The UNESCO salvage campaign
Between 1960 and 1980 an international campaign lifted, cut and moved more than twenty monuments ahead of the rising water. Abu Simbel was raised in place about sixty-five metres up and two hundred metres back; Philae was moved to a neighbouring island; the Kalabsha, Wadi es-Sebua and Amada groups were relocated nearby. Four temples were given to countries that helped: Debod to Madrid, Dendur to New York, Taffeh to Leiden and Ellesiya to Turin. Qasr Ibrim was never moved and survives as an island.
It is usually told as a rescue story, and as engineering it was an extraordinary one. It is also the story of what was not saved: the inhabited valley itself.
Qasr Ibrim is the one major site in Lower Nubia that was never moved. The water rose around its hill and it survives as an island, reachable only by permitted expedition rather than by visitors.
Some easily: Philae and New Kalabsha are both a short trip from Aswan. The Wadi es-Sebua and Amada groups realistically need a Lake Nasser cruise.
Campaign dates, the number of monuments moved, and the four temples transferred to Spain, the United States, the Netherlands and Italy.
The inscription, the scope of the salvage campaign, and the relocation of Philae, Abu Simbel and the Lake Nasser temples.
The engineering of the Philae coffer dam, the dismantling and reassembly, and the reshaping of Agilkia island.
Reviewed by no Nubian editor appointed yet · We will not mark this section reviewed until a real, named person has read it.