A new study reveals that the Egyptians 4,500 years ago only modified the Sphinx statue located next to the Khafre Pyramid. It has long been placed there by a “mysterious force.”
This surprising research has just been published in the journal Physical Review Fluids, led by a team of scientists from New York University (NYU, USA).
The Sphinx statue in question is situated next to the Khafre Pyramid, the final resting place of Pharaoh Khafre (also known as Khafra), from the Fourth Dynasty of the Old Kingdom of Egypt.
Khafre Pyramid and the Sphinx guarding in front – (Photo: EGYPT TIME TRAVEL).
The Khafre Pyramid is the second-largest pyramid in the Giza Pyramid Complex (Giza Province, Egypt), and the Great Sphinx here is believed to be the prototype for many other large and small sphinxes created by humans afterward.
Both structures are thought to have been built during the reign of this pharaoh, around 2500 BCE. However, the new simulation reveals a different scenario.
The research team used a soft clay mound with harder material inside, placing it in a tunnel with fast-flowing water to simulate the erosion process caused by wind over thousands of years. The processes were fine-tuned according to various sophisticated parameters, fitting the characteristics of the area.
How the Sphinx was originally sculpted – (Graphic: Math Lab).
The original mass of earth was merely an elliptical shape, like most other earth and stone mounds on Earth. However, thanks to the harder material inside and the direction of the wind, the head of a lion-like creature began to take shape.
“We have demonstrated that natural erosion can indeed create a form resembling a lying lion with its head raised,” said Associate Professor Leif Ristroph from NYU in an interview with Live Science.
Professor Ristroph noted that even if such a natural feature existed, the ancient Egyptians undertook a significant amount of work to create this iconic structure, most notably the human face, to transform the lion-shaped rock into the Sphinx.
This result also aligns with the existence of yardang structures found in various locations within Egypt’s deserts and other deserts around the world.
Yardangs are sculpted-looking rock structures formed from natural materials, created by erosion. They typically have one steep side and a gradually sloping side toward the “tail,” resembling a sail or an animal raising its head.
Some yardang structures – (Photo: AGU BLOGOSPHERE).
A field study by French archaeologist and Egyptologist Emile Baraize in 1939 also argued that the Sphinx was constructed based on two nearby yardangs, one forming the head and the other creating the curved back resembling a lying lion.
