(Livescience.com) This sphinx fragment was found by archaeologists with the Hebrew University of Jerusalem during excavations at Hazor.

Archaeologists digging in Israel found the feet of an Egyptian sphinx linked to a pyramid-building pharaoh. They were found in Hazor, a UNESCO World Heritage Site just north of the Sea of Galilee. a hieroglyphic inscription with the name of king Menkaure is etched between the paws. A.k.a. Mycerinus, more than 4,000 years ago he ruled during the Old Kingdom and built one of the great Giza pyramids.

Researchers think the sphinx was brought to Israel later on, during the second millennium B.C.

The inscription also includes the phrase, “Beloved by the divine manifestation…that gave him eternal life.”Amnon Ben-Tor, one of the Hebrew University archaeologists leading the excavations at Hazor, thinks that descriptor could be a clue the sphinx originated in the ancient seat of sun worship, Heliopolis, which is today mostly destroyed and covered up by Cairo’s sprawl.

Hazor was a crossroads between Egypt and Babylon. Initially a Canaanite city, it had been fortified since the early second millennium B.C., conquered by the Israelites, rebuilt under King Solomon and ultimately destroyed by the Assyrians in 732 B.C.