Colossus of Nero
Coordinates: 41°53′28″N 12°29′29″E / 41.89111°N 12.49139°E
The Colossus of Nero (Colossus Neronis) was a 30-metre (98 ft) bronze statue that the Emperor Nero (37–68 AD) created in the vestibule of his Domus Aurea, the imperial villa complex which spanned a large area from the north side of the Palatine Hill, across the Velian ridge to the Esquiline Hill. It was modified by Nero's successors into a statue of the sun god Sol. It is last mentioned in the 4th century AD. The statue was eventually moved to a spot outside the Flavian Amphitheatre, which (according to one of the more popular theories) became known, by its proximity to the Colossus, as the Colosseum.
The statue was placed just outside the main palace entrance at the terminus of the Via Appia in a large atrium of porticoes that divided the city from the private villa. The Greek architect Zenodorus designed the statue and began construction between A.D. 64 and 68. According to Pliny the Elder, the statue reached 106.5 Roman Feet (30.3 metres (99 ft)) in height, though other sources claim it was as much as 37 metres (121 ft).
Shortly after Nero's death in A.D. 68, the Emperor Vespasian added a sun-ray crown and renamed it Colossus Solis, after the Roman sun god Sol. Around 128, Emperor Hadrian ordered the statue moved from the Domus Aurea to just northwest of the Colosseum (Amphitheatrum Flavianum), in order to create space for the Temple of Venus and Roma. It was moved by the architect Decrianus with the use of 24 elephants. Emperor Commodus converted it into a statue of himself as Hercules by replacing the head, but after his death it was restored, and so it remained.
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