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Two colossal seated statues of Pharaoh Amenhotep III have guarded the Theban plain for some 3,400 years, all that remains conspicuously above ground of his once-vast mortuary temple. Rising around 18 metres, weathered and cracked, they make a dramatic first stop on Luxor's West Bank.

Their fame spread in antiquity: after an earthquake damaged the northern statue, it began 'singing' at dawn — a ghostly moaning as the stone warmed — and Greek and Roman tourists flocked to hear it, believing it the voice of the hero Memnon greeting his mother the dawn. Later Roman repairs silenced the sound forever.

Open and free to view from the roadside, the colossi are a quick, atmospheric introduction to the necropolis beyond.