The Temple of Abu Simbel: Monumentality and Awe

Last visit : August 2025

My opinion : A BIG WOW

Visit duration : 10 minutes to an hour

When, after a whole night spent crossing the Nubian Desert, past the entrance parking lot and down a nondescript driveway a few hundred meters, the Abu Simbel esplanade slowly begins to reveal itself, your heart races at the thought of what's about to appear; but it's the exact moment your gaze passes the final curve of the artificial slope that your breath catches. Before you is not simply a temple, nor a monument in the usual sense of the word, but a millennia-old declaration of power carved into the living rock, a façade that doesn't "stand" in the landscape but rather dominates it, orders it, bends it to the will of its creator. The four colossal seated statues of Ramesses II, over twenty meters tall, don't welcome the visitor: they tower over him, measure him, put him in perspective. In that unreal silence, broken only by the wind and the muffled sound of footsteps on the sand, it immediately becomes clear that Abu Simbel wasn't built to be admired, but to be feared, understood, internalized. It is an architecture that speaks the language of theology and geopolitics at the same time, a stone manifesto designed to last forever and to be read—then as now—by anyone who dared to cross this remote southern border of Pharaonic Egypt.

Ramses II

To talk about Abu Simbel, we must first tell you who the ruler was to whom the temple is dedicated.

Ramses II is a figure who dominates the history of pharaonic Egypt, not only for the exceptional length of his reign, but for his extremely rare ability to transform political power into a coherent, lasting, and perfectly recognizable ideological construct.

He ascended the throne around 1279 BC (1700 years after Narmer and the First Dynasty and about 900 years before the Ptolemaic Dynasty that ended the era of the pharaohs; just 40 years separate us from the death of Tutankhamun), in the midst of the New Kingdom, as the third ruler of the Nineteenth Dynasty, inheriting from his father Seti I a stable, militarily efficient, and well-administered Egypt. But what Ramesses II did with this legacy is unparalleled: he ruled for approximately 66–67 years, a span of time sufficient not only to exercise power, but to rewrite its rules, to monumentalize it, and to fix it in the collective memory for over three millennia.

From a political and military standpoint, Ramesses II was primarily a frontier ruler. His reign occurred at a time when Egypt was no longer the sole great power in the Near East: to the northeast, it had to contend with the Hittite Empire, while to the south, it controlled—and simultaneously feared—Nubia, rich in gold, manpower, and strategic resources. The famous Battle of Kadesh against the Hittites, fought in the fifth year of his reign, was probably not the crushing victory that Ramses II propaganda has handed down to us (Ramses and his ), but it nevertheless represented a turning point: it gave rise to the first international peace treaty known in history, an agreement that established a lasting balance between the two powers. Ramses II understood that stability could be as powerful a weapon as war, and he also built his image as the guarantor of cosmic and political order. I recommend reading Ancient Egypt by Toby Wilkinson (many other books will probably cover the subject, but I have read this one), which recounts the highly relevant skill with which Ramses managed to transform a substantial military defeat into a triumphant propaganda and ideological narrative that served the religious cult of the ruler; reading it makes one wonder what Ramses might have done if he had had access to social media.

But it is above all as a ruler and builder that Ramesses II left his indelible mark on the Egyptian landscape. No pharaoh, before or after him, scattered the land with temples, colossal statues, stelae, reliefs, and inscriptions with such systematicity. From Karnak to Abydos, from Luxor to the Eastern Delta, all the way to the Nubian borders, his name and image became omnipresent. This was not simply a matter of personal vanity: Ramesses architecture was a tool for symbolic territorial control, a means of making the pharaoh's presence visible and tangible even in the most remote places. In this sense, Abu Simbel represents the most extreme and conscious expression of this monumental policy.

On an ideological and religious level, Ramesses II presents himself as a sovereign deity already during his lifetime. He is not simply "loved by the gods," like many of his predecessors, but presents himself as their equal, especially in peripheral and border contexts. The identification with Ra-Horakhty, Amun, and Ptah is not merely ritualistic: it is a message addressed to both Egyptian subjects and subjugated peoples. Ramesses is the one who guarantees maat , universal order, against chaos, and who therefore deserves worship, obedience, and eternal remembrance.

Upon his death, Ramesses II left behind a still powerful and stable Egypt, but also an almost unattainable model of royalty. His successors lived in the shadow of a figure who had become legendary even in antiquity, so much so that for centuries the name "Ramesses" was synonymous with pharaoh. Abu Simbel, more than any other monument, is the place where this ambition for eternity found its purest and most radical form: not a simple temple, but the definitive portrait of a man who sought to transform time, stone, and the landscape into instruments of his own immortality.

The historical moment of the construction of Abu Simbel

The decision to build Abu Simbel occurred at a very specific stage in the reign of Ramesses II , when the king's power was no longer consolidating but had reached full political and ideological maturity. Epigraphic and stylistic studies indicate that construction began in the early years of his reign, likely around year five, immediately following the Syrian campaign and the Battle of Kadesh against the Hittites. This was a crucial moment: Ramesses had just experienced the limits of military expansion northward and was beginning to reorient his imperial strategy, focusing on stabilizing his borders and building a lasting royal image rather than on conquering new territories.

As mentioned, among the kingdom's main adversaries, in addition to the Hittites to the north, were the Nubians to the south, but while the former had only recently demonstrated their fearsomeness, the latter, despite periodic unsuccessful attempts to escape Egyptian control, had been under the substantial yoke of the pharaohs for millennia, also because it was precisely in Nubia that Egypt found its inexhaustible and fundamental reserve of gold.

In this context, Nubia assumes a central role. While the northern front remains politically complex and unstable, the southern border offers Ramesses the opportunity to assert a more clear and less contested dominance. The decision to undertake a monumental project like Abu Simbel precisely at this stage indicates a clear desire to transform military experience into symbolic legitimacy: not a contingent response to an immediate threat, but a long-term strategy. The temple was therefore conceived when Ramesses II was already fully aware of his historical role and began deliberately constructing his propagandistic image as an eternal ruler, destined to outlast wartime events and political contingencies. Abu Simbel thus emerged as a work of maturity, not of youthful ambition: a project designed to enshrine in stone a kingship that was now accomplished and self-aware.

The location and function of Abu Simbel

Abu Simbel was built for a reason that went far beyond religious devotion or dynastic celebration: it was born as a tool for political, military, and symbolic control of a crucial region of the Egyptian empire. The site is located in the heart of Nubia, hundreds of kilometers south of Thebes, the ancient capital, in an area that at the time of Ramesses II represented the true southern border of pharaonic Egypt. It was not a peripheral location in the modern sense of the term, but a strategic transit point along the Nile, a geopolitical threshold through which trade, tribute, military expeditions, and, above all, potential threats passed. Building a monumental complex of unprecedented proportions here was an unequivocal affirmation that the pharaoh's authority did not diminish with distance from the heart of the kingdom, but rather was strengthened precisely at its margins.

The Great Temple of Abu Simbel was conceived as a manifesto carved in stone, addressed primarily to the Nubian peoples subjugated or newly integrated into Egypt's orbit. The four colossal statues of Ramesses II seated on his throne, identical, frontal, and implacable, were not intended for an Egyptian audience, who already knew and venerated the ruler, but for those arriving from the south, up the Nile. The message is immediate and brutal in its clarity: this land is under the protection—and dominion—of a pharaoh who is both king and god. It is no coincidence that within the temple, Ramesses is depicted as an object of worship alongside the principal deities of the state pantheon, in a form of self-deification that finds its most explicit terrain precisely in the border regions.

Abu Simbel is therefore a "frontier" temple in the fullest sense of the term. It serves to sacralize the border, to transform an unstable political line into a cosmic boundary guaranteed by the divine presence of the sovereign. Nubia is not just a province rich in gold and resources, but a space to be ideologically integrated into the Egyptian order. The temple acts as a symbolic machine: it educates, intimidates, and impresses. The choice to carve it directly into the rock, rather than construct it in blocks, reinforces the idea of an eternal power, rooted in the very nature of the landscape, neither transportable nor ephemeral.

This political function is accompanied by a refined religious and cosmological dimension. The famous solar alignment that, twice a year, illuminates the statues of the inner sanctuary is not a simple technical feat, but an integral part of the temple's message: Ramesses is the one who governs in harmony with the cosmos, the ruler chosen by the gods and confirmed by the sun itself. In this sense, Abu Simbel does not celebrate a specific event, but a permanent condition: the world order guaranteed by the pharaoh.

Building Abu Simbel thus meant setting in stone a fundamental political truth of the Ramesside kingdom: Egypt is great because its king is omnipresent, invincible, and divine, and no border—geographical or symbolic—can escape his authority. This is why Abu Simbel is not a temple like any other: it is an act of dominion transformed into architecture, a declaration of power designed to be read, feared, and remembered for eternity.

The temple from an architectural point of view

From an architectural standpoint, Abu Simbel represents one of the absolute pinnacles of New Kingdom rock-cut architecture. The construction of the complex—comprising the Great Temple dedicated to Ramesses II and the great state deities, and the so-called Minor Temple dedicated to Hathor and Nefertari—likely took around twenty years, dating between the fifth and twenty-fifth years of his reign. It was not a "construction" in the traditional sense, but rather a work of subtraction: the entire complex was excavated directly into the Nubian sandstone cliff that bordered the Nile, much as would happen centuries later with the monuments of Petra in Jordan. Royal officials and court architects, likely drawn from the Theban administration, supervised the work, while the workforce consisted of highly specialized artisans—stonecutters, relief workers, scribes—along with local Nubian workers under Egyptian supervision. The absence of transported and assembled blocks did not reduce the complexity of the work: on the contrary, it required extremely rigorous planning, since any error in calculation or orientation would have been irreversible.

The Great Temple is structured according to a seemingly canonical plan. The façade, dominated by four seated colossi of the pharaoh, replaces the traditional monumental pylon of masonry temples. From here, one enters a hypostyle hall with pillars depicting Ramses in divine form as Osiris, followed by a transverse hall and finally the sanctuary, where the ruler is depicted alongside Ra, Amun, and Ptah.

The temple's longitudinal axis is calibrated with astronomical precision: twice a year, sunlight penetrates to the very back of the sanctuary, attracting hundreds of influencers and Instagrammers and illuminating three of the four divine statues, while Ptah remains symbolically in the shadows. I've read somewhere that this is because Ptah was a chthonic god—that is, to put it bluntly, a deity of the underworld—but I'm not entirely sure of this interpretation, which I offer with some hesitation.

Compared to other great Egyptian temples, such as Karnak or Luxor, Abu Simbel differs radically in function and language. It is neither an urban cult center nor a sanctuary continually expanding over the centuries: it is a closed, unified monument, conceived and completed under a single ruler, without substantial subsequent additions. Furthermore, while traditional temples guide the faithful in a progressive approach to the divine, here the message is immediate and frontal: the god is already present, incarnate in the pharaoh himself, and manifests itself even before entering. In this sense, Abu Simbel is not merely a temple, but an unprecedented architectural propaganda device, in which technique, time, and space are bent to a single goal: to make the power of Ramesses II eternal and indisputable.

Figuratively, Abu Simbel is one of the most radical and coherent manifestos of official New Kingdom art, a closed and perfectly controlled iconographic system in which each image is subordinated to a single function: to affirm the absolute and superhuman sovereignty of Ramesses II. The façade itself is already a complete figurative program. The four colossal statues of the pharaoh, seated, frontal, rigidly symmetrical, introduce not a narrative, but a permanent condition: Ramesses is immobile because eternal, identical to himself because perfect, multiplied because omnipresent. There is no psychological evolution, no individualization: the idealized face, youthful and imperturbable, is a regal archetype, not a realistic portrait. Even if even a quarter of what the chronicles of the Battle of Kadesh tell is true, the young Ramesses II must have been reasonably handsome and tough. It is also true that the chronicles of dictatorships can tell anything; It is said, for example, that Kim Jon Il, the first time he played golf, scored an astonishing 38 under par with 11 holes in one.

Inside, the decoration follows an equally rigorous logic. In the great hypostyle hall, the Osirian pillars depict Ramses in divine form, fused with Osiris, god of death and rebirth. Here, the pharaoh becomes a pillar, a support for the cosmic order, an architectural element even before being a character. This fusion of the sovereign's body and the temple structure is one of the most extreme aspects of Ramesside art: the image does not represent power, it physically embodies it in space.

In the wall reliefs, however, the figuration becomes narrative, but without ever losing its ideological character. The battle scenes—particularly those related to Qadesh—show Ramses as a lone hero, disproportionate to his enemies, always at the center of the composition, as he stabs, overwhelms, annihilates, like Godzilla on a coastal city, like Calvin and Hobbes in a field of miniature snowmen. It is not a military chronicle, but a theology of victory: the pharaoh fights alone because, as a divine being, he has no need of equals. The enemies are anonymous, repetitive, devoid of individuality; the pharaoh is unique, recognizable, invariable, unfailingly devoted to the favorite sport of ancient Egyptian rulers: asserting his primacy by joyfully smashing the skulls of his defeated enemies with blows of clubs. on closer inspection, nothing could be further from modern sensibility than ancient Egyptian iconography, which nevertheless continues to attract crowds of tourists with an extraordinary ability to suspend their critical sense.

On this subject, I'd like to digress a little: perhaps it's because of my background as a librarian, but one thing I can't stand is misinformation, especially when it's ideologically biased (which should actually make me hate the temple of Abu Simbel, but that's another story). I've already written a post on this and will do more. Recently, the Netflix series featuring a black actress as Cleopatra has (rightly, I might add) fueled some controversy. Many blind supporters of this bleak display of blackwashing (and I won't mention the rumors circulating that the otherwise excellent Lupita Nyong'o will play Helen of Troy in Christopher Nolan's upcoming The Odyssey ...) have claimed that we can't know what the ancient Egyptians looked like and that the statues that have reached us could very well depict a black person. From this perspective, the temple of Abu Simbel is like a light dispelling the darkness: the subjects depicted on its walls are clearly recognizable as Nubians, with the typical facial features of sub-Saharan peoples and clearly distinguishable from the Egyptians, who, guess what, have the facial features of modern-day Egyptians! Cleopatra, of course, belonged to the Ptolemaic dynasty, so it's reasonable to assume she had the facial features... 100,000 Avios points awarded to whoever said "Macedonians"!

But let's get back to us. In the final sanctuary, finally, the figuration is concentrated in a powerful theological synthesis. Ramses sits next to Ra, Amun, and Ptah as their equals, not as a devotee. There is no gesture of submission, nor hierarchical distance: the pharaoh is now fully integrated into the pantheon. The choice of a sober, static figuration, devoid of superfluous ornamentation, reinforces the idea of a kingship that has transcended historical time to enter the dimension of eternity.

Taken as a whole, Abu Simbel is the quintessence of Egyptian iconography; from a graphic point of view, they are extremely finely crafted, especially considering they were created over 2000 years ago (although my favorite wall paintings remain those from the palace of Nineveh, preserved in the British Museum ); what is astonishing, however, is the monumentality of the temple as a whole.

The minor temple of Abu Simbel

Next to the Great Temple, slightly set back and deliberately subordinate in its spatial arrangement, is the so-called Minor Temple of Abu Simbel, dedicated to the goddess Hathor and her great royal wife Nefertari. Its importance, however, goes far beyond its smaller size: it is unique in the history of Egyptian art, as it is one of the very rare temples in which a queen is depicted on the same scale as the pharaoh, in this case Ramesses II. The façade features six colossal statues carved into the rock: four of Ramesses II and two of Nefertari, arranged in alternating rows. Unlike what almost always happens in royal iconography, Nefertari is not reduced to an ancillary or symbolic figure, but fully shares the sovereign's monumentality, a sign of exceptional status and a specific ideological choice.

From a figurative and theological perspective, Nefertari's identification with Hathor is central. Hathor is the goddess of love, fertility, music, and joy, but also a liminal deity, protector of foreign lands and border regions. It is no coincidence that her cult is emphasized in Nubia: Hathor is "Lady of the Distant Lands," the one who softens and integrates that which lies outside Egypt. Nefertari, associated with the goddess, therefore takes on a role that is not merely conjugal or decorative, but profoundly political and symbolic: she is the harmonizing face of Ramesside power, the feminine counterpart and mediator of the pharaoh's authority.

The interior of the temple replicates, on a smaller scale, the layout of the Great Temple, but with a more intimate and refined figurative language. The pillars are decorated with Hathor heads with characteristic bovine horns enclosing the solar disk, while the walls depict scenes of offerings and rituals in which Ramesses and Nefertari act as a sacred couple. Here, the message is not the destructive force of the warrior ruler, but the complementarity between the masculine and feminine principles, between power and fertility, between order and harmony.

In the overall context of Abu Simbel, the temple of Nefertari and Hathor thus fulfills an essential function: balancing the symbolic violence of the Great Temple with a theology of conciliation. If Ramses dominates, Hathor protects; if the pharaoh inspires fear, the queen-goddess reassures. It is a dialogue carved in stone, in which imperial power presents itself not only as an invincible force, but as a complete order, capable of encompassing, generating, and perpetuating itself over time.

The relocation of the temple

As I visited the temple, the natural awe fueled by the monumentality of the work was compounded by the further amazement of the engineering marvel achieved by the men who moved the temple— I repeat, moved the temple —in the 1960s to protect it from the rising waters caused by the construction of the Aswan Dam. The images of Ramses's face being lifted by cranes have remained etched in my memory ever since I saw them in my elementary school textbook, and ever since then I've always wanted to visit the temple.

The Abu Simbel rescue operation represents one of the most complex engineering interventions applied to cultural heritage ever undertaken, not only because of the scale of the undertaking, but also because of the multitude of interdisciplinary problems—structural, geological, archaeological, symbolic—that had to be addressed simultaneously. The threat was clear and unavoidable: the construction of the High Dam of Aswan would raise the Nile's water level to the point of completely submerging the temples. Time, however, was limited: the filling of the basin of the future Lake Nasser was already scheduled and could not tolerate delays. Beginning in 1960, under the aegis of UNESCO, an unprecedented international mobilization was launched, involving engineers, archaeologists, geologists, and specialized companies from numerous countries.

The first major difficulty was conceptual: Abu Simbel was not a "built" structure, but a rock-cut complex carved from a single body of rock. It could not be dismantled like a temple in blocks, nor protected with a local dam, because the hydrostatic pressure of the lake would have compromised the rock over time. The alternative solutions considered—submerged transparent domes, diversions of the Nile's course, protective dams—proved impractical or excessively risky. Thus, the most radical option was chosen: disassembling the temple, transporting it, and reconstructing it elsewhere, consciously accepting the violation of its original material unity in order to preserve its historical and symbolic identity.

From a technical standpoint, cutting the rock was an extreme challenge. The Nubian sandstone, relatively soft but stratified and irregular, posed a constant risk of unpredictable fractures. The technicians had to study the hill's geology inch by inch, identifying cutting lines that respected the natural stratification and minimized internal stresses. The temples were sectioned into over a thousand blocks, each numbered, catalogued, and mapped in three dimensions. Each block had to be large enough to ensure structural stability, but not so massive as to become unmanageable for transport: a delicate balance, requiring constant compromises between safety, precision, and feasibility.

A further layer of complexity concerned the conservation of the sculpted surfaces. The interior reliefs, colossal statues, Osirian pillars, and the sanctuary's decorations could not be subjected to vibrations, microfractures, or microclimatic variations that would compromise their legibility. Low-vibration cutting techniques and custom-designed harnessing systems were therefore adopted, while archaeologists supervised each phase to avoid losing fragments or distorting the figurative profiles. The temple was essentially dismantled like a living organism, with the understanding that any error would be irreversible.

The reconstruction posed even more subtle challenges. The temples were not simply reassembled "higher," but inserted within an artificial hill of reinforced concrete and stone, designed to simulate the original natural profile. This shell had to ensure static stability, proper ventilation, humidity control, and protection from erosion, without visually betraying the illusion of a temple carved into the rock. The real test, however, was respect for the sacred axis: the solar alignment of the Great Temple, which illuminates the inner sanctuary twice a year, had to be preserved with pinpoint precision. Even a minimal angular rotation would have compromised a phenomenon that was integral to the monument's theological significance.

With inevitable pride, I point out that this monumental work was built mainly by Italian companies.

The final result, completed in 1968, is an extraordinary paradox: Abu Simbel is today a "reconstructed" temple that continues to function symbolically like the original. Nothing is geologically intact, yet everything remains historically, figuratively, and ritually intact. The operation marked a turning point in the way we conceive of heritage protection: no longer just passive conservation, but conscious, critical, and, when necessary, openly artificial intervention. Today, visiting the temple, it is almost impossible to see the signs of this extraordinary process of deconstruction and reconstruction, and this adds wonder to wonder, in the dual recognition of how extraordinary and capable human beings are.

The photos above are from the site https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/

Practical advice and scattered notes

I've indicated a visit time of 10 minutes to an hour; this is because getting to the site, entering the temple, and exiting takes no more than 10 minutes; the temple's interior is barely larger than apartments in Milan that sell for millions of euros. The maximum range of an hour is for those, like me, who enjoy taking as much time as possible to dedicate to contemplation; beyond that, aside from the fact that someone might call a compulsory medical treatment for you, it becomes physically difficult to stay on site, at least for those, like me, visiting Abu Simbel on a day trip from Luxor. Abu Simbel is, in fact, quite out in the middle of nowhere, so while you're visiting the temple, you'll have to deal with the ten-hour drive that separates you from your destination, wherever that may be. However, I don't rule out the possibility that some people visit Abu Simbel while staying overnight, for example, in Aswan; even in that case, I believe that after an hour inside the temple, you'll feel completely satisfied and will want to devote yourself to other activities.

I personally visited Abu Simbel at the end of a week-long diving cruise, and for the visit to Abu Simbel I availed myself of the services of my good friend Steven and his Dive UK Hurghada , whom I always recommend; if you want to spend a few days diving in Hurghada and add a few days visiting the archaeological sites of southern Egypt, Steve is your man.

There's also a light show in the evening; I haven't used it, but it looks nice.

Somewhat unexpectedly, there's a well-stocked bookshop on Egyptian antiquities at the entrance; I suggest keeping some space in your luggage in case you want to make some purchases.

I have already written above about the spectacle of the alignment of the Sun that repeats every February 22nd and October 22nd, foresightedly staged by Ramses II so as to allow numerous Instagrammers to crowd the temple twice a year.

One last note: I really don't understand the latest trend in archaeological and museum design to fill archaeological sites and museums with shrieking, unrestrained Eastern tourists, touching every artifact over 500 years old, wearing completely inappropriately luxurious clothing, and occupying the sites for hours posing for photos with their mouths shaped like the arsehole of a hen. I think it would be much more beneficial to the visit if they were screened at the entrance and denied entry, but I suppose that's just my own whim.