The fashion for sphinxes - lions with human heads - came to Europe after Napoleon Bonaparte’s Egyptian campaign (1798-1801), which brought many ancient monuments from there. In St. Petersburg, they began to be installed in the first half of the 19th century. The oldest lions are installed on the University embankment. They guard the Academy of Arts. In the 1830s, they were brought from Alexandria by a member of the Academy of Sciences on the wave of fascination with Ancient Egypt. These sphinxes were created over 3500 years ago for the mortuary temple of Pharaoh Amenhotep III. On the pedestals, you can see the inscription “Sphinx from ancient Thebes in Egypt, transported to the city of St. Peter in 1832.” The hieroglyphs on the statues denote the full name of the pharaoh. At the pier of the Malaya Neva, there are also famous sphinxes - these have women’s heads. This is the work of sculptor Pavel Sokolov from the 1820s. He made several “samples” for the Egyptian Bridge, but apart from this pair, the rest have been lost. In total, over 30 sphinxes can be counted in St. Petersburg. Additionally, in Tsarskoye Selo, there is an Egyptian pyramid, and in Pushkin - the Egyptian Gates. This is already a stylization of Egyptian architecture carried out at the end of the 18th - beginning of the 19th century.