Before the Pyramids: Cracking Archaeology's Greatest Mystery Read Free Page B

lost at sea on its way to a museum in England.
    The spellbinding beauty and scale of these three pyramids, along with a raft of unanswered questions, has led to a large number of ideas regarding what they were intended to achieve. These range from the safe assumption that they were simply grand mausoleums for the three named kings, through to wild notions such as the suggestion they were built by aliens or that the structures themselves possess super-advanced technological capabilities of various kinds. There are still people who claim that the building technology employed sprang from nowhere and that we lack the technology to build such edifices even today.
    Both of these claims are false. It would be quite possible, albeit with some difficulty and considerable expense, to build the pyramids today. And the notion that the expertise necessary to create these stone giants suddenly appeared is also clearly false. There is ample evidence of an experimental evolution from simple mud-brick tombs that lead over a period of time up to the Great Pyramid itself.
    The earliest Egyptians had buried their dead directly into the baking-hot desert sand, where the high, dry temperature desiccates the bodies to effectively mummify them. As the civilization developed, mud-brick structures known as ‘mastabas’ began to appear. These buildings were trapezoid structures – rectangular in plan with inward sloping sides and a flat top. Over time it became the practice to build one slightly smaller mastaba on top of another, which led to the development of the step pyramid ( see figure 1). There then followed a phase during which the architects improved the design of the step pyramid by adding triangular infills for the saw-tooth sides, leading to the sort of smooth pyramid with which most people are familiar. The later stages of this process actually came about surprisingly rapidly – given the normally ponderous nature of building evolution.
    Prior to the modern age, innovation in any architectural styling or technology was a rare event, and one that was usually driven by need rather than a search for aesthetic excellence. The one great exception to this obser-vation was the cathedral-building revolution initiated by the Order of the Knights Templar from AD 1130 onwards, when both the technology and the beauty of architecture leapt to previously unseen levels – almost overnight.
    The first known stepped pyramid was that of Djoser at Saqqara, a few kilometres south of Giza. A series of developmental techniques followed, which included the Pyramid of Meydum, which was still a step pyramid but the stages were becoming so frequent that is was losing its saw-tooth profile. The so-called ‘Bent Pyramid’ at Dashour followed, in which the architects began planning structures with a super-ambitious angle of 60°. However, the realities of physics soon taught these experimental builders to moderate their ambitions and settle for sides that were slightly less steep.

    Figure 1. Diagrams showing the evolution of the pyramids
    A ‘smooth-sided pyramid’ appeared not long before the Giza complex was planned. It is known as the ‘Red Pyramid’ and was created at the instructions of King Snefru, who is believed to be the father of Khufu. The Red Pyramid has a slope of just over 43°, which is less that the later Great Pyramid, but it contained many of the architectural features associated with its grander and slightly later counterparts. It was built upon a foundation of stone blocks and contained interior tunnels and chambers of the sort found at Giza.
    However, the Great Pyramid of Khufu and its two companion pyramids appear to be much more than just an improvement on their forebears. They have properties that link them to the stars.

Chapter 2
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STAR WATCHERS
The Orion Correlation Theory
    It is true that there is certainly a reasonably clear evolution of the pyramid builder’s art, but the Giza pyramids are clearly superior both in their