where laborers

fitted them into place. In a 1969 article pub-

lished in National Geographic magazine, Swiss

journalist and photographer Georg Gerster

wrote: “The climax of the reassembly came

on September 14, 1966 ... The ceremony had

all the appearance of a triumphal procession.

As a flatbed trailer moved the giant sandstone

face at a snail’s pace toward the new site,...

All of new Abu Simbel’s 1,530 residents—

engineers, workers, and their families—watched

... When the pharaoh’s face arrived before the
Great Temple, a crane operator raised it care-
fully from its cushion of sand.... Slowly the
21-ton face and its curious concrete appendage
rose above the spectators, hovered a moment
over the two southernmost, partially rebuilt
colossi, and finally came to rest on the figure
immediately north of the temple entrance.”

PUTTING

THE PIECES

IN PLACE

GEORG GERSTER/NGS