Not much is known of the Colossus, neither just where nor in what position it stood. It has never had a very favorable press. Ancient authorities found it pretentious and nouveau-riche (Rhodes has not changed much over the centuries), and its being numbered among the Seven Wonders of the ancient world, while adding to its notoriety, did not increase its aesthetic repute.
Such discoveries do not come out of the blue. Two years ago a travel agent and tourism promoter from Rhodes met a Dutch-Australian clairvoyant in Adelaide and asked her to visit his lovely island. Provided with a ship by the harbor police, they investigated the area. She was convinced that the Colossus was there within grasp. Now it so happened at the end of June that frogmen employed by the Merchant Marine Ministry were sent out to pull up caches of narcotics from outside the harbor. That inner tubes filled with heroin and hashish have been regularly found off Rhodes for the last 10 years is merely one of the wonders of the modern world. Furthermore, since 1985, works have been in progress dredging up and filling in parts of the harbor. Given this extraordinary set of coincidences, something wonderful was bound to turn up.
The first government official to make a public statement on the matter was the Minister of Merchant Marine, Mr Alexandris. Although he cautioned that any sort of identification lay outside his domain, he did say that the configuration of the stone object was made not by nature but by man, and that the discovery was “an event of the first rank”. The first minister to be photographed with the object was PASOK’s Johnny-on-the-spot, Mr Yennimatas, first to earthquake-stricken, maybe-to-be-rebuilt Kalamata; first to, maybe, the Colossus of Rhodes. Rumors were rife as foreign journalists in search of a scoop – and the “scoop” was said to be of sculptured porous stone – descended on Marine Venus Land.
A 24-hour period followed during which reality was suspended. Archaeologists pondered; scientists produced diagrams; mathematicians worked out algebraic formulae. It was noted that the laws of classical proportion set down by Polycleitus – according to which the width of a man’s fist is just on> twentieth of his stature – tallied neatly with the size of the statue as described by ancient authorities. As the Colossus was made of bronze, the rock formation was clearly the “filler”. As for the hand being clenched into a fist, this exposed the old delineators to charges of fantasy.
The simple truth was that everyone wanted it to be the Colossus, so for one wonderful day that’s what it was. The most superficial examination proved that the rock was no more than a piece of debris chucked into the sea whose grooves, which gave the impression of four colossal fingers, were made by the grater of a bulldozer.
As the Colossus affair had attracted international attention by now, the embarrassment was great, and it is unfortunately (but innately) human tnat deep disappointment expressed itself in recrimination. Before the contretemps between the Ministries of Culture and Merchant Marine, between Melina and the clairvoyant, let a curtain be decently drawn.
But that certainly was not the end of the story. In Greece one has to have ashes to let the phoenix rise again. Its motto is per aspera ad astra. This is its wonderfulness. At a press conference Melina said, “This arrival of mine to Rhodes is a painful one. But I want to tell you this: I’m optimistic, because with the assistance of archaeologists and naval experts, we will find the Colossus of Rhodes!” And on this point the clairvoyant backed her up to the hilt: “I’m not a politician or a bureaucrat. I’m just an ordinary clairvoyant. Everything will end for the best!”
And one can see that Eighth Wonder of the World coming clear as a socialist daydream probably before the next elections – when, led by Melina in her designer wetsuit, the Colossus is raised from the sea like the Titanic and stands proud again in the harbor at Rhodes, its head framed with the great green rays of the PASOK sun and its famous fist held defiantly high as it recites a Hellenistic version of the International.
When one thinks of the fuss made over the mere centenary of the Statue of Liberty, the mind boggles at the thought of the 2500th anniversary of the Colossus: the harbor lined with Swedish Miss Universe semi-finalists, the fireworks illuminating the dark coasts of Turkey, the Aegean choked with tall ships, and millions of American tourists, ignoring travel advisories and throwing dollars around like confetti, eating out their hearts in envy and despair.
