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# This wooden sphinx in the British Museum has nothing to do with Egypt
- URL: https://theparnassian.com/en/etot-dereviannyi-sfinks-iz-kollektsii-britanskogo-muzeia-nikak-ne-sviazan-s-egiptom/
- Published: 2023-03-17T06:56:23.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-01T05:36:54.000Z
- Author: Alexandr Radayev
- Tags: Art, London, Museums, Ethnography

This wooden sphinx in the British Museum has nothing to do with Egypt. The sculpture is the work of a North American artist of the Haida, a small nation living on the islands of British Columbia. The sphinx was found in an abandoned Haida village, buried inside an empty house. The sculptor is believed to have been the Haida artist Simeon Stilthda, who carved the figure between 1874 and 1878\. The decline of the Haida came in the nineteenth century, when the population shrank from tens of thousands to a thousand people.

No, Stilthda never went to Egypt, and knew the sphinx only from a picture in an illustrated Bible shown to him by missionaries. The sculpture conveys the general features of the Great Sphinx, yet has wholly kept the hallmarks of the Haida manner, for the Haida are known not only as skilled mariners and the Phoenicians of the North Pacific, but also as accomplished woodcarvers.

![](https://theparnassian.com/content/images/2026/09/photo_8630@17-03-2023_09-56-23.jpg)

![](https://theparnassian.com/content/images/2026/09/photo_8631@17-03-2023_09-56-23.jpg)