Swathes of dense sea-fog wrap around the Golden Gate Bridge, concealing and revealing the city of San Francisco like a colossal, beguiling Dance of the Seven Veils.

BBC: The road to Hollywood, California

There is too little sense of what life was like for the ordinary soldier caught up in the most colossal of conflicts, subjected after decades of peace to an environment for which nothing could have prepared him.

ECONOMIST: 20th-century history

But we are the only species to have defined a geological period by our activity something usually performed by major glaciations, mass extinction and the colossal impact of objects from outer space, like the one that defines the upper boundary of the Cretaceous.

FORBES: On The Anthropocene Age

The four colossal statues of the pharaoh fronting the temple were like gigantic sentinels watching over the incoming traffic from the south, undoubtedly designed as a warning to the strength of the pharaoh.

BBC: Abu Simbel: The great temple of Egypt

But there's no denying that a tandem like Revis and Asomugha would have been a game-changer, a colossal headache for opposing quarterbacks.

WSJ: Jason Gay: Philly Out-New Yorks New York

Scientists are finding life that can resist the colossal pressures, from deep-sea fish to shrimp-like scavengers called amphipods, some of which can reach 30cm (1ft) long.

BBC: James Cameron back on surface after deepest ocean dive

"Wilkinson was colossal today, I've never seen a number 10 tackle like him, " said Woodward.

BBC: Woodward hails gutsy conquest