Egypt - Nubia
63 images Created 11 Dec 2008
SOUTH ON NASSER LAKE
Once the Nubia, a vast region rich in gold between the First and Fourth Cataracts of the Nile river, was a necessary link between Equatorial Africa and the Mediterranean civilisations for caravans and traders transporting ivory, spices, animal skins, incense, slaves and any kind of exotic goods that after passino through Nubia were sold in Aswan suq. The pharaohs built here fortress and temples in Nubia, the most grandiose expression of which are the temples of Abu Simbel built by great pharaoh Ramesses II. With the construction of the Aswan High Dam in 1971, Lake Nasser, the "Sea of Nubia", is now the second largest artificial lake in the world with an average width of 10 km and an extension to south of about 500 km. The construction of the dam jeopardised the existence of all the Nubian monuments along the Nile river. An extraordinary campaign under the auspices of UNESCO, in which partecipated 51 nations, saved many temples, cut into thousand of stone blocks and reassembled dozens of kilometers away from its original site. Others, like Amada Temple, were moved on special railways tracks. But the most difficult and colossal rescue operation was the salvage of the temples at Abu Simbel, the most grandiose monumental complex in all of Nubia. The Great Temple, a volume of 11.000 square cubic meters, and the small Temple of Hator and Nefertari were dismantled and rebuilt with the same alignment on an artificial hill 65 meters above. Today only few small cruise ships reach the Nubian monuments, a different way to visit Egyptian archeological trasures, far from the mass tourism of Nile valley between Luxor and Aswan.
Once the Nubia, a vast region rich in gold between the First and Fourth Cataracts of the Nile river, was a necessary link between Equatorial Africa and the Mediterranean civilisations for caravans and traders transporting ivory, spices, animal skins, incense, slaves and any kind of exotic goods that after passino through Nubia were sold in Aswan suq. The pharaohs built here fortress and temples in Nubia, the most grandiose expression of which are the temples of Abu Simbel built by great pharaoh Ramesses II. With the construction of the Aswan High Dam in 1971, Lake Nasser, the "Sea of Nubia", is now the second largest artificial lake in the world with an average width of 10 km and an extension to south of about 500 km. The construction of the dam jeopardised the existence of all the Nubian monuments along the Nile river. An extraordinary campaign under the auspices of UNESCO, in which partecipated 51 nations, saved many temples, cut into thousand of stone blocks and reassembled dozens of kilometers away from its original site. Others, like Amada Temple, were moved on special railways tracks. But the most difficult and colossal rescue operation was the salvage of the temples at Abu Simbel, the most grandiose monumental complex in all of Nubia. The Great Temple, a volume of 11.000 square cubic meters, and the small Temple of Hator and Nefertari were dismantled and rebuilt with the same alignment on an artificial hill 65 meters above. Today only few small cruise ships reach the Nubian monuments, a different way to visit Egyptian archeological trasures, far from the mass tourism of Nile valley between Luxor and Aswan.
