THE SPHINX

[24] See Hamblin (1973) for a popular discussion of Jericho. Concerning Jericho and its potential relationship to Egypt, Hayes (1965, 92) had this to say: "Jericho lies a scant two hundred miles [320 km] to the east of the Nile Delta, and it would seem inevitable that a Neolithic, food-producing, village culture of the type attested there before 7000 B.C. should have reached northern Egypt from this immediately adjacent southwest Asian area in the course of the seventh or, at the latest, the sixth millennium B.C." Hayes (111) also points out that pendants found at the Sixth-to-Fifth Millennium site of Merimda (Merimde beni-Salame; see Hoffman, 1979, 168-169), on the western edge of the Nile Delta about thirty-seven miles (sixty kilometers) northwest of Cairo, are very similar to pendants found in the early-Neolithic levels of Jericho. Baines and Malek (1980, 20) state that "contacts between Egypt and the Near East are attested already in the Predynastic Period, and the name of Narmer, the latest Predynastic [Egyptian] king, has been found at Tel Gat and Tel Arad in Palestine." Baines and Malek (31) illustrate a "probable route" for trade between Egypt and Palestine, and even suggest that there may have been an early (latest Predynastic? or the beginning of the Dynastic Period?) Egyptian settlement in southern Palestine.

[25] See P. Bierman and A. Gillespie, "Range fires: A significant factor in exposure-age de- termination and geomorphic surface evolution," Geology 19 (1991), 641-644; T. Graf, C.P. Kohl, K. Marti and K. Nishiizumi, "Cosmic-ray produced neon in Antartic rocks," Geophysical Research Letters 18 (1991), 203. 206; and M.D. Kurz, "In situ production of terrestial cosmogenic helirn and some applications to geochronology," Geochemica et Cosmochemica Acta 50 (1986), 2855-2862; and references cited therein.

[26] For comments made to the popular press by various archaeologists and Egyptologists, as well as general news coverage of the "Sphinx-age story," see, for example, articles printed in The New York Times, 24 October 1991 and 9 February redating the sphinx; The Washington Post, 11 November 1991 and 17 February redating the sphinx: Newsday (New York), 25 October 1991; The Independent (London), 14 October 1991; USA Today, 10 October 1991; The Boston Globe, 23 October 1991; The San Diego Union, 23 October 1991; Los Angeles Times, 23 October 1991; The Chronicle of Higher Education, 13 November 1991, 11 December 1991 and 15 January redating the sphinx; The Egyptian Gazette, 28 October 1991; Vancouver Sun, 28 October 1991; International Herald Tribune, 12 November 1991; The San Francisco Chronicle, 8 February Redating the Sphinx; The Daily Telegraph (London), 10 February Redating the Sphinx; and The Houston Chronicle, 23 October 1991 and 12 February 1999.

[27] My research concerning the age of the Great Sphinx would not have been possible without the help and cooperation of many individuals and organizations. In particular, I thank Drs. Mohamed I. Bakr, Ali Hassan and Zahi Hawass (all of the Egyptian Antiquities Organization) for permission to pursue geological and geophysical studies on the Giza Plateau. I thank Drs. Gabor Barakat, L. Abdel-Khalek, M. M. El Aref and Egial Refai (all of the Faculty of Science, Cairo University) for their interest, advice and help. Dr. Thomas Dobecki (McBride-Ratcliff and Associates, Houston) has provided valuable assistance with the geophysical studies on the Giza Plateau. Dr. Robert Eddy (College of Basic Studies, Boston University) first introduced me to John Anthony West, and it was as a result of discussions with West that I became interested in the problem of the age of the Sphinx. Thus, West is responsible for initiating this research and he, along with Boris Said, deserve credit for their hard work relative to the logistics of the Sphinx Project. Of course, all matters of fact and interpretation expressed in this paper are solely my responsibility.

 

Many thanks to Dr. Colette M. Dowell for piecing my article together from segments of unfinished papers and files.
 

Dr. Robert M. Schoch  ©  1992


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