More than 40 years ago, Farouk El-Baz \u2014 a space scientist and geologist known for his field investigations in deserts around the world \u2014 theorized that the wind played a big hand in shaping the Great Sphinx of Giza before the ancient Egyptians added surface details to the landmark sculpture. <\/p>\n
Now, a new study offers evidence to suggest that theory might be plausible, according to a news release from New York University. <\/p>\n
A team of scientists in NYU\u2019s Applied Mathematics Laboratory set out to address the theory by replicating the conditions of the landscape about 4,500 years ago \u2014 when the limestone statue was likely built \u2014 and conduct tests to see how wind manipulated rock formations. <\/p>\n
\u201cOur findings offer a possible \u2018origin story\u2019 for how Sphinx-like formations can come about from erosion,\u201d said senior study author Leif Ristroph, an associate professor at New York University\u2019s Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, in a news release. \u201cOur laboratory experiments showed that surprisingly Sphinx-like shapes can, in fact, come from materials being eroded by fast flows.\u201d <\/p>\n
The team behind the study, which the release said had been accepted for publication in the journal\u00a0Physical Review Fluids, created clay-model yardangs \u2014 a natural landform of compact sand that occurs from the wind in exposed desert regions \u2014 and washed the formations with a fast stream of water to represent the wind. <\/p>\n
Based on the composition of the Great Sphinx, the team used harder, non-erodible inclusions within the featureless soft-clay mound, and with the flow from the water tunnel, the researchers found a lion form had begun to take shape. <\/p>\n
While the Great Sphinx of Giza has its mysteries \u2014 what it originally looked like and why it was made \u2014 it is believed that the 66-foot-tall (20-meter-tall) statue was carved out of a single piece of limestone. <\/p>\n
The original theory that wind had shaped a yardang into the Sphinx\u2019s formation was first featured in a 1981 Smithsonian Magazine article by El-Baz titled \u201cDesert Builders Knew a Good Thing When They Saw It.\u201d <\/p>\n
El-Baz said he did not believe this new study provided any more support to his original theory. <\/p>\n
Salima Ikram, distinguished university professor of Egyptology at the American University in Cairo, questioned altogether the idea that the Sphinx had started with a yardang. <\/p>\n
\u201cOnce the Great Sphinx was carved, nature played a part in its further formation, but it is unlikely that the original form was based on a yardang (which are generally of mud \u2014 this is limestone) as there are significant quarry marks and working marks surrounding it,\u201d said Ikram, who was not involved in the study, in an email. <\/p>\n
\u201cThere is too much evidence of human intervention in the construction of the Great Sphinx to make the yardang theory feasible,\u201d Ikram said. <\/p>\n
The New York University researchers said their results suggest that Sphinx-like structures can form under fairly commonplace conditions, but their findings don\u2019t resolve the mysteries behind yardangs and the Great Sphinx. <\/p>\n\n
More than 40 years ago, Farouk El-Baz \u2014 a space scientist and geologist known for his field investigations in deserts around the world \u2014 theorized that the wind played a big hand in shaping the Great Sphinx of Giza before the ancient Egyptians added surface details to the landmark sculpture. Now, a new study offers <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":11228,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-11227","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11227"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11227\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}