Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XV.djvu/274

 SPEZZIA in 1872, including the ports of Lerici, Fezzano, and Portovenere within the gulf of Spezia, amounted to 461 and 459, and of sailing ves- sels to 1,118 and 1,124; aggregate tonnage, 93,445. The imports were valued at $1,607,- 000 (including $867,660 for the navy) and the exports at $533,772. Among the most cele- brated products are olive oil and wine. SPEZZIi, or Spetda (anc. Tiparenos), an isl- and of Greece, in the archipelago, at the E. entrance of the gulf of Nauplia, and about 2 m. from the coast of Argolis ; greatest length 5 m., greatest breadth 3 m. ; pop. in 1870, 8,443. It is rocky, but has some fertile patch- es, which are carefully cultivated. In the war of independence the islanders distinguished themselves in naval engagements with the Turks. The chief place, of the same name, is a pleasant town on the E. shore, with a good harbor ; pop. about 3,000. It is a resort for invalids on account of the climate. SPHAGNUM. See MOSSES. SPHENOGRAMS. See CUNEIFORM INSCRIP- TIONS. SPHERE (Gr. c-^cZpa), in geometry, a body bounded by a surface, every point of which is equally distant from a point within called the centre. The figure may be generated by the revolution of a semicircle about its diam- eter as an axis. It is easily shown that if a sphere be enclosed in a right cylinder, the portions of the surface between any pair of planes parallel to the bases of the cylinder are equal in area to the portions of the cylindrical surface between the same planes. According- ly, the total surface of the sphere is equal to the curved surface of the cylinder. This sur- face is manifestly equal to the rectangle of the height of the cylinder by the circumfer- ence of its base ; that is, to four times the base, for the height of the cylinder is equal to the diameter of the base. Hence the sur- face of a sphere is equal to four times the area of a circle of the same diameter. Its solid content is manifestly equal to that of a pyramid, whose base is equal to the surface of the sphere, and whose altitude is the radius ; hence equal to one third of the product of its radius into its surface ; or, the cube of the diameter being to the solid content nearly as 800 to 157, the content may be calculated from this proportion, or by multiplying the cube by the decimal -52333. In geography, sphere denotes a representation of the earth on a globular surface. (See GLOBE.) In astrono- my, it is the concave expanse of the heavens, which appears as the interior surface of a sphere, of which the centre is the earth. SPHLVX, a fabulous monster of Greek my- thology, which was represented generally as having the winged body of a lion and the breast and head of a woman, but sometimes with a female face, the breast, feet, and claws of a lion, the tail of a serpent, and the wings of a bird ; and sometimes the fore part of the body is that of a lion, and the lower part that SPHINX of a man, with the claws of a vulture and the wings of an eagle ; all which forms were used as architectural ornaments. In the legends of the poets the sphinx is said to have been the daughter of Orthus and Chimtera, or of Ty- phon and Chimera, or of Typhon and Echidna, and to have come from the most distant parts of Ethiopia. She is also said to have been sent by Mars to avenge the death of his son the dragon slain by Cadmus, or according to others sent by Bacchus or by Pluto; while others again represent her as one of the women who with the daughters of Cadmus were thrown into madness and metamorphosed into mon- sters. She was ravaging Thebes and devour- ing those who could not solve a riddle which she proposed to all whom she met, when (Edi- pus, being offered the crown of Thebes on condition of delivering the country from the monster, solved the riddle, upon which the sphinx destroyed herself. (See (EDIPUS.) It is probable that the Greeks derived the idea of the sphinx from Egypt, where from remote antiquity such figures had been used to embel- lish the avenues which formed the approaches to temples. Among the Egyptians they had the head of a man, bearded and capped, and the body of a lion, thus differing from the Greek sphinxes, which had a female head and the body of a winged lion. Clemens and Plu- tarch say they were placed before the temples as types of the mysterious nature of the deity. Some sphinxes have the head of a ram, and are called crio-sphinxes, and others the head of a hawk, called hieraco-sphinxes ; the former were sacred to Amen or Jupiter Ammon, the latter to Ra, the god of the sun. The great sphinx at the pyramids was supposed by Lep- sius to represent King Cephren, the builder of the second pyramid ; but an inscription has lately been discovered which renders it prob- able that it was sculptured even before the time of Cheops, the builder of the first pyra- mid. The Egyptians called it Hor-em-khu, or Har-ma-khu, " the setting sun," the name of the god to whom it was dedicated, which was converted by the Greeks into Armachis. It is near the eastern edge of the platform on which the pyramids stand, with its head turned toward the Nile. The head measures 28 ft. 6 in. from the top to the chin. The total length of the body, which is that of a lion crouching close to the ground, is 146 ft. Across the shoulders it measures 36 ft., and the paws are extended about 50 ft. Between the paws was built a small temple, which was of masonry, as were the paws, while all the rest of the sphinx seems to be carved out of solid rock. Col. Vyse drilled a hole 27 ft. deep into one of the shoulders, and found that it was one piece of stone throughout. Near the sphinx Mariette discovered a vast temple buried in the sand, which is supposed to have been dedicated to the worship of the divinity of the sphinx. The countenance is now so much mutilated that the outline of the fea-