Frostburg mining journal. [volume] (Frostburg, Md.) 1871-1913, 1886-08-28
Revealing the Sphinx.

It will be good news for antiquaries
TO learn that at last an effort is being
made to disinter the Sphinx. For ages
visitors to Egypt have been amazed at
this stupendous effort OF the sculptors
who fourished before the gnomon OF
Cheops was built. Yet, while city after
city has been disinterred almost with
in sight of the monument to the kingly
Horus, this magnificent memorial of q
vanished race has been permitted to get
heaped deeper and deeper with the
desert sand, in spite of the prayer in
! scribed on the slab of Thothmes, which
begs the peoples that are to come tC
keep the statue clear of the drift,
which even then was threatening to
overwhclm it. Some forty feet of the
| fgure is still above the surface; but all
save the head and neck are covered,
from the description of travellers like
Salt and Cav; glia, who examined it be.
fore the sands had submerged the body
of the figure. Even then. nearly seven
ty years ago, it was only by great
labor that the excavators could manage
to make out the details they have sup
piled, and, in spite of their efforts the
desert sand was constantly encroaching
on the cleared space. Since that date
nothing has been done. Every year
has added to the accumulations, and so
i steadily has the work of interment been
going on that visitors, after an absence
of twenty or Thirty years, notice q sen.
sible change in the amount of debris
piled up around the Sphinx. Indeed,
if something is not done the chances
are that before long the monument,
which divides with the pyramids them
selves the interest of every intelligent
traveller, will be entirely swallowed up.
This has been the fate of many similar
architectural remains in its close prox'
unity.
1t is difficult to say for certain when
the Sphinx was seulptured. But it is,
we believe, now generally admitted that
the idea of shaping great rock into
the semblance of Horus, surmounted
with the regal "pschent, the tall conf
cal crown and wide flowing wig over
the brow of the threatening basilisk,
and from the chin the royal beard, was
carried out during the era of Alta and
Seneferu, Pharaohs III whose reign the
love of arch lecture was u ruling PAS
sion. The ancient Egyptians loved to
have everything on a great scale. They
erected huge pyramids and carved their
records on obelisks which, under north.
ern skies, are still the wonder OF the
quarry-man. Hence, when they saw a
huge ridge of limestone projecting
from the platform at the foot of the
Libyan Mountains, and bearing rude
resemblance to reclining quadruped,
the temptation to give it human form
must have been irresistible to PEG.
pie who seemed TO have lived chisel in
hand. The figure of u lion with the
head of man was the form it was des.
tined to take. These sphinxes, as they
came to be called, were not the crea-
lures of the Egyptian imagination, for
as symbols of force and intelligence
they are found in Assyria and Baby
lonia, and their figures are not uncom-
mon in PHI nician works of art.
No wonder that the Arabs knew this
mighty monster as Aboo1 Hol (the
10 whom its symbolism was q mystery,
named it the Sphinx. Its face is thirty
feet long and fourteen broad, and was
at one time glazed with sa"ret pigment,
while its body is one hundred and forty
feet in length, and the outstretched
paws, no longer to be seen, fifty feet
long. Between the paws was erected
o temple thirty-tive feet long, while in
front of the giants breast was small
sanctuary, entered by a doorway di.
vided into passages 10y reclining Lon.
At the far end of the sanctuary was the
tablet of Thothmes w., and on either
side other tablets covered with sculp-
turel asreliefs and hieroglyphics.
altar, which, with some fragments of
the Sphinx, is now in the British Mu-
scum. Here for ages troops of priests
otficiated. Upon the stately fight of
steps, so arranged that the lordly pro-
portions of the Sphinx might be seen
to advantage, endless troops of wor-
slippers assembled, or Frustrated them
selves as the smoke OF the burned sac
rifce curled over the then fertile val
ley. Though the slabs with the dream
of Thothmes and prayer of the Sphinx
to keep his statue clear OF the sand
which has since then overwhelmed it
are no longer there, the outline of the
temple and the fight of steps will be
exposed to view. The dead wall, with
the mounds of shifting sand piled
against it, will, as we have said, form a
most prosaic outwork to this noble
monument, and must conceal from the
visitor thai front view which, rs in the
case Of stonchenge, is to many most
striking. But the opportunity of SEQ
ing the entire figure and of observing
the majestic face as the sculptor in
tended it to be seen from below, not
from in front, and on the same level,
will be ample compensation for what
must necessarily be lost.-London
Daily Telegram.
Valuable Plants.