The Great Sphinx of Giza bears clear signs of intentional damage on its face. The disfigured colossus, deprived of its nose between the third and tenth century AD, paradoxically is not documented in this sense as one would expect for such an evident feature. Information about it is, in fact, few and fragmentary in local Arabic sources and in journals of the European travellers who visited Egypt between the Middle Ages and the Modern Era. This paper aims to present a selection of the main testimonies on the Sphinx’s broken nose until the first decades of the eighteenth century. An unpublished and anonymous 1743 manuscript from the Biblioteca Estense Universitaria in Modena will also be analysed. This document consists of a traditional report of a visit to Giza but also presents peculiar aspects as an alternative explanation of the colossal statue’s deterioration and the citation of an Arabic proverb still used today.
“Ne mancagli altro se non che un poco di Naso”: il danneggiamento del volto della Sfinge di Giza in un manoscritto inedito da Modena (1743)
Mattia Mancini
2024-01-01
Abstract
The Great Sphinx of Giza bears clear signs of intentional damage on its face. The disfigured colossus, deprived of its nose between the third and tenth century AD, paradoxically is not documented in this sense as one would expect for such an evident feature. Information about it is, in fact, few and fragmentary in local Arabic sources and in journals of the European travellers who visited Egypt between the Middle Ages and the Modern Era. This paper aims to present a selection of the main testimonies on the Sphinx’s broken nose until the first decades of the eighteenth century. An unpublished and anonymous 1743 manuscript from the Biblioteca Estense Universitaria in Modena will also be analysed. This document consists of a traditional report of a visit to Giza but also presents peculiar aspects as an alternative explanation of the colossal statue’s deterioration and the citation of an Arabic proverb still used today.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.