The Sphinx's Nose
The Sphinx, 1743.
In 1737, British traveler Richard Pococke visited Egypt and made a
sketch of the Sphinx that was published six years later. The nose is
shown intact, but Pococke likely exercised his poetic license by adding
it when it was not there (earlier, in 1579, Johannes Helferich had
further taken an artist's liberties by depicting the Sphinx with a nose
-- and with decidedly female features). Frederick Lewis Norden,
an artist and marine architect, also sketched the Sphinx in 1737. His
detailed drawings, published in 1755, were more realistic and showed the
Sphinx with no nose. It is very unlikely that Norden would omit the
nose if it was present. We can conclude that the nose was gone by 1737
at the latest; thus its removal can not be blamed on Napoleon's troops,
who visited more than 50 years later.
The Sphinx, 1755.
There exists an interesting account written by historian Muhammad
al-Husayni Taqi al-Din al-Maqrizi (died CE 1442), in a book called al-Mawa`iz wa al-i`tibar fi dhikr al-khitat wa al-athar
(G. Wien, ed., 1913). In vol. 2, page 157 of the Wien edition,
al-Maqrizi states that the face, specifically the nose and ears, were
demolished in 1378 by a Sufi from the khanqah of Sa`id al-Su`ada named
Sa'im al-dahr. The reason for the vandalism, according to al-Maqrizi,
was to "remedy some religious errors:" at that time some Egyptians were
still burning milk-thistle (shuka`a) and safflower (badhaward) at the
foot of the Sphinx while murmuring a verse 63 times in hope that their
wishes would be fulfilled. "From the time of this disfigurement also,"
al-Maqrizi wrote, "the sand has invaded the cultivated land of Giza, and
the people attribute this to the disfigurement of Abul-Hol [i.e., the
Sphinx]."It is interesting that al-Maqrizi mentions that the ears were demolished. As far as I can see, the Sphinx still has his ears.
The Sphinx, 1579.
Comments
Post a Comment