Cleopatra’s Needle

Avant d’arriver au Pont d’Embankment, on peut voir deux Sphinx le long de la Tamise qui ont la spécificité de Sourire!

The Sphinxes add an unexpected touch of exoticism to the London Embankment.

I found these statues along the Embankment either side of Cleopatra’s Needle. I was told that they are supposed to be ‘guarding’ it but they are facing the wrong way round to do that!
They were originally cast in bronze and have hieroglyphic inscriptions which translate as The good God Thuthmosis 111 gives life.
During the First World War, in 1917, a bomb exploded near Cleopatra’s Needle which damaged the base of one of the sphinxes and has remained unrepaired in commemoration.
There are other, smaller, Egyptian sphinxes along the Embankment on the armrests of some of the benches.