Within it, too, are to be seen large masses of rock, by the weight of which the artist steadied it while erecting it.[22][23]
Destruction of the remains[edit]
The ultimate fate of the remains of the statue is uncertain. Rhodes has two serious earthquakes per century, owing to its location on the seismically unstable Hellenic Arc. Pausanias tells us, writing ca. 174, how the city was so devastated by an earthquake that the Sibyl oracle foretelling its destruction was considered fulfilled.[24] This means the statue could not have survived for long if it was ever repaired. By the 4th century Rhodes was Christianized, meaning any further maintenance or rebuilding, if there ever was any before, on an ancient pagan statue is unlikely. The metal would have likely been used for coins and maybe also tools by the time of the Arab wars, especially during earlier conflicts such as the Sassanian wars.[9]
The onset of Islamic naval incursions against the Byzantine empire gave rise to a dramatic account of what became of the Colossus. 