The Enigma of the Great Sphinx

The Great Sphinx of Giza is the largest monolith statue in the world. It is 73.5 m (241 ft) long, 6 m (20 ft) wide, and 20 m (65 ft) high and represent the oldest known monumental sculpture. But its origins are still a subject of debate, as the statue seems to be much older than the Egyptian civilization.

In the famous Egyptian Giza Valley, three pyramids captured the attention of the Egyptologists. They were built at close distance one from another, being placed on a line, but not on a straight one, as the third pyramid is deviated from the line determined by the other two.

Looking on a sky map from around 10,500 BC, made on computer, researchers discovered the missing cue: the three pyramids and the Nile were the perfect mirror image of the Lion's Constellation. The three pyramids represented the three stars, placed in the same position, of which the third was less shiny, determining the Egyptians to build a third smaller pyramid, close to the Nile, representing the Milky Way.

The Sphynx could have been built at Giza by a pre-Egyptian civilization around 10,500 BC, and the Egyptians could have taken from that civilization the map of the sky to raise the Giza pyramids around 2,000 BC.

Initially, the Sphynx could have been built in a savanna and represented a lion, the figure of the constellation. Around 9,000 BC, the clime changed and the savanna turned gradually into the current desert. The lion's body was covered by sand and protected this way against the action of external agents, erosion being experienced only by the upper part of the monument. Thousands of years later, a pharaoh ordered the recarving of the head, this time representing not a lion head, bur his.

This would explain the disproportion between the huge made body and the restored head, which dwindled and did not experience as much erosion as the body.

Common theory says the Sphinx would have been built (or at least the face was of) by King Khafra, somewhere between 2520 BC and 2494 BC, or Khufu, his father and the builder of the largest pyramid ever.

Still, much more puzzles are triggered by the Sphynx. Robert M. Schoch, making a facial analysis, showed the sphinx has a distinctive "African," "Nubian," or "Negroid" aspect (the face is one of a Black man), not real with Khafra's face. Some data points that during Khafra's rule, the Sphinx was already buried in sand.




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