sphinx

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. Mythology A figure in Egyptian myth having the body of a lion and the head of a man, ram, or hawk.
2. n. Greek Mythology A winged creature having the head of a woman and the body of a lion, noted for killing those who could not answer its riddle.
3. n. A puzzling or mysterious person.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. In Greek myth, a female monster, said to have proposed a riddle to the Thebans who passed her as she sat on a rock by the roadside, and to have killed all who were not able to guess it. The riddle, according to tradition, inquired what being has successively four, two, and three feet, and is weakest when it has most feet. Œdipus answered, Man, who creeps in infancy, afterward goes erect, and finally walks with a staff (a third foot). The Sphinx, in compliance with her own conditions, thereupon threw herself from her rock and died. In art this monster is represented with the body of a lion or a dog, winged, and the head and often the breasts of a woman.
2. n. In Egyptian antiquity, a figure somewhat similar in composition to the Greek, having the body of a lion (never winged), and a male human head or an animal head. The human-headed figures have been called androsphinxes; those with the head of a ram, criosphinxes; and those with the head of a hawk, hieracosphinxes. Egyptian sphinxes are symbolical figures, having no connection with the Greek fable; and the Greeks probably applied the term sphinx to the Egyptian statues merely on account of the accidental external resemblance between them and their own conception. The Egyptian sphinxes were commonly placed in avenues leading to temples or tombs. The most celebrated example is the Great Sphinx near the great pyramids of Ghizeh, hewn out of solid granite, with the recumbent body of a lion, 146 feet long from the shoulders to the rump, and 56 feet high, and a man's head 28½ feet high from chin to crown. A small temple stood between the fore paws of this sphinx. There are also Oriental sphinxes, in general akin to the Egyptian, but more often winged than wingless. See cut under androsphinx.
3. n. In heraldry, a creature with a lion's body and a woman's head, but not necessarily like any ancient original. It is assumed to be winged; when not winged, it should be blazoned “sans wings.”
4. n. An enigmatic or sphinx-like person; one who talks puzzlingly, or is inscrutable in disposition or character; one whom it is hard to understand.
5. n. In entomology:
6. n. A hawk-moth; a member of the genus Sphinx or the family Sphingidæ. See cuts under hawk-moth, hog-caterpillar. Lepidoptera, and Philampelus.
7. n. The typical genus of the family Sphingidæ. At first it was coextensive with this family; later it formed a group of variable extent; now it is confined to forms having the head small, the eyes lashed, tibiæ spinose, and fore tarsi usually armed with long spines. It is a wide-spread genus; 19 species occur in America north of Mexico. The larvæ of this, as well as of other groups of the family Sphingidæ, have the habit of erecting the head and anterior segments, from which Linnæus derived a fanciful resemblance to the Egyptian Sphinx (whence the name).
8. n. The Guinea baboon, Cynocephalus papio or Papio sphinx. Also called sphinx-bahoon.

Wiktionary

1. n. A creature with the head of a human and the body of an animal (commonly a lion).
2. n. A person who keeps his thoughts and intentions secret.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. In Egyptian art, an image of granite or porphyry, having a human head, or the head of a ram or of a hawk, upon the wingless body of a lion.
2. n. On Greek art and mythology, a she-monster, usually represented as having the winged body of a lion, and the face and breast of a young woman.
3. n. Hence: A person of enigmatical character and purposes, especially in politics and diplomacy.
4. n. Any one of numerous species of large moths of the family Sphingidæ; -- called also hawk moth. See also tomato worm.
5. n. The Guinea, or sphinx, baboon (Cynocephalus sphinx).

WordNet 3.0

1. n. an inscrutable person who keeps his thoughts and intentions secret
2. n. (Greek mythology) a riddling winged monster with a woman's head and breast on a lion's body; daughter of Typhon
3. n. one of a number of large stone statues with the body of a lion and the head of a man that were built by the ancient Egyptians