Sphinx
pronunciation
How to pronounce Sphinx in British English:
UK [sfɪŋks]
How to pronounce Sphinx in American English:
US [sfɪŋks]
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- Noun:
- an inscrutable person who keeps his thoughts and intentions secret
- one of a number of large stone statues with the body of a lion and the head of a man that were built by the ancient Egyptians
Word Origin
- sphinx
- sphinx: [16] The original Sphinx was a monster, half woman and half lion, which terrorized the country around Thebes in ancient Greece. According to legend, it would waylay travellers and ask them a riddle; and if they could not solve it, it killed them. One of its favoured methods was strangulation, and its name supposedly means ‘the strangler’ – as if it were derived from Greek sphíggein ‘bind tight’ (source of English sphincter [16]).However, this account of its name sounds as mythological as the account of its existence, and a more likely explanation is perhaps that the word was derived from the name of Mount Phikion, not far from ancient Thebes. One of the first yachts to carry a spinnaker sail, in the mid-1860s, was the Sphinx, and it has been conjectured that its name (or rather a mispronunciation /spingks/) formed the basis of the term spinnaker [19], perhaps as a partial blend with spanker, the name of another type of sail.=> spinnaker
- sphinx (n.)
- monster of Greek mythology having a lion's (winged) body and a woman's head; she waylaid travelers around Thebes and devoured those who could not answer her questions; Oedipus solved the riddle and the Sphinx killed herself. In English from early 15c., from Latin Sphinx, from Greek Sphinx, said to mean literally" the strangler," a back-formation from sphingein "to squeeze, bind" (see sphincter). There also was an Egyptian form (usually male and wingless); in reference to this it is attested in English from 1570s; specific reference to the colossal stone one near the pyramids as Giza is attested from 1610s. Transferred sense of "person or thing of mysterious nature" is from c. 1600. The proper plural would be sphinges. As adjectives in English, sphingal, sphingian, sphingine, sphinxian, sphinxine, and sphinx-like all have been tried.
Example
- 1. The sphinx is one of a pair .
- 2. Today , the sphinx is still eroding .
- 3. There are signs the sphinx was unfinished .
- 4. But who carried out the backbreaking work of creating the sphinx ?
- 5. Hawass arranged for workers to drill test holes in the bedrock around the sphinx .