The island of Naxos in the largest of the Cyclades in extension, famous and coveted since ancient times for its wealth and its white marble, with quarries exploited until today (only those of crystalline marble). As is the case in Egyptian quarries, where obelisks remained, or in those of Rapa Nui, with half-finished moai, in those of Naxos we can find ancient statues that never exercised the function for which they were destined and that today form part, picturesque, of the landscape.
The main ancient quarries of the island are to the north, on the hill of Agios Ioannis near the town of Apolonas, and in the Melanes region. The modern ones are in the central part, around Kinidaros.
In one of those close to Apolonas we find the Colossus of Dionysus, a statue 10.7 meters high and weighing 80 tons, unfinished and lying on the ground. It is a kuros, a type of sculpture characteristic of the 8th-6th centuries BC. depicting a young man.
Like most kuroi, she was long considered a representation of Apollo. In 1932 Wilhelm von Massow identified it as a sculpture of Dionysus, hence the popular name Colossus of Dionysus . Actually, as we said, it is a kuros and its official name is Kuros de Apolonas .
Being unfinished, the carving is very crude, although both the body and the head, beard, ears and the beginning of the hair are easily recognizable. The arms are still in the form of rudimentary rectangles and the feet, which rest on a plinth half a meter high, are barely defined. The marble with which it is made, the one from the quarry itself where it lies, has a more grayish color and stripes that indicate a higher level of impurity than that from other parts of the island.
It is not very well known why it was abandoned. It is true that it has cracks, already noted by Schaubert in an 1835 sketch for a bronze engraving, but it is not known whether they occurred at the time of carving or later.
The tourist guides of the area include various explanations, such as that the owner could not pay for the statue, or that the cracks made him desist from advancing in its creation. None can be proven. The consensus of archaeologists is that it must have been too heavy to transport.
Holes can be seen in the kuros, the result of working with bronze chisels, picks and hammers, which should have been smoothed and concealed with finer chisels at a later stage.
In the town of Melanes there are two other kuroi equally unfinished but smaller. The first has a height of 4.7 meters and the second of 5.5, weighing 5 and 7 tons respectively. The little one is in a local garden, while the other remains in the quarry located nearby.
The one in the garden has no feet and the lower part of the right leg is broken. It also has numerous chisel marks all over its surface. The expert theory is that this kuroi broke while being transported, and was therefore left abandoned.
The other, which is also called Kuros of Potamia or kuros de Faranga It is located on a marble outcrop about 300 meters high. His legs are broken, with his feet apart and placed on a recent concrete base.
His face is missing and he is lying on his back, probably in the same place away from the rock from which he was cut, where he was dropped as soon as the transport began. Most likely, it was broken when it was shipped, and for that reason it was also abandoned.
Today Naxos marble is still used on the island, mainly for door and window frames and lintels, sculptures and decorative motifs. Around 5,000 cubic meters of the purest marble are exported annually to other countries.
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Litos Online / Ferienhäuser in Azalas / Greek Reporter / Wikipedia.