• r2-41-10
    Headless recumbent sphinx, Manisa 311, right side. (©Archaeological Exploration of Sardis/President and Fellows of Harvard College)
  • r2-41-20
    Headless recumbent sphinx, Manisa 311, left side. (©Archaeological Exploration of Sardis/President and Fellows of Harvard College)

Marble Sculpture of a Headless Recumbent Sphinx

Date
Late 6th or 5th C. BC?, Late Lydian (Persian)
Museum
Manisa, Archaeological and Ethnographic Museum, 311
Museum Inventory No.
311
Sardis or Museum Inv. No.
Manisa 311
Material
Marble, Stone
Object Type
Sculpture
Sculpture Type
Animal
Site
Sardis?
Findspot
"Salihli." As Salihli has no Lydian antiquities of its own, this provenance usually indicates Sardis or vicinity, Apr. 14, 1946.
Description
A straight rectangular cut was made to seat the neck, head, and part of the wing (rectangle: W. 0.19, L. 0.15; dowel hole: diam. 0.035, D. 0.035). Judging from the cutting, the head may have been slightly turned to the proper r. The tail is slung up on the back and disappears at the l. haunch. The horizontal wings are broken across the back. Semicircular breast feathers are joined at the sides by long (up to 0.25), straight wing feathers which slant upward slightly. There are large claws on the l. rear paw, which is folded under the haunch.
Condition

Marble

Surface worn and partly blackened by weathering.

Dimensions
P.H. 0.44; L. 0.90; H. of base 0.10
Comments
See Also
Bibliography
For this type, which is of Near Eastern derivation, see Herrmann, Urartu und Griechenland, 97-99, n.69, figs. 19-20. The archaic Greek sphinxes of the Assos frieze, Caskey, Catalogue Sculpture Boston MFA, 12, no. 8, are fairly close in proportions. For earlier Lydian example cf. Cat. 239 (Figs. 416-418).
Author
GMAH