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These days we are all floundering in an ocean of information, often with by distinguishing falsehood from truth by labor, we live in such times. Human pulls into a whirlpool of all kinds of arguments and facts, and getting out of it on your own is sometimes beyond the power. Especially if it’s about some very interesting, mysterious topic. For example, as bewitching as the origin and destination Egyptian pyramids.
The Echo of the Planet magazine talked about this with Viktor Solkin, famous Russian Egyptologist, founder of the Association for the study of Ancient Egypt “IAAT” and full member International Association of Egyptologists.
– Victor, for you, of course, it’s no secret that age pyramids – one of the topics of fierce debate among people who are addicted the mysteries of ancient Egypt. In particular, the opinion about that these unique structures appeared in the Nile Valley long before the birth of Egyptian civilization. One of the reasons is the lack of any inscriptions inside the Great Pyramid. What is your professional opinion on this?
– First of all, people who promote such versions, I I immediately want to send to study the history of the Ancient World. But they they won’t do this, but continue to watch “sensational” TV shows dedicated to “scandals, intrigues, investigations. ”
Curiously, an incredible amount of hypotheses regarding secrets pyramids, has taken root precisely in our country – in the West the situation completely different. I will call a spade a spade: there is much less charlatans from history! However, not all so simple. The fact is that traditional Egyptology is the science of three languages: English, French and German. And, unfortunately, only a negligible percentage The research has been and is being translated into Russian. That’s where legs grow in various theories.
But let’s not live apart from reality: everything of the rest of the world, the age of the pyramids is not in doubt. Long ago obviously the oldest of them is the famous pyramid Necherethet-Djoser, which was erected in the XXVII century before the new era, and the last, the “youngest” royal pyramid of Pharaoh Jahmes I appeared around the 16th century BC in the city of Abydos. TO Joser is an honorary nickname meaning “sacred,” and the name of the ruler was just Necherehet. So, after the era of Yahweh I the ancient Egyptians refused to build the pyramids, the royal the necropolis has taken on a new shape, becoming the Valley of the Kings – this rocky gorge with underground tombs. And such a format preserved until the end of the existence of classical Egyptian civilization.
As for the pyramids of Giza and the Great Sphinx, one of the largest modern geological studies of these buildings was carried out in 1992 by the reputable Shell company International During these works, it was confirmed that traces of processing stone, the nature of organic residues in the rock, and so on – all indicates the first half of the third millennium BC, then there are on the very dates that are quite consistent with generally accepted the historical time frame for the appearance of sacred objects.
– Many versions are put forward about the creators the pyramids. In particular, they often talk about a kind of civilization, which left these constructions to the Egyptians “as a legacy”. In this communication as an indicator of a different time period, some scientists indicate suspicious erosion of the sphinx. Well, fans extraterrestrial civilizations are known to claim to erect the pyramids were helped by aliens, since buildings today Amaze your imagination with its scale, design complexity, incomprehensible purpose. How do you think everything happened on the very business?
– Hypotheses about the so-called civilization do not have no reason. During a detailed geological research conducted by the aforementioned Shell International, it was found that erosion of the Great Sphinx was caused by the wind, and not water at all – exactly the same erosion of wind damaged the walls many tombs in giza. So the time frame for creating the pyramids remain the same: the third millennium BC. Supporters I’ll also lower the versions of alien intervention from heaven to earth: the plates did not arrive and the blocks did not move. Pyramids – the work of hands people, and specifically – the ancient Egyptians. They used nummulite limestone – a rock that includes fossilized organisms. it a fact that you can’t dispute, so no concrete in ancient Egypt did not have. And this version is also quite popular.
The builders of the pyramids were not slaves at all, as they often say in textbooks, and free community members whom the royal house is actively recruited for work during the spill of the Nile, which, as we know, lasted three months. At this time, life in ancient Egypt stood still – it was impossible to engage in peasant farming and crafts, people happily went to the service of their pharaoh. It was awesome an honor for them. Let’s not forget that the ancient Egyptians were extremely religious.
The hard work at the construction site of their king was perceived by them as great blessing and the opportunity to come closer in the future – eternal – life to the blessed ruler, enter his retinue and be honored with the best fate somewhere near the gods. Where was received information about builders and construction progress, you ask.
A pyramid is an object that never “is silent.” All around is filled with texts, you just need to be able to read them. Next to the royal pyramid was always the memorial temples, as well as huge necropolis of people close to the pharaoh. Special place occupied the tomb of the great architect. In most cases, we the names of these architects are known. So, in these burials were detailed descriptions of how the construction of the pyramids were found, from which provinces the workers recruited from where limestone was brought from. Many papyruses have survived with detailed estimates: how many provisions and clothes were required for the maintenance of people, how many bulls was necessary to move the stone slabs. It’s even known that for every thousand builders there was a team of three or four doctors. Being extremely meticulous, the Egyptians are all scrupulous logged.
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According to the incomplete pyramidal complexes of the XVI century BC Zawat el Ariana we well know what the logic was complicated ramp systems along which blocks rose to a great height. AND This is not the only example. It is also worth mentioning the NOVA project, not so long ago implemented by American and Japanese experts, in during which the model of the pyramid was built using exclusively ancient technologies in a very short time and with the participation of limited number of workers.
And how many people actually worked on the construction individual pyramids, we also know from authentic ancient Egyptian texts. For example, in the construction of the pyramid of Pharaoh Amenemkhet III in Dakhshur, this is the 19th century BC, 40 molders worked bricks, 50 clay carriers, 600 brick carriers, 30 sand porters, 250 masons, 1,500 stone porters blocks, 200 boatmen, 600 workers moving blocks of stone, 1,500 laborers. Total: a pyramid 75 meters high with a length side of the base 105 meters and extensive, beautifully finished 4770 people built a dungeon. Developed for centuries, in the east, a rigid system of control and organization of labor gave incredible results.
I cannot but mention the discovery of an outstanding American archaeologist Mark Liner. In 1982, he discovered a giant necropolis of the builders of the royal pyramids. It’s clear that the work of these people were very dangerous: let’s say a person could be crushed by a stove or he could fall from a great height. The bodies of all those buried these are typical injuries incompatible with life. Besides the necropolis of Liner also found raw brick huts, in which builders lived. Petrified breads and fish.
In addition, historians know many examples of how the construction of the pyramids was not completed until it became it is clear that the construction was inaccurate and could soon collapse. So nothing human was alien to the ancient architect – they too made mistakes. All this information has long been studied and described in historical literature. The only problem is that in Russia, indeed, this data, alas, is not widely distributed received – they are known mainly by specialists in the region.
– What, after all, was the main purpose of the pyramids? After all no trace has yet been found in any of them burials.
– The fact that the pyramids were intended exclusively for burial of the king and sometimes members of his family, testifies many authentic sources. First of all, these are archeology data: fragments of elements were found in almost all pyramids traditional Egyptian royal burials, mummies, sarcophagi and boxes for canopies – vessels for viscera that are not just have accurate dating, but sometimes were even built into the architecture of the funeral chambers of the pyramids. That is, they were there initially.
We also know about this from the ancient Egyptian “Texts” pyramids “, which describes in detail the function of the pyramids and their symbolic mission. In addition, there is evidence of Arab historians of the Middle Ages. So, Caliph al-Mamun, the grandson of the legendary Haruna ar-Rashid, in 820 tried to find royal treasures in the Khufu Pyramid. A pickaxe and heated vinegar went into action, corroded limestone. “A coffin similar to a statue of a man carved from green stone. When the coffin was brought to the caliph and removed the lid, under it was the body of a man in gold armor decorated with precious stones. In his hand he held a sword which has no price “- that’s what the Arab chronicler of the 12th century wrote Al Qaisi.
The very idea of the pyramid is “measures,” as the ancient Egyptians called it, – lies in the desire to embody some semblance of the original a hill of sushi created by the Supreme deity. In Egypt, there were various cosmogonic systems, but they are united by the fact that they connected with the concept of the eternal waters of the ocean-chaos of Nun, in which in uncreated, dormant state inhabited by spirits, deities and in general, everything that subsequently arose in the universe. In some the moment a creator god appears who ejects from this ocean the first piece of land – with it, our world begins. And he has pyramidal structure.
Understand what the pyramid meant for the ancient Egyptians, help texts found, for example, on the gilded top of the pyramid King Amenemhet III, this part of the structure is called the pyramidion. On it is carved a text in the name of the deceased pharaoh, in which he says that he looks with his own eyes to the east, in the sun, and which is similar to how it repeats daily on the eastern horizon the act of creation, when the sun rises in the sky, so he wanted to ask the sun god to revive his essence. I.e the pyramid is an attempt to return to the original times and revive in another world of the king as an immortal bright spirit.
The pyramid was also considered the last legal wife of the pharaoh, in whose womb he sank. This is such an allusion with a cult mother goddess. In more detail, all this ideological background known to us from the “Pyramid Texts” mentioned above, which are from XXV centuries before the new era began to be applied to the walls of burial chambers. These texts consist of the order of seven hundred sayings that contain magic spells and mythological descriptions of the afterlife. By in essence, they were supposed to help the deceased king overcome difficulties otherworldly reality, rise to another world, reunite with ancestors and become the solar satellite of the same solar god.
In addition, the pyramids were the key pillars ancient Egyptian economy. In those days, the Egyptians didn’t there was money, there was barter. And since the pyramids were perceived living creatures, allotments of land, herds were assigned to them animals, various values. By our standards, they sometimes possessed absolutely breathtaking condition! As a result of the pyramid turned into a kind of city-forming objects around which whole settlements developed, markets appeared. There is a mass documents in which, from our point of view, funny – as one pyramid sends a gift to another, for example, a herd of elite bulls, and in return receives vegetables.
“You mentioned magic spells on the walls of the pyramids.” And what can you say to those who believe that the famous lord Carnarvon and archaeologist Howard Carter, like some of their colleagues, who worked on the excavations of the tombs of Tutankhamun, fell victims so called the “curse of the pharaohs”?
– I relate to this theory with humor. To begin with, in that not so many deaths happened in history, but those that happened, were completely explainable by natural causes. Carter He died in old age, having lived a very happy life, and Carnarvon died of infection, accidentally introducing infection into a bite section mosquito. But that’s not the point. Ancient egyptian royal curse was never intended to shorten the earth vandal life: it extended to the post-mortem state of man – eternal life. That was the main thing.
In the “Texts of the Pyramids” it says something like this: “If you encroach on my pyramid built for me and my spiritual double – “ka”, then I will sue the gods and you will be the most terrible punishment – you will devour your own sewage and you will be cast down into oblivion. “According to the ancient Egyptians, there wasn’t nothing worse than the threat of a second death, when a person is deprived of a chance to become an immortal spirit after death and remain in the fields cane, this is an analogue of paradise.
A slightly different curse was in private tombs. People were afraid that tombs can be pulled into stones – this is quite often happened. Therefore, the following spell was distributed: “If you destroy or appropriate my tomb, may the lion be against you in the sand, a snake on the ground and a crocodile in the water. “But, notice it was about the destruction and appropriation of the tomb, and not about that it cannot be disturbed! That is, disturbance of peace as such not perceived as a serious crime.
In the understanding of the Egyptians, the pyramid was a complex ritual mechanism, and man had nine constituent entities, one of which was the divine unit “ah.” The task of the tomb was help the deceased to cleanse himself of earthly dust, get out of the tomb and join the world of the gods. So after a while she’s like the mechanism was no longer necessary and was simply turning into a place memory. And this is very important: a person is alive while his name is remembered. In this communications, by the way, from the point of view of the ancient Egyptians, Carter and Carnarvon would still be very honorable people – yes, they disturbed the peace of Pharaoh Tutankhamun, this is blasphemy, but they returned his name is to the world!
– Since we are discussing hypotheses and versions, it is impossible not to recall this: supposedly the Egyptian authorities hinder the study the incredible secrets of the pyramids, not allowing access to some of them, and that, for example, under the feet of the Great Sphinx, in the dungeons are stored unique artifacts that can flip views humanity about its origin.
– Under the paws of the Sphinx, alas, there are no sensational “knowledge”. There is nothing at all. In addition to water. Two years ago, the Japanese translucent the soil with geomagnetic radar and found that on salty groundwater flows at a distance of two meters. And this a huge problem. And it was designated, by the way, even when in Egypt began the construction of the Aswan Dam. Now water from under Sphinx is constantly pumped out.
As for the fact that to some objects of power of Egypt closed access, then this is also understandable. Tourists are people malicious, they would tear off a piece “for memory” from everything. For example, closed the pyramid of King Unas, from which over the last thirty years, visitors stubbornly “endured” pieces of beautiful green pigment with which the inscriptions were covered. In return for tourists discovered the neighboring pyramid of the pharaoh Aunt, where this pigment no and there’s nothing to peel off, respectively. And still, with a big If you wish, you can get a lot where.
There is a clear price list for visiting closed places. Pay two thousand dollars for a group of ten people – go and see. It is clear that such a price filter is set intentionally, but monuments of architecture will be more intact. Do not forget that even moisture in the breath causes certain damage to the pyramids. By the way, today in Egypt they understand very well the value of their historical heritage. But it was not always like that. Egypt gradually began to come to understand this only at the end of the 19th century. More Mohammed Ali, the famous Egyptian ruler of the time when French or German consuls asked him for permission to take out from the country any objects, asking them why they need it necessary. He was honestly answered that these are very beautiful works art, to which he said: no, no, cunning Europeans, just in this your Europe does not have the same quality stone!
Can you imagine how enormous the misunderstanding of what owned ?! But now the second generation of Egyptian has grown Egyptologists and Egyptians realized what wealth they possess. No wonder during the recent dramatic events when the country covered with revolution, people surrounded the ring museums, the temple in Karnak and other significant objects to protect them from vandals.
– Victor, what then do you think is riddle of the pyramids? It can not be, even if you do not believe in any what are the “abnormal” versions of their origin.
– Pyramids are those places on Earth in which there is a special space, its own unique atmosphere, different from that what surrounds us. When you look at these amazing buildings when millions of human destinies pass before your mind’s eye, you involuntarily plunge into a state in which you begin to think about such important things as the meaning of life, death, immortality, the soul. You feel how, in fact, young is our civilization. In the bustle modern people rarely remember that our life transient. And here you suddenly distinguish a voice from the past and better hear your own heart. This is incredible piercing mysticism of the ancient Egyptian pyramids. Water Time Egypt Life Stones Pyramids Russia Tutankhamun Pharaohs
