It's always seemed a reasonable assumption to me, from looking at the Sphinx and the clear discrepancy in size and carving style between the face and the rest of the body, that originally it was an outcrop of rock carved simply into a massive statue of a lion (lion gods or lions as emblem of G/god, IIRC, pre-date (and would possibly also predate ) Egypt, and can certainly be found in many other cultures from Judea to Ethiopia... throughout the range of the lion, really), and then, much later, some pharoah with a massive ego/self-personification-as-lion-deity complex/desire to show his triumph over previous lion-adulating regime had it recarved into his own face...
The nose could easily then have been lost through vandalism, natural erosion or any sort of accidental damage...
Of course, if you believe Lovecraft (who was ghost-writing for Harry Houdini in that story, IIRC), the original Sphinx was carved from life, and less than life size... :shock:
The nose could easily then have been lost through vandalism, natural erosion or any sort of accidental damage...
Of course, if you believe Lovecraft (who was ghost-writing for Harry Houdini in that story, IIRC), the original Sphinx was carved from life, and less than life size... :shock: