The Great Sphinx and Egyptian Statues
To this day, the most ancient statue known is a colossus—namely, the Great Sphinx of Gizeh. It was already in existence in the time of Khȗfȗ (Cheops), and perhaps we…
From: Unknown To: 1902 C.E.
Note: This article has been excerpted from a larger work in the public domain and shared here due to its historical value. It may contain outdated ideas and language that do not reflect TOTA’s opinions and beliefs.
From Manual of Egyptian Archaeology and Guide to the Study of Antiquities in Egypt by Gaston Maspero, 1902.
To this day, the most ancient statue known is a colossus—namely, the Great Sphinx of Gizeh. It was already in existence in the time of Khȗfȗ (Cheops), and perhaps we should not be far wrong if we ventured to ascribe it to the generations before Mena, called in the priestly chronicles "the Servants of Horus."
Hewn in the living rock at the extreme verge of the Libyan plateau, it seems, as the representative of Horus, to uprear its head in order to be the first to catch sight of his father, Ra, the rising sun, across the valley (fig. 183). For centuries the sands have buried it to the chin, yet without protecting it from ruin. Its battered body preserves but the general form of a lion's body. The paws and breast, restored by the Ptolemies and the Caesars, retain but a part of the stone facing with which they were then clothed in order to mask the ravages of time. The lower part of the head-dress has fallen, and the diminished neck looks too slender to sustain the enormous weight of the head. The nose and beard have been broken off by fanatics, and the red hue which formerly enlivened the features is almost wholly effaced. And yet, not-withstanding its fallen fortunes, the monster preserves an expression of sovereign strength and greatness.
The eyes gaze out afar with a look of intense and profound thoughtfulness; the mouth still wears a smile; the whole countenance is informed with power and repose. The art which conceived and carved this prodigious statue was a finished art; an art which had attained self-mastery, and was sure of its effects. How many centuries had it taken to arrive at this degree of maturity and perfection? In certain pieces belonging to various museums, such as the statues of Sepa and his wife at the Louvre, and the bas-reliefs of the tomb of Khabiusokari at Gizeh, critics have mistakenly recognised the faltering first efforts of an unskilled people.
The stiffness of attitude and gesture, the exaggerated squareness of the shoulders, the line of green paint under the eyes,—in a word, all those characteristics which are quoted as signs of extreme antiquity, are found in certain monuments of the Fifth and Sixth Dynasties. The contemporary sculptors of any given period were not all equally skilful. If some were capable of doing good work, the greater number were mere craftsmen; and we must be careful not to ascribe awkward manipulation, or lack of teaching, to the timidity of archaism.
The works of the primitive dynasties yet sleep undiscovered beneath seventy feet of sand at the foot of the Sphinx; those of the historic dynasties are daily exhumed from the depths of the neighbouring tombs. These have not yielded Egyptian art as a whole; but they have familiarised us with one of its schools—the school of Memphis. The Delta, Hermopolis, Ekhmim, Abydos, Denderah, Thebes, Asdan, do not appear upon the stage earlier than towards the Sixth Dynasty; and even so, we know them through but a small number of sepulchres long since violated and despoiled.
Maspero, Gaston. Manual of Egyptian Archaeology and Guide to the Study of Antiquities in Egypt, Amelia B. Edwards, translator, G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1902.
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