sphinxlike
Britishadjective
Explanation
Something that is sphinxlike resembles a mythological creature which had a lion's body and a human head. A sphinxlike person is quiet, secretive, and mysterious. The word sphinxlike is often used to describe people who are hard to figure out. What are they thinking as they sit in silence, looking at you with a calm expression that is hard to decipher? In a way, someone described as sphinxlike acts like a Sphinx, the clever, winged monster of Greek mythology who guarded the ancient city of Thebes by posing difficult riddles to those who wished to enter. A sphinxlike person is mysterious and, like a riddle, keeps everyone guessing.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Within hours of arriving in Venice, he begins to suspect that the city itself, with its disorienting streets and shady denizens, is somehow in cahoots with his sphinxlike wife to betray him.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 9, 2025
Cryptics, by comparison, age gracefully: their sphinxlike wordplay has a long shelf life.
From The New Yorker ● Nov. 26, 2019
“You suffer,” Bobbi observes in her sphinxlike way, to which Frances replies, wryly, “Everyone suffers.”
From Slate ● Aug. 3, 2017
And so — serene, smiling, aloof, mysterious, enigmatic and unapproachable — surrounded and protected by a small coterie of friends, Jacqueline Onassis remains sphinxlike, Garbolike, our most tantalizing, most exasperating celebrity.”
From Washington Post ● Nov. 18, 2015
Was it about a woman or about some strange sphinxlike animal?
From "Invisible Man" by Ralph Ellison
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
