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The Colossal Statue of Shapur I‌ ( Persian: پیکره شاپور یکم) is a statue of
Shapur I Shapur I (also spelled Shabuhr I; pal, 𐭱𐭧𐭯𐭥𐭧𐭥𐭩, Šābuhr ) was the second Sasanian King of Kings of Iran. The dating of his reign is disputed, but it is generally agreed that he ruled from 240 to 270, with his father Ardas ...
(AD 240–272), the second
shah Shah (; fa, شاه, , ) is a royal title that was historically used by the leading figures of Iranian monarchies.Yarshater, EhsaPersia or Iran, Persian or Farsi, ''Iranian Studies'', vol. XXII no. 1 (1989) It was also used by a variety of ...
(king) of the
Sassanid Empire The Sasanian () or Sassanid Empire, officially known as the Empire of Iranians (, ) and also referred to by historians as the Neo-Persian Empire, was the History of Iran, last Iranian empire before the early Muslim conquests of the 7th-8th cen ...
. It stands in the Shapur cave, a huge
limestone Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms w ...
cave located about 6 km from the ancient city of
Bishapur Bishapur (Middle Persian: ''Bay-Šāpūr''; fa, بیشاپور}, ''Bishâpûr'') was an ancient city in Sasanid Persia (Iran) on the ancient road between Persis and Elam. The road linked the Sassanid capitals Estakhr (very close to Persepolis ...
in the south of
Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
. About 1400 years ago, after the
Arab invasion of Iran The Muslim conquest of Persia, also known as the Arab conquest of Iran, was carried out by the Rashidun Caliphate from 633 to 654 AD and led to the fall of the Sasanian Empire as well as the eventual decline of the Zoroastrian religion. The ...
and collapse of the Sasanian Empire, the statue was pulled down and a part of one of its legs was broken. About 70 years ago, again, parts of his arms were also broken in an earthquake. The statue had been lying on the ground for about 14 centuries until 1957 when
Mohammad Reza Pahlavi , title = Shahanshah Aryamehr Bozorg Arteshtaran , image = File:Shah_fullsize.jpg , caption = Shah in 1973 , succession = Shah of Iran , reign = 16 September 1941 – 11 February 1979 , coronation = 26 Octob ...
, the last
Shah Shah (; fa, شاه, , ) is a royal title that was historically used by the leading figures of Iranian monarchies.Yarshater, EhsaPersia or Iran, Persian or Farsi, ''Iranian Studies'', vol. XXII no. 1 (1989) It was also used by a variety of ...
of Iran, had a group of Iranian military to raise it again on its feet and repair the broken foot with iron and cement. The project of raising the statue, building the roads from Bishapur to the area and paths in the mountain, stairs and iron fences on the route to the cave took six months in 1957. The statue is about 35 m from the cave entrance, on the fourth of five terraces, lying approximately 3.4 m below the level of the cave entrance. Its height of about 6.7 m and breadth across the shoulders of more than 2 m make it one of the most impressive sculptures from the Sassanian period.


Characteristic features of the colossal statue

The monumental sculpture is chiseled from a huge
stalagmite A stalagmite (, ; from the Greek , from , "dropping, trickling") is a type of rock formation that rises from the floor of a cave due to the accumulation of material deposited on the floor from ceiling drippings. Stalagmites are typicall ...
grown in situ, but it no longer stands exactly in its original position. After its fall (probably caused by an earthquake), the sculpture was raised onto two concrete pillars, which are located near the original feet. The head and the body of the sculpture have remained quite well preserved while parts of its arms and almost all of both legs are missing. The colossal statue is rich in detail. It is chiseled on every side with the same amount of extraordinary care and attention. The king wears a crenellated
crown A crown is a traditional form of head adornment, or hat, worn by monarchs as a symbol of their power and dignity. A crown is often, by extension, a symbol of the monarch's government or items endorsed by it. The word itself is used, partic ...
. A large piece of the front crenellation is missing, while the crenellations of both sides and the rear are well preserved. At the lower end of the crown, there is a wide
diadem A diadem is a type of crown, specifically an ornamental headband worn by monarchs and others as a badge of royalty. Overview The word derives from the Greek διάδημα ''diádēma'', "band" or "fillet", from διαδέω ''diadéō'', " ...
. The two bands of the diadem fall heavily down the back to the waist and widen from top to bottom. Around twenty horizontal, parallel furrows cross on these bands. The head of the sculpture has been carved out in all its particulars symmetrically. The hairstyle of the colossal statue shows a high degree of sculptural definition. The mass of hair on the left side of the sculpture has remained intact while the ends of strands of hair on the right side are broken off. Of the left arm of the sculpture, only half remains. The missing left hand of the sculpture must have once rested on the
sword A sword is an edged, bladed weapon intended for manual cutting or thrusting. Its blade, longer than a knife or dagger, is attached to a hilt and can be straight or curved. A thrusting sword tends to have a straighter blade with a pointed ti ...
handle. The right arm is broken off just below the axilla. A small part of the right underarm is still attached. The right hand is strongly weathered and rests on the waist. The clothing of the colossal statue consists of three pieces: an undervest, an upper garment and wide trousers. The upper garment of the sculpture fits tightly to the body and appears to be made of a sheer fabric. Through its skin-tight fit, the shoulders, the upper arms and the chest of the king have been emphasized. The sculpted ornaments on the upper garment are quite remarkable insofar as they resemble flames flickering downward. These are varyingly long, shaped in several different ways and irregularly arranged. At the waist, the upper garment is held together tightly by a belt while a second belt, which is hanging loosely around the hips, functions to fasten on the sword scabbard. Only small parts of the legs of the sculpture have remained. The small remaining piece of the left thigh supports a conclusion that the ruler was wearing fluted trousers. The fact that the trousers of Shapur I originally reached the ground is evident from the traces of folds encircling the original feet of the sculpture at irregular intervals. It stands to reason that the sculptor designed the length of the trousers not only for aesthetical reasons but also to increase the sculpture's stability. The long trousers would have functioned to enlarge contact area with the ground and to spread the stress of the colossal statue, which weighs several tonnes. The two feet of the sculpture are slightly spread. The left foot is lying a little ahead of the right foot. The original shoes of the colossal statue now have a contrasting conservation status. The right shoe is largely destroyed. The left shoe is virtually intact and has a round toe cap. The broad shoelaces, pleated lengthways, meander in an S-shape onto the ground. On the colossal statue of Shapur I, there are three pieces of jewellery: a necklace, earrings made of large
pearl A pearl is a hard, glistening object produced within the soft tissue (specifically the mantle) of a living shelled mollusk or another animal, such as fossil conulariids. Just like the shell of a mollusk, a pearl is composed of calcium carb ...
s and an armlet on the right wrist.


Identification of the statue

In the Sassanian period, the crowns' details were subject to stringent regulations and varied from one king to another. Each Sassanian king possessed his own crown, designed at the time of his accession to power. Because of the shape of the crown (diadem, the crenellated part and korymbos) and on the basis of art historical considerations, the colossal statue can be clearly identified as Shapur I, the second Sassanian king.


Reconstruction of the crown

Shapur I is not always shown wearing a crenellated crown, but he is never represented with a crenellated crown without a korymbos. A korymbos, or globular-shaped structure, sat originally on the top of the crown of the sculpture standing in the cave. The presence of a borehole on the vertex indicates that the korymbos could not have been of stone, but consisted of metal. The korymbos of the colossal statue was originally 1.5 m high and 1 m wide. After research and experimentation at the University of Basel, it was found that a korymbos of metal of a suitable size would have weighed more than a tonne even with a very low wall thickness.


Hairstyle as an important criterion for dating the statue

Below the diadem, the hair springs thickly up. There are four rows of strands that are very clearly distinguishable from each other and lying in waves on top of each other, on both sides of the face. The wave patterns of the individual strands are almost identical, but at their tips, the heavily stylized, nearly spherical curls differ. The end of the top strand is rolled up on each side of the head like a snail. The underlying strands have differing forms of braided knots at their ends. The wavy strands billow out on each side across the shoulders with the curl of the lowest and shortest strand lying on the shoulder. This kind of
hairstyle A hairstyle, hairdo, haircut or coiffure refers to the styling of hair, usually on the human scalp. Sometimes, this could also mean an editing of facial or body hair. The fashioning of hair can be considered an aspect of personal groomi ...
can be only seen on those rock reliefs of Shapur I that were carved after 260 AD and is, therefore, the most important criterion for the precise dating of the colossal statue of Shapur I. Due to the details of the hairstyle, G. Reza Garosi succeeded to date the colossal statue exactly in the second half of the sixties of third century AD.


Sculptor

The anonymous sculptor of the colossal statue of Shapur I must be considered one of the greatest sculptors in the
ancient Near East The ancient Near East was the home of early civilizations within a region roughly corresponding to the modern Middle East: Mesopotamia (modern Iraq, southeast Turkey, southwest Iran and northeastern Syria), ancient Egypt, ancient Iran ( Elam, ...
. It is certain that he succeeded in finishing the colossal statue. According to post-Sassanian reports, the sculpture, which weighed several tonnes, stood on its own feet at least until the 14th century AD. An adept sculptor was not the only master for creating this sculpture – a skilled
metalsmith A metalsmith or simply smith is a craftsperson fashioning useful items (for example, tools, kitchenware, tableware, jewelry, armor and weapons) out of various metals. Smithing is one of the oldest metalworking occupations. Shaping metal with a ...
was also involved in this work. The metalsmith was responsible for making the korymbos of metal and had to fix it firmly onto the crown of the colossal statue. The addition of a metal korymbos was indeed an innovation and is not known from any other statue in the ancient Near East. In the Sassanian era, no other statues with similar dimensions have been discovered. Thus, the colossal statue of Shapur I must be considered as an absolute exception in the history of Sassanian sculptural art.


State of research

Although the colossal statue of Shapur I is known in Europe since at least 1811, it was not dealt detailed till recently. It was mentioned, for example, by
Roman Ghirshman Roman Ghirshman (, ''Roman Mikhailovich Girshman''; October 3, 1895 – 5 September 1979) was a Russian-born French archeologist who specialized in ancient Persia. Ghirshman spent nearly thirty years excavating ancient Persian archeological ...
,
Kurt Erdmann Kurt Erdmann (9 September 1901, in Hamburg – 30 September 1964, in Berlin) was a German art historian who specialized in Sasanian and Islamic Art. He is best known for his scientific work on the history of the Oriental rug, which he establish ...
and Georgina Herrmann. The first comprehensive research about the cave and the colossal statue of Shapur I was done by G. Reza Garosi.


Gallery

Shapur statue with a man standing in front of it.JPG, Shapur cave - description.JPG, Shapour statue.jpg, Shapur cave inside.JPG, Shapur statue back.JPG, Shapur cave - Pahlavi crown.JPG,


See also

*
List of colossal sculptures in situ A colossal statue is one that is more than twice life-size. This is a list of colossal statues and other sculptures that were created, mostly or all carved, and remain ''in situ''. This list includes two colossal stones that were intended to be m ...


Literature


James Justinian Morier. A journey through Persia, Armenia, and Asia Minor, to Constantinople, in the years 1808 and 1809. 1812

A journey from India to England, through Persia, Georgia, Russia, Poland, and Prussia, in the year 1817. By Lieut. Col. John Johnson. 1818
*
Roman Ghirshman Roman Ghirshman (, ''Roman Mikhailovich Girshman''; October 3, 1895 – 5 September 1979) was a Russian-born French archeologist who specialized in ancient Persia. Ghirshman spent nearly thirty years excavating ancient Persian archeological ...
: ''Iran, Parther und Sasaniden''. Universum der Kunst. Hrsg.
André Malraux Georges André Malraux ( , ; 3 November 1901 – 23 November 1976) was a French novelist, art theorist, and Minister of Culture (France), minister of cultural affairs. Malraux's novel ''La Condition Humaine'' (Man's Fate) (1933) won the Prix Go ...
;
Georges Salles Georges Salles (24 September 1889 – 20 October 1966) was a 20th-century French art historian and curator. Biography A specialist of the East, George Salles led excavations in Iran, Afghanistan, and China. He was then curator at the Asian ...
(1962). *
Kurt Erdmann Kurt Erdmann (9 September 1901, in Hamburg – 30 September 1964, in Berlin) was a German art historian who specialized in Sasanian and Islamic Art. He is best known for his scientific work on the history of the Oriental rug, which he establish ...
: ''Die Kunst Irans zur Zeit der Sasaniden''. 2. Aufl.; Kupferberg (1969). * Georgina Herrmann: ''The Iranian revival''. Impressum Oxford: Elsevier-Phaidon (1977). * G. Reza Garosi: ''Die Kolossal-Statue Šāpūrs I. im Kontext der sasanidischen Plastik''. Publishing company: Philipp von Zabern, Mainz & Darmstadt, Germany (2009). * G. Reza Garosi: ''The Colossal Statue of Shapur I in the Context of Sasanian Sculptures''. Publisher: Persian Heritage Foundation, New York (2012).


References

{{Reflist Shapur I Sasanian art Statues in Iran Colossal statues Sculpture of the Ancient Near East Buildings and structures in Fars Province