stylistic:style_transfer, stylistic:tone
Missing nose

Examination of the Sphinx's face shows that long rods or chisels were hammered into the nose area, one down from the bridge and another beneath the nostril, then used to pry the nose off towards the south, resulting in the one-metre wide nose still being lost to date. Many folk tales exist regarding the destruction of its nose, aiming to provide an answer as to where it went or what happened to it. One tale erroneously attributes it to cannonballs fired by the army of Napoleon Bonaparte. This is considered false since drawings of the Sphinx by Frederic Louis Norden in 1737 already show the nose missing, predating Napoleon's arrival by sixty years.

The damaged nose has also been attributed by some 10th century Arab authors stating that it was a result of iconoclastic attacks. Besides this, there was also mention of the damage being the work of the Mamluks in the 14th century. According to Ibn Qadi Shuhba, Muhammad ibn Sadiq ibn al-Muhammad al-Tibrizi al-Masri (d. 1384), desecrated the sphinxes of "Qanatir al-Siba", built by Sultan Baybars.

The Arab historian al-Maqrīzī, writing in the early 15th century, attributes the loss of the nose to Muhammad Sa'im al-Dahr, a Sufi Muslim from the khanqah of Sa'id al-Su'ada in 1378, who found local peasants making offerings to the Sphinx in the hope of increasing their harvest and therefore defaced the Sphinx in an act of iconoclasm. According to al-Maqrīzī, many people living in the area believed that the increased sand covering the Giza Plateau was retribution for al-Dahr's act of defacement. Al-Minufi (1443–1527) meanwhile mentioned that the Alexandrian Crusade in 1365 was divine retribution for Muhammad Sa'im al-Dahr's breaking off the nose of a sphinx.