Sphinx

Origin and myth

The sphinx begins in Egypt, where the lion-bodied, human-headed figure was a royal guardian. The Great Sphinx of Giza, carved around 2500 BC and usually identified with the pharaoh Khafre, wears the royal headdress and faces the rising sun; hundreds of smaller sphinxes lined temple avenues at Thebes (Karnak and Luxor), many of them ram-headed and linked to the god Amun. The Egyptian sphinx is usually male, though some queens, notably Hatshepsut, were also shown as sphinxes; it is wingless, calm and protective. It has little narrative myth of its own. The best-known story is on the Dream Stele of Thutmose IV (around 1400 BC), set up between the Great Sphinx's paws: a prince sleeps in its shadow and is promised the throne if he clears away the sand.

The Greeks took the image, gave it wings and a woman's head, and made it dangerous. In the myth of Oedipus, known in the 5th century BC and in the background of Sophocles' Oedipus the King, the Sphinx sat on Mount Phikion near Thebes and devoured those who could not answer her riddle. The wording was never fixed: in Apollodorus it asks what has one voice and becomes four-footed, two-footed and three-footed, and the familiar version with morning, noon and evening is a later retelling. Oedipus answered "man", and the Sphinx threw herself from the height. Hesiod's Theogony makes her (as Phix) the offspring of Orthus and a mother the Greek leaves ambiguous, usually read as the Chimera or Echidna; Apollodorus names Echidna and Typhon.

Between Egypt and Greece, the sphinx spread across the Near East, where Levantine and Mesopotamian sphinxes were given wings, as on Phoenician ivories. Winged sphinxes already appear in Aegean Bronze Age art, and Near Eastern models strongly shaped the sphinxes of Archaic Greek art. The Greek word was linked in antiquity to "sphingein", to squeeze or bind, which gives the popular translation "strangler"; this is probably a folk etymology, and the true origin of the name is uncertain.

Appearance

The Egyptian sphinx lies in a couchant pose, forelegs stretched forward, body of a lion with smooth, stylised musculature. The head is human and male, wearing the striped nemes headcloth, false beard and uraeus cobra on the brow. The expression is serene. There are no wings.

The Greek sphinx sits upright on her haunches like a cat, or crouches ready to spring. The body is a lioness, lithe rather than massive. The head is a woman's, with an archaic Greek face and hair in tight curls or a long braid, sometimes wearing a diadem. Large bird's wings rise from the shoulders, either folded along the back or raised in a high curve behind the head. Some later descriptions give her a serpent-headed tail. Archaic painted sculpture and vases often show pale skin, a tawny body and wings picked out in bands of bright colour.

In modern fantasy

Sphinxes appear in tabletop roleplaying games as riddling guardians of tombs and treasure, in mythology-themed strategy and adventure video games, and in countless films set in fantasy Egypt. The riddle motif is nearly always preserved. Both the calm Egyptian guardian and the winged Greek predator are common, and a sculptor is free to use either general form without reproducing any franchise's specific design.

3D printing notes

The Egyptian sphinx is one of the easiest large prints in the bestiary. Its couchant pose is a compact block with almost no overhangs - only the chin and the underside of the headcloth lappets need supports - so it prints beautifully on FDM at any scale from 75 mm upward, and even at 28-32 mm an FDM print can look acceptable if the face is simplified. It also makes an excellent single-piece centrepiece at 150-250 mm, hollowed with drain holes.

The Greek sphinx is harder. The wings are the issue: raised wings need supports over their entire underside, and at small scales they are fragile. Print the wings as separate parts, lying flat with the inner face down, and slot them into the shoulders with keys. The head should be printed with the body, oriented so that the supports touch the back of the hair rather than the face. Resin is strongly preferred at 28-32 mm for the face; FDM is fine at 75 mm and above for the body.

Painting and display

For the Egyptian version, the point is stone. Base in a sandy ochre, wash with a thin burnt umber, dry-brush with a pale cream and add a scattering of darker sand-tone speckles with a stiff brush. Painting the nemes stripes in faded blue and gold, as the original polychrome statues had, adds life without breaking the stone illusion.

For the Greek version, paint her as a living creature: a warm skin tone for the face, tawny lion fur, and wings in the archaic banded scheme of white, black, red and blue. A limestone crag base with a small, dusty road below sells the Theban legend.

Related creatures

Depending on the source, the Greek sphinx is a daughter of the Chimera or of Echidna, which places her in the same monstrous family as Cerberus. Its closest visual cousins are the Manticore, a lion with a human face and none of the sphinx's restraint, and the Griffin, the other winged lion of the ancient Near East.

Sources

• Theoi Project, Sphinx, https://www.theoi.com/Ther/Sphinx.html
• Wikipedia, Sphinx, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sphinx

For a sphinx in either tradition, from a tabletop guardian to a large stone-finished centrepiece, ask Fantasy Lab 3D for a custom print.