Great Sphinx

The Great Sphinx was carved directly from the limestone bedrock of the Giza Plateau during the Fourth Dynasty. The monument combines the body of a lion with the head of a king, an image that expressed royal power and divine authority. Archaeological evidence strongly associates the Sphinx with the reign of Khafre, builder of the second major pyramid at Giza. Its position beside Khafre’s valley temple and near the lower end of his causeway places it within the architectural and ritual organization of the king’s funerary complex. The Sphinx also had a long life after the Old Kingdom. During the Eighteenth Dynasty it was revered as Horemakhet, Horus in the Horizon. Thutmose IV erected the famous Dream Stela between its paws, recording a story in which the Sphinx promised him kingship if he cleared away the sand that had accumulated around the monument.