The Sphinx is a composite monster which appears in both Greek and Egyptian mythology. Both sphinx have the body of a lion and the head of a man - though the Egyptians had also two other sphinx with the head of a ram or a hawk. The Greek sphinx has wings, the Egyptian does not. In Greek mythology, the Sphinx posed a riddle to all who sought to pass. This riddle was at last explained by Oedipus, where upon the Sphinx destroyed itself. The Egyptian Sphinx was deemed to represent a real creature fabled to haunt the deserts, and was a god of wisdom and knowledge.
The oldest example of a statue of a sphinx is the Great Sphinx of Gizeh, in lower Egypt. This is a recumbent image of a man-headed lion, hewn out of a rocky knoll near the pyramid of Khafra. It is 57 meters long, the head nine meters long, the face four meters wide, and the height to the top of the head is 20 meters. The features were originally painted red, but were marred by mediaeval Mamelukevandals. Portions of the beard and uraeus are in the British Museum. In front of the breast Thothmes IV set up a granite slab, mentioning Khafra's name, to commemorate the digging of the image out of the drifted sand. Worshipped as Harmachis, there are the remains of an open-air temple between the paws, with an altar dating to Roman times.
The next oldest pair of sphinxes are a granite pair two meters long, bearing the name of Pepi I, of the Vith dynasty. Several examples from Tanis , once regarded as of Hyksos origin, are attributed to Amenemhat III. Under the New Empire avenues of sphinxes, mostly recumbent rams or ram-headed lions (crio-sphinx), were erected at Thebes from temple to temple. An unfinished Sphinx of that period was found in the Gebel Silsila quarries. Research Sphinx
Abbreviations
Mythology
Research Sphinx