The Sphinx was carved in a rocky outcrop The Sphinx was not mentioned by Herodotus or Strabo By contrast, Pliny the Elder, who lived just after Strabo, gave us a quite precise description of the Sphinx, at least regarding its dimensions, in his Natural History written at the beginning of our times. It’s a fact that the Sphinx seems to be an “added piece” on the Plateau. Why was it carved and why at the precise place where it stands? Jean-Pierre Houdin thinks that the path of the ramp of the port must have had a great influence on its creation. The Sphinx was not sculpted in a mound as some tell us, but in a rocky outcrop that was enclosed in a space defined by the North by Khufu’s pyramid, to the West by the main external ramp, to the South by the ramp of the port and to the East by the port where materials were delivered. That kind of outcrop (yardang) is the result of a lesser erosion of a stratum made of a harder limestone occurring in the general stratification. Curiously, and only a few people notice it, there are still some outcrops visible on the Giza Plateau, particularly on the South, on the Hill of the Crows, on the other side of the waddi. The outcrops on the Hill of the Crows There is one which, viewed from the lower end of Khafre’s Causeway, looks from afar like a lion resting on its paws. Moreover, the outcrop in which the Sphinx’s head was carved was situated below the level of the main quarries of the construction site, very close to the port. Did all these elements contribute to inspire an idea to one of the architects to open a small additional quarry around this outcrop while keeping a central core in order to create this mythical animal, bearing the face of the king, which would mark and guard the site? Who knows? Any creation, any innovation, often finds its roots from a particular context, from a triggering element. Once the concept of a monument was embedded in the minds of the builders, the construction of a temple dedicated to the offerings became a logical addition to the mystical function of the Sphinx. From the moment that a new quarry was opened, the only additional constraint was to keep the central core in which the body of the Sphinx would be carved and enough blocks to build the temple; any surplus blocks would be sent to the building site and used in the construction of the pyramid itself, as with any other block from the neighboring quarries. Finally, only qualified workers were needed for the carving work on the Sphinx and I think that there were many very good carvers among the quarrymen, a trade very different from the masons working at the pyramid itself. Moreover, and I’ll certainly talk about this later on, the planning for the work on the Sphinx came at a time when there was less of a need for limestone blocks for the pyramid, something which must have freed a lot of quarrymen. Thus, for both constructions, I don’t see any technical or human incompatibility for these works to be carried out in parallel. Credits: INTERVIEW with JP HOUDIN in three parts: (English) Keith Payne emhotep.net/ (Française) Marc Chartier pyramidales.blogspot.fr/
Posted on: Thu, 15 Aug 2013 11:03:11 +0000
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