Which pharaoh ordered the construction of the temples at Abu Simbel?

The pharaoh who ordered the construction of the temples at Abu Simbel was Ramesses II.

Built during the 19th Dynasty in the 13th century BCE, Abu Simbel consists of two monumental rock-cut temples in Nubia, southern Egypt. Ramesses II commissioned the complex as part of a broad building program that projected Egyptian power in a region important for trade, gold, and contact with neighboring kingdoms.

The Great Temple was dedicated to the gods Amun, Ra-Horakhty, and Ptah, as well as to the deified Ramesses himself. Its façade is dominated by four seated statues of the pharaoh, each about 20 meters high. Reliefs inside celebrate Ramesses’s rule and include scenes associated with the Battle of Kadesh.

The smaller temple was dedicated to the goddess Hathor and Queen Nefertari, Ramesses’s chief wife. It is notable for depicting the king and queen with statues of similar scale, an unusual honor for an Egyptian queen. In the 1960s, both temples were dismantled and reconstructed on higher ground to save them from the rising waters of Lake Nasser.