The Great Sphinx

The Ancients

History Hit

History

4.7 • 3.5K Ratings

🗓️ 4 April 2024

⏱️ 43 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The Great Sphinx of Giza is one of the most iconic monuments from ancient history. 73 meters in length and 20 meters high, the huge limestone statue depicts a mythical creature with a lion's body and a human head thought to represent Khafre, an ancient Egyptian pharaoh of the Fourth Dynasty during the Old Kingdom (c. 2570 BC).

In this fascinating bumper episode of our special Wonders of the World miniseries, Tristan is joined by Dr Campbell Price from Manchester University to learn more about this world-famous effigy, from its shadowy origins, to its role as a tourist attraction for the Ancient Greeks & Romans, and of course its mysterious missing nose.

This episode was produced by Joseph Knight and edited by Aidan Lonergan.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	It's the entrance on history hit. I'm Tristan Hughes your host. And in today's
0:15.0	episode, well it was fantastic to see how well received our
0:17.9	wonders of the World Miniseries proved in March, and so we kind of
0:22.1	decided to do an ancient's encore, another great architectural
0:26.3	marvel of antiquity, a monument that has become the face of ancient Egyptian culture alongside Tooten-Karmen and the pyramids. I am of course talking
0:36.6	about the great Sphinx of Giza, one of the, if not the oldest surviving monumental sculpture in the world.
0:45.0	It's colossal and still stands to this day.
0:49.1	Now a few weeks back I headed to Manchester Museum to finally go and see their highly praised exhibition on ancient Egypt called Golden Mummies.
0:58.0	It is fantastic, but only on for a few more weeks, so do make sure you go and see it before it's not too late.
1:04.0	I've done some videos all about it on my Instagram page at Ancient Tristan if you need further convincing.
1:11.2	Now while I was at Manchester Museum I caught up with this ancient Egypt curator Dr.
1:16.4	Campbell's price because Campbell he is also an expert on the Great Sphinx so he is our guest for today's episode. I really do hope you enjoy. And he is Campbell.
1:29.0	Campbell, it is such a pleasure to have you on the podcast.
1:34.0	Hello again, Tristan.
1:35.0	Hi, it's a pleasure to be with you in person.
1:37.0	We're doing it in person this time.
1:38.0	And what a scenic place to do it?
1:40.0	This is behind the scenes of the Manchester Museum too yes this is our
1:44.0	archery store that we're sat in at the moment so pose narrows and lots of books
1:48.8	we are talking about the Sphinx and this has to be one of the most recognizable and colossal statues, not just in ancient
1:56.7	Egypt, but in the ancient world.
1:57.7	Yeah, I think the great Sphinx of Giza, which is associated with the pyramids of Giza the Great, pyramid and the two other pyramids there in the plateau.
	...

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