id: 110236 accession number: 1928.858 share license status: CC0 url: https://clevelandart.org/art/1928.858 updated: 2023-03-04 09:29:42.445000 Head of a Sphinx, 540–520 BC. Greece, Archaic period, 6th century BC. Marble; overall: 27 x 20.5 x 26.3 cm (10 5/8 x 8 1/16 x 10 3/8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of the John Huntington Art and Polytechnic Trust 1928.858 title: Head of a Sphinx title in original language: series: series in original language: creation date: 540–520 BC creation date earliest: -540 creation date latest: -520 current location: 102B Greek creditline: Gift of the John Huntington Art and Polytechnic Trust copyright: --- culture: Greece, Archaic period, 6th century BC technique: marble department: Greek and Roman Art collection: GR - Greek type: Sculpture find spot: catalogue raisonne: --- CREATORS --- measurements: Overall: 27 x 20.5 x 26.3 cm (10 5/8 x 8 1/16 x 10 3/8 in.) state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: inscriptions: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS --- PROVENANCE --- fun fact: digital description: wall description: This female head once belonged to a sphinx, a mythological hybrid creature with the head of a woman and body of a winged lion. Her short cylindrical crown, known as a polos, helps to identify her as a sphinx, as does the slope of her hair and neck, which once continued onto a feline body. Also common in ancient Egyptian and Near Eastern art (though more often in male form), the sphinx is best known in Greek mythology for devouring passersby who could not answer her riddle outside the Boiotian city of Thebes. Stone sphinxes like this one served as both votive offerings and grave monuments in Archaic Greece. --- RELATED WORKS --- CITATIONS The Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art Handbook. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1958. page number: Mentioned and Reproduced: cat. no. 12 url: https://archive.org/details/CMAHandbook1958/page/n18 Carter, Martha L. Classical Art. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1961. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: p. 2. Plate 3 url: https://archive.org/details/ClassicalArt/page/n5 --- IMAGES web: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1928.858/1928.858_web.jpg print: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1928.858/1928.858_print.jpg full: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1928.858/1928.858_full.tif