Note to Julius Caesar, Act 1, Scene 2, line 136, "Colossus"


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Julius Caesar,
Act 1, Scene 2, line 136
the Colossus of Rhodes.


The Colossus, a gigantic statue of the sun god, Helios, was one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Completed in 282 BC and standing over 110 feet high, it stood at the entrance of the harbor of the Greek island of Rhodes. In Shakespeare's time it was believed that the statue had straddled the entrance to the harbor; this belief is what Cassius has in mind when he says that Caesar "doth bestride the narrow world."