Culture

Facts about Great Sphinx of Giza

We found 12 facts about Great Sphinx of Giza

A mythical statue in Giza

The Great Sphinx is one of the world’s largest and most distinctive sculptures and one of Egypt’s most famous tourist attractions. According to some researchers, its creation is the work of about a hundred workers who forged it for three years using stone hammers and copper chisels.

Great Sphinx of Giza
1
The Great Sphinx is a monolithic sculpture in Giza, Egypt.
It is located adjacent to the three great pyramids of Cheops, Chephren and Mykerinos.
2
The Great Sphinx is not actually a real sphinx.
According to ancient Greek mythology, the sphinx is a figure with a woman’s head, a lion’s body and bird wings. Therefore, since the Sphinx at Giza has neither a female face nor wings, technically, it should not bear this name.
3
The Sphinx statue was created during the Old Kingdom period, around 2550 BC.
It is the oldest monumental sculpture in Egypt. It is a monolith carved into the rock used as a quarry to build the surrounding pyramids.
4
It is not entirely clear under whose reign the Great Sphinx was built.
The most popular theory is that it happened during the reign of Chephren, since his pyramid and a complex of tomb temples are located nearby in the valley. However, since there is no conclusive evidence, Cheops or his son Djedefre are also considered the creator of the Sphinx.
5
Until recently, it was believed that the people working on the creation of the Sphinx were enslaved.
It is contradicted by recent discoveries, suggesting that these workers ate similarly to the rulers of Egypt. Their menu included excellent quality beef, mutton and goat meat.
6
After several centuries of splendor, fate was no longer kind to the Sphinx.
More than a thousand years after its creation, the statue was covered up to its shoulders with desert sands. The worst damage came during the First Intermediate (2250 to 2050 BC) when the Giza necropolis sites were abandoned, and a wave of chaos and looting swept through the region.
7
The statue was restored by Pharaoh Thutmose IV.
Around 1400 BC, after becoming pharaoh, Thutmose IV decided to unearth the front paws of the sphinx as a token of gratitude for receiving power and placed a shrine and a granite stele with inscriptions between them. It is said that when he rested near the statue, he dreamed of a deity promising him dominion over the kingdom in exchange for digging up the Sphinx.
8
The face of the Sphinx most likely represents the image of Chephren.
His head is covered by nemes - a head cloth worn by pharaohs- a symbol of royal power. Moreover, fragments of a uraeus - a cobra-like symbol of divine authority and royalty - were found at the statue’s feet during the 1817 excavations. During the same excavations, a stele of Thutmose IV was also discovered.
9
The Sphinx’s face is missing a nose. For a long time, the blame fell on Napoleon Bonaparte.
It is said that one of the artillery bullets fired from French cannons hit the face of the statue, redeeming the nose. However, this hypothesis has been debunked, as many sketches from the French Emperor’s period depicted the Sphinx as it looks today. For the disfigurement of the Sphinx’s face, 15th-century Egyptian historian Al-Maqrizi blames a Sufi Muslim, Muhammad Sa’im al-Dahr, who, seeing that the local population was offering their crops as gifts to the Sphinx, decided to damage the statue in order to curb pagan customs. The local population linked the damage to the statue to the sandstorms haunting the Giza plateau. Al-Dahr himself was killed shortly after the incident.
10
It is 73 meters long (counting from paws to tail), 20 meters high, and 19 meters wide.
For most of its existence, the lower part of the statue rested buried in the desert sands. It was not until an archaeological survey in 1817, led by Italian archaeologist Giovanni Battista Caviglia, that its torso was excavated from under the desert sands. The Sphinx’s paws did not see the sun’s light until 1878.
11
In ancient times, the Sphinx’s face was adorned with a beard.
However, it fell off the statue or was detached from it. Although it is not known precisely when this element was attached, it was not created parallel to the creation of the statue. If this were the case, the falling off beard would certainly have harmed the lower part of the Sphinx’s face.
12
According to Pliny the Elder (Gaius Plinius Secundus), the Sphinx’s face was painted red.
Traces of yellow and blue pigment were also found on the statue. According to one researcher, Mark Lehner, the statue in its heyday may have been colored in the fashion of characters from today’s cartoons.
Hungry for more facts?

Similar topics

20 facts about Statue of Liberty
20 facts about Statue of Liberty
Lady Liberty
The Statue of Liberty, commonly known as Lady Liberty, is one of the symbols of the United States of America. This neo-classical sculpture was initial ...
22 facts about Colosseum
22 facts about Colosseum
Bloody pearl of the ancient world
Visited by over five million tourists a year, the Colosseum is one of the most important relics of the ancient world. In antiquity, the amphitheater w ...
20 facts about Space Needle
20 facts about Space Needle
Seattle’s finest
The Space Needle was once the tallest building west of the Mississippi River. Towering the city at 184 meters, it is a historical landmark of Seattle ...
18 facts about Lighthouse of Alexandria
18 facts about Lighthouse of Alexandria
One of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World
For hundreds of years it pointed the way for sailors to the port of Alexandria. Unfortunately it did not survive to our time, the information about th ...
20 facts about Axum Empire
20 facts about Axum Empire
One of the most advanced ancient civilizations
The Axum Empire was one of the most remarkable powers of the ancient world. Located in the northern part of modern Ethiopia and Eritrea, it once domin ...
18 facts about ancient Sumer
18 facts about ancient Sumer
The mysterious people of antiquity
We know little about them, but what we have established makes you dizzy. A people of unknown origin who created a civilization that was the cradle of ...
26 facts about Temple of Artemis
26 facts about Temple of Artemis
Artemesium
Artemis was one of the most prominent gods of ancient Greece. She was the daughter of Zeus and Letho and a twin sister of Apollo. Ephesians devoted to ...
16 facts about Stonehenge
16 facts about Stonehenge
Presumably, the world of the dead
Despite insightful archaeological research, we have not yet fully understood the method of construction and the purpose of Stonehenge to this day. Unf ...

Latest topics

20 facts about beer
20 facts about beer
World’s third most popular beverage
It is one of the oldest alcoholic beverages produced. The first archaeological evidence of brewing dates back 13,000 years ago from the territory of I ...
15 facts about StarCraft
15 facts about StarCraft
The computer game classic of the 1990s
For gamers whose childhood and early youth were in the 1990s, StarCraft can evoke nostalgia. This already classic title lived to see a sequel in 2010, ...
12 facts about capybaras
12 facts about capybaras
The world’s largest rodent and social media star
The capybara, the largest rodent known to us today, is an animal with a very pleasant disposition and appearance, living both an aquatic and terrestri ...
20 facts about Amazon River
20 facts about Amazon River
Its basin covers nearly half of South America
In the year 1500, European explorers stumbled upon one of the most remarkable wonders on the planet: the amazing Amazon River. This majestic waterway ...
13 facts about churro
13 facts about churro
A dessert worth the sin
Churros are known to all lovers of Spanish and Latin American cuisine, but few may realize that their genesis, in all likelihood, took place in the Fa ...
29 facts about Colorado
29 facts about Colorado
Centennial State
Colorado is one of the larger American states, bordered by longitude and latitude. The state is famous for its varied landscape of mountains, forests, ...
18 facts about Roland Garros
18 facts about Roland Garros
French pioneer of aviation who played tennis only a few times in his life
Roland Garros was a French aviator who played an important role in the history of aviation. He began his aviation career in 1909 and achieved many aer ...
24 facts about Sri Lanka
24 facts about Sri Lanka
The “Land of Smiles”
Sri Lanka is an island country in the Indian Ocean. Previously, until 1972, both the country and the island on which it lies were known to the world a ...

Similar topics