‘Nebuchadnezzar the king made an image of gold, whose height was threescore cubits, and its breadth six cubits. He set it up in the plain of Dura, in the province of Babylon.'
This image of gold which Nebuchadnezzar set up, if it was gold through and through, would take up much of the temple treasury, for its cost would have been enormous, for the image was huge (the Colossus of Rhodes was not quite as high). But when a king like Nebuchadnezzar, with the treasures of the nations in his treasury, decides to make an impression, we must expect some such display. However, it is quite possible that it was in fact gold plated as was customary with such statues (compare Isaiah 40:19; Jeremiah 10:4). The image is said to be over twenty eight metres (ninety feet) high and nearly three metres (nine feet) across. Grotesqueness was a feature of Babylonian sculpture. But the image itself may not have been that height for the height probably included a large base or mound. Such kings loved to boast and the measurements were probably official ones. The sexagesimal measurement (based on sixties rather than tens) is an indication of authenticity.
The statue would soon disappear once Babylon was captured. Herodotus mentions a pure gold statue of a man twelve cubits high connected with a temple in the time of Cyrus.
‘The plain of Dura.' This was possibly Tell Dur, twenty seven kilometres south west of Baghdad although there are several Babylonian places named Duru. The name is thus in keeping with the Babylonian milieu and is a further sign of historicity.