630 



SPHINX 



Sl'K IIKKKN 



II. to the Sphinx, whom they adore under the name 

 of Haremkhu, or Harmachis, as the Greek in-ciip 

 tions found at the same place call it i.e. the Sun 

 on the Horizon. These tablets fonneil three walls 

 of the chapel ; the fourth, in front, had a door in 

 t lie centre and two coucliant lions over it. A 



Great Sphinx at Gizeh. 



mall lion was found on the pavement, and an altar 

 between its fore-paws, apparently for sacrifices 

 offered to it in the time of the Romans. Before the 

 altar wax a paved causeway or drnmos, leading to a 

 walled staircase of thirty steps, repaired in the reign 

 of M. Aurelius and L. Verns on the 10th May 166 

 A.D. In the reigns of Severus and his sons, 199-200 

 A.D., another dromon, in the same line as the first, ami 

 a diverging staircase were constructed, while some 

 additions had been mode to the parts between the 

 two staircases in the reign of Nero. Votive inscrip- 

 tions of the Roman period, some as late as the 3d 

 century, were discovered in the walls and construc- 

 tion-: and on the second digit of the left claw of the 

 Sphinx an inscription in pentameter Creek verses, 

 by one Arrian, probably of the time of Severus, was 

 discovered. In addition to these walls of mil. unit 

 brick, galleries and shafts were found in the rear 

 of the Sphinx extending northwards. The e\ea\a- 

 tions of M. Mariette in 1852 threw further light on 

 the Sphinx, discovering that it was surrounded by 

 a peribolos or outer wall; and showing that the 

 head only wan sculptured; that the sand which 

 had accumulated round it was brought by the 

 hands of man and was not an encroachment of the 

 desert : and that the masonry of the l>elly w~as sup- 

 |H,rted by a kind of abutment. To the south of the 

 Sphinx Mariette found a dromos which led to a 

 temple of the time of the fourth dynasty, built of 

 huge blocks of alabaster and red granite. In the 

 midst of the great chamber of this temple were 

 lound seven diorite statues, five mutilated and two 

 entire, uf i|p. monarch Chafra or Chephren, which 

 are line examples of the oldest Kgyptian sculpture. 

 While the dignity ami grandeur of the Great Sphinx 

 have often attracted the admiration of travellers 

 (see SCULPTL-RK, p. 264), its age has always re- 

 mained a subject of doubt; but these later dis 

 coveries prove it to have been a monument of at 

 least the age of the 4th dynasty, or contemporary 

 with the pyramids, and Maspero regards it as 

 anterior even to Menes. 



Beside* the Great Sphinx, avenues of Sphinxes 

 have lieen discovered at Sakkara, forming an ap- 



proach to the Serapeum of .Memphis and elsewhere. 

 Sphinxes of the time of the Shepherd dynasty have 

 IMH'II found at Tanis, ami another of tin- 

 in the Louvre : while a granite Sphinx, found liehind 

 the ' vocal Memiion.' and in-ciil-ed with the name of 

 Amenophis III., is at St Petersburg. An avenue 

 of rriosphinxes, each al>out 17 feet 

 long, is still seen at Kaniak, and 

 belongs to the time of lloms, one 

 of the last monarchs of the 1Mb 

 dynasty. Various small Sphii 

 are in the different collection- of 

 Europe, but seldom are of any \ci\ 

 great antiquity. 



The Theha'n Sphinx of Greek 

 legend, whose myth first ap] 

 in Hesiod ( Thriii/. 326), is dcscrilied 

 as having a lion's body, female 

 head, bird's wings, and" serpent's 

 tail, ideas probably derived from 

 Phoenician sources. She \\a* said 

 to be the issue of Orthros, the two- 

 headed dog of Geryon, by Chiniieia. 

 or of Typhon and Echidna, and 

 was sent from Ethiopia to Thebes 

 by Hera to punish the transgression 

 of Laius, or, according to other 

 accounts. l>y Pionysu- or Ares (see 



<KDIITS). " The Sphinx was a 

 laMinrite subject of ancient art, 

 and appears in reliefs, on coins of 

 Chios and other towns, and often as 

 a decoration of arms and furniture. 

 In Assyria and Babylonia repre- 

 sentations of Sphinxes have been found, and the 

 same are not uncommon on Phoenician works of art. 

 Sphinx. See HAWK-MI rui. 

 Spll.VKIIlOyrrapll. an instrument for indicat- 

 ing changes ot tension in the blood in an artery : 

 practically a pulse-recorder. It was invented 'bv 

 Yicrordt, and perfected in 1863 by M. E. J. 

 Marey of Paris. When the instrument is applied 

 to an artery a moving point traces a record on a 

 band of paper moved by clockwork. A spliyg- 

 iiiophone is a spliygmograph combined with a 

 microphone. A sphygmoscope renders the pulsa- 

 tions visible. Sec woiks li\- ,1. I!. Sanderson ( iNtiT), 

 ltudgeon(1882), Iiraiuwelf( 1883), and Keyt(1887). 

 Spire Islands. See MOLUCCAS. 

 Spices (Lat. tpecicx, 'kinds;' in later Latin, 

 kinds of goods, or produce ill general; and then 

 the most highly prized kind of goods, the aromatic 

 productions of the East), aromatic and pungent 

 vegetable sulistances used as condiments and for 

 flavouring food. They are almost exclusively the 

 productions of tropical countries. In ancient I: 

 and throughout the middle ages all the spices known 

 in Kurope were brought from the Ejast; and Arabia 

 was regarded as the land of spices, but rather 

 Itecause they came through it or were brought by 

 its merchants than because they were produced 

 in it, for they were really derived' from the farther 

 e.-i-i. They owe their aroma and pungency 

 chiefly to essential oils which they contain. They 

 are yielded by different parts of plants ; some, 

 as pepper, cayenne pepper, pimento, nutmeg, mace, 

 and vanilla, being the fruit or particular parts of 

 the fruit; whilst some, as ginger, are the root stock; 

 and others, as cinnamon and cassia, are the bark. 

 Tropical America produces some of the spices, being 

 the native region of cayenne pepper, pimento, and 

 vanilla ; but the greater number are from the East. 

 Spicheren. or SI-KH-UKKX, a village on the 

 frontiers of Prussia and Lorraine, 2 miles S. of 

 Saarbrhck. Here on 6th August 1870 was fought 

 a bloody battle lictwcen the French ami Germans, 

 in which the former were defeated. See FRASCE, 



