Revisiting Atlantis

I've recently stumbled across a video called "Visiting Atlantis", by George S. Alexander and Natalis Rosen ("A&R"). The pair advance the hypothesis that the Richat structure (aka "the Eye of Africa", alternately referred to herein as "RS") is the original site of the fabled city of Atlantis.

Actually, this has a lot of merit. And the video does ask the single best question a historian can tackle: "What does this mean for our understanding of ancient civilizations?" That's really the question that I'd like to explore today. In doing so, I'm going to approach this as if  Solon's account of Atlantis given to us via Plato is an accurate retelling. That doesn't mean it definitively is; but we're going to assume it is.

There are two reasons for doing so. First; unless you do, the conversation's over. Second; we don't really have any reason not to. In other places, where Plato uses a parable he simply tells you that. Here, he's claiming to pass on reputable information. He names his source (Solon). He tells you where Solon got that information (Sais, in Egypt). And though Sais is destroyed, at the time of Plato's writing it wasn't. So Plato, at the very least, believed what he wrote.

But, aside from some technical difficulties, there is a methodological problem with Plato's account, and it's a problem that's repeated in modern times by most researchers, including A&R in this documentary. Before I explore that, let's look at the "good stuff". I will neither be complete nor comprehensive here, as I don't have that kind of space or time. But I think I'll hit the important points.

Geography:

Mauritania, showing the location of the Richat Structure.
From Google Maps

The Richat Structure in satellite imagery

The best explanation for the Richat Structure is that it is a collapsed, eroded dome of rock, caused by volcanism. In any event, it is a natural phenomenon. This shouldn't deter anyone from considering it as a site, as almost all cities are built on natural features. This one is singularly striking.

Plato describes Atlantis in two books: Critias and Timaeus. He claims to have gotten the information from Solon, a distinguished ancestor of his, by means of writings left by Solon. He further claims that Solon got his information from a temple in Sais, where there was a model of Atlantis. The wonderful thing about models and physical artifacts is that they pretty much provide their own description. 

Atlantis as described by Plato in Critias

The RS resembles the description of Atlantis in some very specific ways. Most of the geographic details are spot-on, save one, of which I'll have more to say. The archaeological details... mmmm... we'll have to talk about those.

1. Atlantis was located beyond the Pillars of Hercules (Gibraltar). So is the RS.
2. Atlantis is sheltered by mountains to the north, and is open to the south in the direction of the sea. So is the RS.
3. Atlantis is about 23 kilometers across. So is the RS.
4. Atlantis is arranged as a central island and concentric rings; two of land, three of water. So would the RS, if there were water.
5. Black, white, and red stones were prevalent in Atlantis. So too at the RS. Well, red and black. The 'white' ones are a judgement call. Let's call grey 'white' and give credit.
6. There were two springs or wells on the center island, one warm, one cool, which provided fresh water. There is a fresh water well near the center of the RS that provides fresh water, though shallow wells in the surrounding area yield salt water. Other than at the center of the RS you have to dig very deeply to reach fresh water.
7. The Atlanteans mined copper, tin, and gold. These are still mined in Mauritania today... but they're also mined in a lot of other places.
8. The date given for Atlantis (10,000 years before Plato's time) coincides with the last African Humid Period. The RS preserves clear evidence of ancient rivers and extensive water erosion.

These are all discussed in the video.

The last geological feature is the elephant in the room: proximity to the sea. Of course, there isn't. In the video, A&R postulate that the ocean levels were some 300 feet higher than at the present, but that's quite a stretch. While there are shells found inland, the age of those shells aren't clear. Shells are basically calcium carbonate: a kind of rock. As such, they don't really need to be fossilized to be preserved. And in my own experience, while digging in the neighborhood of my parent's house in Columbia, South Carolina, I routinely dug up a multitude of seashells, though the ocean hadn't been anywhere near that area since the Mesozoic era. Dinosaurs used the beach formerly located at my parents' house. It's somewhat frustrating that A&R didn't provide the location of some of the features (the shells; a beached ship) that they depicted in the video.

Before I say another word, I'm going to take A&R to task on a point. In the video, they display the following image as they're describing how they encountered "boats beached miles from the water":

Dunedin Star, in Namibia

If they encountered this ship, they took the long way 'round.  The ship is the MV Dunedin Star, which ran aground on Namibia's Skeleton Coast, in the south of Africa, thousands of miles away, but certainly not "miles from the water". Here's CNN's image:

CNN published this image, with proper attestation

This video is full of stuff like that. Images just grabbed from wherever and stuffed into the narrative, as if they were illustrative. In a documentary this is unconscionable. If you were there with cameras and you encountered boats, then you show the boats you saw. You don't grab a stock image from the Web and use that instead. It undermines your credibility and becomes evidence against your position.

In any event, a beached modern ship on one coast does not count as evidence of a shoreline miles inland and 300 feet higher 12,000 years ago on a completely different coast. That shoreline may have been there then, but it may have been a million years ago, or 65 million years ago. It's up to you to put the event at the right time.

Vertical movement of Earth's landmasses
via Wikipedia

Estimating coastlines becomes a tricky scenario when we remember that ocean levels aren't necessarily reflected in the coastlines. Focusing on "sea levels" doesn't always cut it. For example, when a glacier melts, you might expect far more coastal flooding than you could actually get in the local area. Isostatic rebound occurs when the weight of all that water is removed from a landmass. It's due to the plasticity of the Earth, having a molten core and mantle. Water levels rise, but so does the continent itself.  So it's possible for the coastal effects to be felt much more greatly in areas that are nowhere near the site of the glacier. While isostatic rebound is commonly called "post-glacial rebound", let's remember that glaciers are water. We might ask whether the same thing could have occured in north Africa as the Sahara dried out; and if not, why not? In any event, the A&R hypothesis would require that the portion of the north African landmass on which Mauritania sits was far lower 12,000 years ago than it is today. That alone probably wouldn't be enough, unless it were also affected by other events associated with the Younger Dryas. For this hypothesis to hold, the coastline of Mauritania would have had to reach nearly to the town of Atar at the foot of the Adrar Plateau. 

But there's another possibility. Perhaps Plato, Solon, or the Egyptians just got it wrong, and "direction of the sea", didn't necessarily indicate "proximity to the sea".

Archaeology:

Here's where things start to fall down. There are other features which do not match Plato's description at all. These descriptions, given in Critias, are not mentioned in the video.

1. "First of all they bridged over the zones of sea which surrounded the ancient metropolis, making a road to and from the royal palace." There are no indications of any bridgework whatsoever at the RS.
2. "And beginning from the sea they bored a canal of three hundred feet in width and one hundred feet in depth and fifty stadia in length, which they carried through to the outermost zone, making a passage from the sea up to this, which became a harbour, and leaving an opening sufficient to enable the largest vessels to find ingress.". There is no indication of boring on this or any other scale at the RS.
3. "Moreover, they divided at the bridges the zones of land which parted the zones of sea, leaving room for a single trireme to pass out of one zone into another, and they covered over the channels so as to leave a way underneath for the ships; for the banks were raised considerably above the water." Again, there are no indications of any of this at the RS.
4. "All this including the zones and the bridge, which was the sixth part of a stadium in width, they surrounded by a stone wall on every side, placing towers and gates on the bridges where the sea passed in. The stone which was used in the work they quarried from underneath the centre island, and from underneath the zones, on the outer as well as the inner side." There is no indication of any of this at the RS.
5. "Some of their buildings were simple, but in others they put together different stones, varying the colour to please the eye, and to be a natural source of delight." -- there are a very few indications of buildings (UPDATE: here, here, and here (thanks Bright Insight)) but no indication of age, and nothing matching Plato's description. 
6.  "The entire circuit of the wall, which went round the outermost zone, they covered with a coating of brass, and the circuit of the next wall they coated with tin, and the third, which encompassed the citadel, flashed with the red light of orichalcum". There is no indication of this at the RS. 
7. Plato goes on to describe numerous temples, often clad or surrounded in gold, of which not the slightest sign is indicated at the RS.

A&R describe more recent buildings of a primitive nature, built of stone, but chinked with mud rather than mortar, and hypothesize that the cataclysm would have destroyed all traces. I find this less than compelling. Archaeologists find foundations on the weakest of evidence. And here we're not talking about "a house", but "a city". Presumably we should find streets, earthworks, etc. Any long civic habitation should have signs of refuse. But we really have nothing permanent here that we can date to the period in question.

The region is littered with stone tools of a sort that we would expect to find from a stone age culture. We actually find many tools of many different epochs mixed together, and they weren't washed away. Rather, what we see is consistent with what is called "deflation" in archaeology. This is when sand and dust is blown away by persistent winds, leaving the heavier artifacts co-mingled on a harder surface. Rather than seeing the sort of stratification, or layers, that we normally use to date artifacts, the strata have been "deflated", leaving everything jumbled together. That's what happens in north Africa, where many tons of dust are blown into the Atlantic every year. You can see evidence of the scale of this in the satellite photos. But at the RS, we don't see evidence of middens (kitchen waste dumps), building foundations (on the required scale), or any of the mega-engineering projects described by Plato. They just don't exist. And of the many artifacts that have been found, none of them attest to a highly advanced civilization.

In short, I would say that the geography is compelling, but the archaeology is not.


A Crisis of Expectations:

So what does this mean for our understanding of ancient civilizations?

Every avid researcher of Atlantis is looking for an "advanced civilization", however it is they choose to define that term. A&R do the same. They mention alleged Dogon ancient knowledge of the star Sirius (something I take to have been debunked). They depict Atlantis as Plato described it, covered in gleaming metals with bridges and geometrically perfect water channels plied by trireme ships. They depict marble columned temples and colossal statuary dedicated to Poseidon. They show bridges supported by Roman arches.

None of that could be remotely correct.

Remember, Plato relates that Egypt began as a colony of Atlantis. And quite frankly, this might actually be true. The Sahara, as it moistened and dried over the millenia, acted as a sort of "pump" that drove the migrations of humankind, as well as our hominid ancestors. It's not at all incredible that Egyptians were the last migrants out of the Sahara at the end of the last African humid period. It's not at all incredible that they brought stories of a place that geographically resembles Atlantis; after all, such a place exists, and in a place where legend tells us Atlas reigned as its first king.

But we do know something about ancient Egyptians. We know of their building styles, for example. We know about the kinds of boats they built of papyrus reed. We know that the same kinds of boats are found halfway across Africa, in Lake Chad. So we need not look for Hellenistic architecture and Roman arches as today's artists fancifully depict. Such visualization are in no way credible. Nor need we look for any evidence of "Poseidon" as such. As Plato himself began his story,

"Yet, before proceeding further in the narrative, I ought to warn you, that you must not be surprised if you should perhaps hear Hellenic names given to foreigners. I will tell you the reason of this: Solon, who was intending to use the tale for his poem, enquired into the meaning of the names, and found that the early Egyptians in writing them down had translated them into their own language, and he recovered the meaning of the several names and when copying them out again translated them into our language. My great-grandfather, Dropides, had the original writing, which is still in my possession, and was carefully studied by me when I was a child. Therefore if you hear names such as are used in this country, you must not be surprised, for I have told how they came to be introduced."

-- Plato, Critias.

We can reasonably suppose that not only names were translations of translations. So were cultural descriptions. Each recipient of this story has translated the idea of "advanced civilization" into his own concept of what it means to be "advanced". Some people today fantasize that it must surely have included exotic lost technologies that we ourselves are only now beginning to envision. However...

About 12,000 years ago, at the alleged time of Atlantis, agriculture was just beginning to take root (pun intended) in Mesopotamia. At that time, a non-nomadic, sedentary colony was enough to count as being "advanced". If you built a structure at all, even if it be of unshaped stone chinked with mud, having no foundation, it was enough to count as a "palace". If you piled rocks into an altar, even if it be roofless under the stars, that was enough to count as a "temple". If you built a boat that could get you across the water, even if it be made of lashed reeds or animal hide, you had constructed a "ship". If you built a fortification of dirt and timber, you had built a "castle".

But if you wait a time and then tell someone these stories, they will imagine palaces, temples, castles, ships, and harbors in the shape of their own experience. They will add in details of the life not very different from their own. Innovation moved slowly in the ancient world, and the inhabitants didn't really imagine how greatly things could change. When they themselves pass on the inflated stories, they're not lying per se, and they're not including anything of their own invention. Rather, it's their lack of imagination that causes them to include only those descriptions of which they themselves are familiar. They depict "great" in terms they recognize as "greatness". Surely a "great civilization" couldn't be a village, or a tribe! But yes, it could, just as a "king" in ancient but historical times might rule over a single city.

A visualization filled with anachronisms.

A&R fall into this trap as well. They not only mix Egyptian and Roman culture into their visuals, but Babylonian and even modern as well. From their video:

Not. Even. Close. This is Greek, top to bottom.

According to the video, "Folk art depictions of the Nommos show creatures
with humanoid torsos and fishlike tails". This is shown during that narration.
The problem is, this is the Babylonian deity Dagon.
Nommo were not 'a' god like Poseidon, but is a collective noun for a
group of beings,  perhaps inspired by West African manatees.

Let me state though, that visuals aside, this isn't one of my usual debunkings. Alexander & Rosen are by all indications reasonable people who follow the evidence as it is presented to them (even though the evidence they present is suspect). I am probably more skeptical of some evidence than they are, but they do take time to at the very least mention where controversies exist, or where some evidence is problematic. Taking more time on the archaeology would have been nice, but it's their video, not mine.

Conclusion: 

Have we found Atlantis? Honestly, I think we probably have. But there are no secrets here. No advanced technologies, no lost knowledge. Unless, that is, you count the knowledge that a "golden age" is golden in hindsight, and that an ancient people might be rightly proud of what they accomplished, even if to our eyes it's not terribly noteworthy once the embellishments have been stripped away. But it's not really our eyes that matter, is it? It's theirs.

The story of Atlantis has been continually embellished over the centuries. But embellishments serve a distinct and valuable purpose. They tell us what these meager accomplishments meant to those who actually performed them. Think of what "advanced" means to you. Whatever it is, that's what stone tools and a few stone and mud houses meant to inhabitants of West Africa 12,000 years ago. Their vision was greater than their power, but so too was that of the Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, and ourselves. This is likely to be true of all civilizations for the remainder of history, no matter how powerful they become. So show some respect.

Pin marks the spot.

UPDATE

Another commentator, on the Bright Insight channel on YouTube, sets great store on the fact that the Richat Structure is thought to be a volcanic dome, noting that volcanism can cause landmasses to rise. However, this completely ignores the timeframe. The RS was formed in the neighborhood of 100 million years ago, ± a few million years. This is far too long ago to account for any uplifting of the northwestern coast of Africa. Bright Insight seems to have been led astray by mention of the multiple intrusions and collapses that formed the structure, concluding that this explains the sinking of Atlantis. Sadly, no. This explains the geology of the structure, which existed prior to the alleged sinking. The mantle of the Earth is significant not because it just generally causes land to rise, but because its plasticity means the Earth can in fact regain shape after deformation, as we saw when discussing isostatic rebound.

Bright Insight also brings up the subject of non-fossilized whale skeletons found in "the deserts of Mauritania, and shows a website. Well, I visited that site. The page author was kind enough to have listed the exact latitude and longitude of the photo. (Latitude: 19°56'40.66", Longitude: -16°15'42.57"). Punching these numbers into Google Maps shows us exactly where the find was: Here.

Site of "ancient whale skeletons" "in the desert"

Yes. It's within a stone's throw of the beach, just as is the MV Dunedin Star on a Namibian beach, pictured earlier. What you don't get told is that African deserts go right up to the coastline. 

A reconstruction of Herodotus' map of the world

One other piece of evidence is the Herodotus map of the known (to him) world. I thought it was pretty common knowledge. Only four of Bright Insight's commenters mentioned it, but I think that sample's both weak and self-selecting. Looking outside of that channel there are gobs of references. And no: I don't think that the Nile ever ran east-west across the Sahara. The map attributed to Herodotus is a reconstruction. We have no evidence that he ever actually created a map, though he did discuss them. In that discussion, he reveals the limits of his understanding, which you can read about in this PDF. Also note that in these reconstructions, the map doesn't actually say "Atlantis". Rather, it is "Atlantes"; that is, "Atlanteans". It's not exactly a nit-picky point. Here's what Herodotus actually wrote (emphasis mine):

"...Near this salt hill is a mountain named Atlas, which is small in circuit and rounded on every side; and so exceedingly lofty is it said to be, that it is not possible to see its summits, for clouds never leave them either in the summer or in the winter. This the natives say is the pillar of the heaven. After this mountain these men got their name, for they are called Atlantians; and it is said that they neither eat anything that has life nor have any dreams." -- The History Of Herodotus Volume 1 (of 2) Translator: G. C. Macaulay

In other words, Herodotus' description has precious little to do with the lost city of Atlantis. It's an accident of linguistics, and getting too excited about it is analogous to wondering whether "martial law" is imposed by Martians.

Bright Insight is a personable enough fellow, and he has a lot of enthusiasm. I think he's letting that enthusiasm run away with him a bit. It's necessary to follow the evidence. All of it, not just confirmational evidence. Especially when it comes to subjects like this, you have to consider the source of the evidence; not just taking it at face value, but actually going to the source and seeing for yourself, to the extent possible. As I state above, I too think that the Richat Structure may have been the site described as 'Atlantis'. However, I think that a lot of our ancient sources are simply wrong on some important details, the reasons for which I give. At the earliest, our sources are 10,000 years more recent than Atlantis, after all. Then again, I'm of that age where the more excited someone is when making a 'find', the more motivated I am to invite them to ponder what exactly it is they found.

More Junk Science on TV

Why do I do this to myself? 

At the beginning of the month I started watching a "documentary" miniseries on Hulu called "The Pyramid Code". IMMEDIATELY my B.S. meter started pegging and I became so frustrated at the depth of balderdash that I stopped watching, and posted something close to the following on Google+:

I'm not talking about the usual "aliens did it" nonsense... alien visitation crackpots are easily dismissed... those are more entertaining than frustrating.

My major beef lies with totally false claims that advanced technology is required to build the things and that advanced mathematics (beyond algebra) are required to arrive at the dimensions... that their construction necessitated the use of exotic 'power sources' that we don't understand today. It's not remotely true. You can construct a pyramid of those exact dimensions (pi and all) using integer math and bronze age tools. And it appears that "elbow grease" and "puttin' your back into it" have suddenly become exotic power sources (I can't say I'm surprised on that one).

The "it's not possible" claims are maddening. All this does is allow the author to advertise two things: 1. "Even though I have a Ph.D, I'm too frakkin' stupid to think of simple solutions to practical math problems", and 2. "I'm so bloody spoiled that I cannot conceive of an age where people were willing to labor."

BTW, here's something I wrote on the subject a few years back: http://blog.cratchit.org/2007/06/how-to-build-pyramid.html

Well, having rested for a good 20 days, I decided to try another stab at watching it today. I should have known better. Now, having endured the entirety of the show, I get to tell you my opinion.

Dr. Carmen Boulter has the kind of Ph.D. that renders all scholarship suspect and the most outlandish of folk tales credible... in other words, the practically worthless kind. Whether it be giant quartz "crystals" (Dr. Boulter hasn't bothered to pay attention to anyone who can tell her the difference between a crystal and a rock) that act as giant vibrational warm-fuzzy transmitters, or nuggets of esoteric physics like, "sunlight on water... that is energy," Dr. Boulter hasn't met a scientific theory she wouldn't like to replace with a hearty helping of woo.

One thing that's particularly distracting is her love affair with the phrase "Band of Peace", which she apparently uses to refer to the fertile Nile river valley. Do a little experiment for yourself. Using Google, try searching for the phrase "Band of Peace", excluding the name of her program. Here's the search term, and a link for you. I'm excluding only the verbatim phrase "The Pyramid Code"

"Band of Peace" -"The Pyramid Code"

See anything about Egypt or the Nile in what's left? Right. What these results tell me is that she promoting the hell out of a phrase she dug out of her butt. In fairness, she might have dug it out of somebody else's butt... maybe Hakim's. Either way, the constant repetitions give the viewer the distinct impression that if this program does nothing whatsoever but make this moniker stick, then Boulter will have won her own little private Nobel Prize. It's totally in keeping with her trend of replacing any hard science she may find with shit she made up.

The series makes copious use of Abd'El Hakim Awyan, though it didn't do him many favors. Hakim was a doctor in his own right, yet was credited "Indigenous Wisdom Keeper". Not so great for his credibility, but a damn cool title, nonetheless. I'm so going to have that put on a business card. Hakim brings just the right amount of down-home folklore, but is clearly out of his depth when discussing anything to do with physics. The "sunlight on water" quote above is his.

Hakim makes much of the fact that the Khemetic language had no word for "death" and thus the ancient Egyptians could not have been obsessed with death, despite all the pyramids, mummies, tombs, temples, mustabas, etc. Of course, he says that just before he relates the word for death ("they called it 'Westing', as in 'going to the West'). To be sure, the same "no word for death" claim can and has been said of the Teutonic languages; and English-speaking Christians have a score of words for death, and still believe in resurrection. Also, the origins of words often have only a vague connection to contemporary usage; for instance, a person may collect a "salary", though it's been 2,000 years since Roman soldiers were actually paid in salt. So it was unclear to me what this is supposed to prove. Then came my answer.

"The Egyptians obviously had a very different world view from ours today. They believed in the afterlife and the soul's immortality."

Suddenly I understood why Boulter and co. were having so much difficulty with the subject, and it made me very sad. I then sat through the rest of the episode watching their "scientists" treat with utmost credibility the notion that the ancient Egyptians had a physical means of attaining what the archaeologists themselves reject in their everyday lives. These beliefs are common in today's culture. I thoroughly understand being an atheist. I don't understand in the slightest being so blind to the world around you that you don't see the parallels in what you're studying and the millions of people for whom a central portion of this worldview has persisted to the present day. How was it possible for them to be so perplexed? 

That question carries forward just in general. I watched the section on reading hieroglyphs with a sincere desire to shout at the screen, "would you stop acting stupid and just present the information?!" Look, if you've got 4,000 hieroglyphs and only 26 letters, it's not a news flash to say that there's not a 1 to 1 correspondence between glyphs and letters. With that number of glyphs, it's pretty safe to assume that we're not talking about a syllabary either. Rather, you're going to have a concept per glyph, as in Chinese. None of this was news even before the Rosetta Stone was discovered. So why does Boulter pretend that this is a revolutionary new understanding of hieroglyphs?

Perhaps she's led astray by Laird Scranton, a computer programmer and amateur anthropologist who, starting from an observation by others that the Dogon people of Africa believed the star Sirius had a companion star, leaped to the conclusion that all of Dogon cosmology is scientifically brilliant, and that their rock paintings of water and eggs and grain should be interpreted as describing quantum mechanics as opposed to, say, a recipe for cake. He estimates the science of their ancients to be at least 50 years in advance of our own... which has enabled them to build mud huts and paint rocks. I weep for our children of 50 years hence. The forward of Scranton's book, Sacred Symbols of the Dogon, lays out his qualifications... hey, he's a software designer! Computers have symbols! Hieroglyphics are symbols! Therefore he's an expert. You can't argue with that kind of logic.

Don't get the idea that there's absolutely nothing of value in this series. There are bits of real scientific information embedded in the video, particularly when Dr. Boulter is not on-screen. I actually feel sorry for the legitimate scientists who share the screen here and there. And I suppose there's some entertainment value in cataloging the myriad forms of woo that appear here. Sadly, the signal-to-noise ratio is so poor that I can't recommend the show to anyone as an introduction to the subject of Egyptology. Get familiar with the subject first, then come back and see what you can pick out.

---

As a reference, here's how you present this sort of information:

Whether you agree with his conclusions or not, Thomas Brophy does things strictly according to the scientific method. He has a hypothesis, calls it a hypothesis (knowing the difference between that and a theory), and does the math. Most importantly, he knows that science ain't horseshoes... close isn't good enough. So when his hypothesis is close, but not exact, he discards it and looks for a better one. Nice.

---

Update: If you'd prefer to see a series by an actual Egyptologist (and for the femi-sexists who have revealed yourselves in my comments, she's female), please have a look at the "Immortal Egypt" Timeline series by Professor Joann Fletcher of the University of York.

Update 2022: I've waited 15 years for someone to ask me the difference between a crystal and a rock. No one has. So I'll put it here for posterity, and note that when I said "rock" above I was writing somewhat hyperbolically to draw out that very question: crystals are a uniform lattice of atoms and/or molecules. It's a repeating pattern all of the constituent molecules are arranged in the same way. One portion of a crystal is substantially the same as any other portion. For instance, a flawless diamond, no matter its size, is literally one giant molecule. Actually, even if it's flawed, any portion that maintains the lattice structure uninterrupted is part of that one molecule. A mineral (which is what Boulter was actually pointing to) is made of many crystals of the same type, but they're granular and weakly bonded. A rock is an aggregate of crystals of different types. Like minerals, rocks don't have a repeating pattern. And it's the pattern of a crystal that makes it useful in high tech applications. Because of this difference in structure, rocks and minerals do not have the same properties as crystals.

How to Build a Pyramid

[9 Oct 2011: I originally wrote this article in 2007 and it was on its own web page. Recently I saw another television special about the pyramids, and my frustration with the astounding ignorance of the Ph.D. who wrote it moved me to re-post it here, update it and fix the formatting.]

How to Build a Pyramid - Giza Style

by David F. Leigh

"Architect! Build me a monument! It must be 280 cubits high and outlast the ages!"

So the Pharoah has appointed you to build his next pyramid. Whe're to start? You live in the Bronze Age, in the year 2580 B.C. Is it even possible to carry out the order with great precision given the tools that you have available to you? Let's find out. We'll start with an inventory.

Your resources 

• Aproximately 20,000 highly motivated manual laborers, stonecutters, foremen, and and support staff. 
• Adequate food and shelter for these workers (money is no object, since it doesn't exist anyway) 
• The natural resources of the land on which you live, and those of surrounding countries for which you can trade. 
• Your intelligence and common sense 

Your tools 

• Wooden mallets 
• Measuring rods and ropes in cubits (about the length of you elbow to your outstretched fingertip) 
• Bronze, copper, and stone chisels, adzes, axes, choppers and pounders. 
• Wooden Levers 
• Rope. Lots of rope 
• Wooden sledges 
• Oil and water. 
• Whatever you can dream up that doesn't involve steam, motors, iron, plastic, or other modern materials. Copper, bronze, stone, wood, leather, papyrus reed, ivory, bone, rope, lead, glue, and shell are all acceptable materials. 
• You can use techniques whose discovery is credited to people living centuries later, so long as they are simply accomplished with Bronze Age technology. For instance, you can bisect an angle with a compass and straightedge. After all, improper assignment of credit happens all the time, even today. 

Making a blueprint 

There are plenty of reasons for selecting a pyramid to be our monument. First, Pharoah's father and grandfather built pyramids.... it's a family tradition. And pyramids echo the timelessness of mountains. And with its sloping sides, a pyramid looks much taller to someone standing at its base than it really is.

But there are practical reasons, too. Two hundred eighty cubits is really, really tall. So tall that we're not going to be able to build an obelisk that high. It would fall over or break with the stress of trying to raise it. We can't build in clay or brick either, since that will crack and buckle under the weight that's placed on it. Besides, bricks crumble over time. So we're going to be building in stone. And we're going to need a wide base. A pyramid is extremely stable.

Nonetheless, we have some limits. Build it too steep and the weight will crack the base. Too shallow and it won't be impressive. This needs to be extremely well built and precise, both because we take pride in our work and to celebrate the perfection of nature and our faith in the infallibility of our ruler.

So we start with an architect's drawing on papyrus. This will be a scale drawing we'll use to get approval from Pharoah, and it will be important for other reasons to be seen later. We start with our height: two hundred eighty cubits. That's what Pharoah ordered, that's what we'll deliver.

[The height here is completely arbitrary. We could have as easily said that we're going to fill up a certain area, and the calculations will work out exactly the same. However, there's no actual problem with the fact that it's arbitrary: the Pharoah wants something bigger than has ever been built before, and it should be divisible by two for the simple reason that we want, in this early age, to avoid fractions. As you'll see, even though the value of pi will be inherent in the pyramid, all of the numbers we'll manipulate are integers.]

Now for the base. We know that it'll be big, big, big, so we're going to need to be able to measure it exactly when we scale it up. Measuring with rope is no good... it stretches. Measuring rods have to many opportunities for slippage. Pacing it off is a joke. I choose to roll a wheel because an odometer is the best low-tech way of measuring the long distance exactly. So, in laying out my blueprint, I measure the base with a wheel, a little scaled-down odometer, one unit in diameter. It looks a little like a pizza cutter. As it happens, 140 turns of the wheel gives us a pretty pleasing shape, just shy of 440 cubits wide at the base. The pyramid is broad but imposing. It's stable, with a slope that's not too steep or shallow. And the math is pretty easy, too. All integers. I'll be able to pace off 70 turns in either direction from the center to find the edges.

I have no intention of sticking with just a papyrus blueprint. We'll build a number of scale models of wood or stone. Heck, we'll build a limestone model for Pharoah to gaze upon while we're building the real thing.

[Now, with a real pyramid we'd include a bunch of other features... a gallery, tombs, conduits... I'll describe those at a later date. But for right now, for the purposes of this web page, I'm building a featureless mountain.] 

Our project plan is to finish the work in about 20 years, before Pharoah dies. To do this we're going to have to shift over 2 million stone blocks into place. Working 360 days a year for 20 years (I'm leaving off a few days for contingency and festivals, or whatever), we're going to need to move about 300 blocks per day. With an average of maybe 2.5 tons per block we're going to need teams of 20 to 25 men per block.... let's say 25. That means 7,500 unskilled men at a time on the gangs if each gang only delivered one block per day. More likely you'd be able to shift a number of blocks per day. Add rampbuilders, quarrymen, and more workers to place the stones, then some masons to finish the blocks. I'm going to estimate 15,000 people working on the pyramid at any one time, but I'll call it 20,000 to include support workers... cooks, potters, doctors, etc. And I think that's conservative. This is doable. We don't have hundreds of thousands of mouths to feed, and given our population, we can do it with part-time conscripted labor.... sort of like a term in the army. At least we won't need slaves. And we can scale up or back for certain portions of the construction.

[Just after I first wrote this I saw a TV special about the Pyramids on the National Geographic channel, narrated by Avery Brooks (talk about timing!). They came to the same reckoning regarding total personnel, but for different reasons. The producers figured that 2,000 laborers would be sufficient to the task. If so, they'd each be shifting an awful lot of blocks each day. As I've personally engaged in labor, and I calculate the length that these blocks would be pulled, I conclude that you'd be doing good to walk the distance in the time allotted per day, much less pull a 2.5 ton weight. I think we'd need at least double the number of laborers they're suggesting. Likewise, there are too many support staff. People worked harder and longer... we're not talking about a 40-hour week with weekends off. I think they were extremely light on common labor and extremely heavy on support staff, but their total figure of 25,000 was reasonably close to mine.] 

Selecting a location 

The criteria for the location our monument are going to be critical. We're going to need a sturdy, level rock base, near a river and limestone quarry. We need limestone instead of granite because we're using Bronze Age tools, and granite's too hard for us to work with exclusively. The quarry will be the source of our raw materials, but the river will bring us wood and supplies, and (very importantly) and unlimited supply of water. Proximity to the river means we'll have farmland on which to grow the food for our workers. Good climate is a plus so we can get in as much work as possible per year. Look at this satellite image of the Giza Plateau (29°58'51"N 31°09'00"E). Zoom out and see how it meets every one of our requirements. It's a limestone plateau on the edge of a fertile river valley cutting through a desert with a stable climate. Furthermore, we already own it. Isn't that a great location? We'll use it.

Leveling the foundation 

This is a fun task! How do we level a rock the size of many professional football fields? Well, I'd do it with a bucket of water.

Have you ever poured water on a concrete floor? It fills every dip and shows off every bump. So we're going to take some of that awesome manpower we have and splash buckets of water all over the plateau. Then it's scrape... level... scrape with our adzes, gavels, and granite blocks until the water doesn't run or pool. It's just a lot of hard work. However, there's nothing technically challenging to a Bronze Age engineer. I think the scrubbed and level plateau would have been one heck of a sight, impressive in its own right.

[The TV dramatization had the Pharoah pounding a stake into the thick sand to indicate True North, as he's surrounded by scrub and creosote bushes, or whatever it is that grows in Egypt. It's a wonder they could they didn't trip over all the plants. The Architect dangled a pendulum from his outstretched hand to site the circumpolar stars as the pendulum swayed to and fro. Why lay a stake that's going to be swept away when the site is subsequently cleared? Or did they simply plan on dropping multi-ton rocks on the plants and dunes, squashing them flat? I don't ask for perfection, just common sense.]

Measuring the base 

This is where we use our full-size odometer one unit (a cubit) in diameter. first we do some gross measurement to figure roughly the center of the plateau. Then we mark off right-angle centerlines North/South and East/West. The North/South line was easy to determine, as we have the clear desert air to help sight the North Star. There are a number of low-tech ways to determine a perfect right angle. The easiest is probably the compass method you learned in high school. Our "compass" is going to be pretty big, though... we can use a length of very stout rope for it. We would not use it to mark the long sides of the structure since it would stretch, but the shorter length we'll use here can be accurate enough.

[My survey would look entirely different from the TV dramatization. Imagine the site completely cleared of scrub and sand . Only bare limestone remains. This might resemble a huge deserted Air Force concrete paved storage field for B-52 bombers. There's no point in pinning down True North until the ground has been prepared to this degree. Very small people in the midst of this vast stone dance floor would survey the centerline to True North. The plumb bob would be suspended from a wooden armature and shielded from the wind. These are professionals. 

Note also that we're perfectly fine using an odometer even though some might argue that the ancient Egyptians didn't use the wheel. News flash: they did. Even before the introduction of the chariot, they used plenty of wheels... just not for vehicles.]  

Getting the angles right 

One of the most important things we're able to derive from the blueprint is the angles at the base. In fact, we're going to use the drawing to create some tools to help us in building. Namely, our angle gauge. It's basically like a crude protractor with a plumb bob. There are a number of variations of this tool that would work. We'll make some similar T-shaped or A-shaped tools to make sure our blocks are level.

During building we can put this thing against the side of the pyramid at any time and sight along it to ensure that our angles are proper. It doesn't matter what the angle actually is in degrees or radians... all that matters is that we exactly match the drawing. If it does, then all four sides will meet at the exact center at exactly the right height, assuming we measured the base correctly. There's no need for us to devise a method of measuring the height during building, since it's necessarily determined.

Ramping up ** (see update) 

[Cutting stone blocks isn't something that's generally disputed in a discussion of pyramid building, so we're going to take it as a given that our experienced Bronze age quarry workers can actually do the job we know they did. At a later date I'll discuss the how we determined the size of the blocks we're to use.] 

We're using a ramp to get our blocks up to the plateau and to hoist them onto the structure. Yep, that's it. No hoists, no cranes. See, there are three things we have plenty of as a result of our quarrying and location: sand, limestone rubble, and water. This ramp is going to be huge, and we really don't care, because there are far too many advantages to the ramp to give it up. First, there's ease of transportation. With a big enough ramp with a shallow enough slope, we have the the energy-saving benefits of an inclined plane. Trying to lift the blocks vertically will take far too much effort and will be much slower by comparison. Second, we can get more workers on the task of moving each block. You can't crowd very many people around a crane. Third, there's safety. There are no cranes to collapse. The block is never off of the surface; if a rope breaks, it won't fall on someone. And the shallow slope prevents a block from sliding back very far or fast. Finally, we can depend on unskilled labor to do the work. The architects may be professionals, but the laborers are just citizens doing community service. When they've done their time they'll go back to farming or fishing or herding goats.

A good portion of our crew will be engaged in a never-ending road paving project. As we build up each level of the pyramid, the ramp is extended to the next level. It becomes longer, and longer as it gets higher. At the end of the project, this ramp will be completely dismantled. We might use the material for other construction projects, roads or paving, or we might just use it to back-fill the quarry.

We're going to be moving our large stone blocks with ropes, wooden sledges, and brute force provided by gangs of workers who drag them up the ramp. We could use some other clever techniques, such as attaching rockers to the sides of a block to turn the block into a wheel. The problem here is with safety. Pushing a wheel up the ramp is ironically tougher than moving the block on a sledge. Why? Because with the sledge friction isn't just your enemy; it's your friend. You can rest, change crews, etc without expending a lot of energy to keep the sledge stationary. If a rope breaks it's not a big deal in the grand scheme of things. To overcome friction you'll be using water or oil on the sledge runners. With the wheel rockers, you'd have to expend a great deal of energy just to keep it stationary. It means constant tension on the ropes at all times. And it means that a rope breaking could be a devastating event as two tons of rock goes careening down the ramp, killing workers as it goes, causing them to release their ropes on their blocks, which go careening down... you get the picture. Ironically, for our construction purposes, dragging is the superior technique.

The work goes something like this: some workers build the ramp up. At the same time lots of quarrying is going on and stones are awaiting transport. When the ramp is finished, then the ramp-builders lay off or are reassigned while stones are dragged up. When the level is completed, it's the same thing all over again. The number of workers available for quarrying varies depending on how many are needed for transporting the stones or working on the ramp at any particular time.

** UPDATE 8/20/2013: It's unlikely that the actual pyramid had a huge external ramp. A new theory, which has plenty of credibility as it makes testable predictions, is that the pyramid contains an internal spiral ramp. This is well-thought out, and explains a number of features of the great pyramid that are otherwise puzzling (to say the least). In addition to requiring very little additional material (a ramp would only be used for the bottom third of the pyramid), it explains the "grand gallery" as a channel for a counter-weighted sledge used to hoist the granite slabs used for the roof of the King's Chamber. Also, this technique agrees with my assumption that safety is a major concern, and describes how the limestone cladding would have been placed first, back-filled with the sandstone blocks. As you can read below, I have always maintained that the cladding would have been placed as the construction progressed rather than separately, but Houdin's theory not only ups the safety, but makes construction much easier. Click on the cover of Archaeology to read more about it. The major point here is that neither magic, divine intervention, nor super-science is in any way ever required for construction of this impressive structure.

Casing the Joint 

Some people might consider cladding the pyramid with casing stones after the main structure is built. I prefer to plan the cladding as each level is done. Again, this is a safety issue. The casing stones are smooth. How would you possibly plan to put the stones there after the fact? You really don't want to wind up sliding on an unstoppable path to the plateau floor to be crushed by a falling casing stone. Cladding as we go keeps it safe, and allows us to better track our angle as we move up the structure. It also allows us to build and dismantle our ramp only once.

** UPDATE 9/1/2022: I recently saw a detailed video (here's a link) of the construction including the casing blocks, and was pleased to see further confirmation that this is exactly what they actually did. In fact, the casing stones were laid first,  and then the level was filled in with rough-hewn stones and mortar. We know this because the rough-hewn interior limestone lies on top of the casing stones. The Egyptians did not take the time to finish any of the interior stones (except in the corridors and burial chambers) as no one would see  it. There are significant gaps which were filled in with limestone and gypsum mortar. The vast bulk of the interior is barely better than rubble. It was moved straight from the quarry without significant shaping.

Capping it off 

The capstone ("pyramidium") is the last thing we'll add. Prior to putting it in place the architect and each team leader might sign or mark the base. After all, this is something to be truly proud of. The Pharoah has a surprise for us... he's provided specialists to apply gold leaf to the capstone. The reflection of the sun can be seen for miles!

Cleaning up 

Goodbye ramp. It's dismantled and hauled away by the millions of bucketloads.. The white limestone casing is washed and polished on the way down. The polishing is done by scrubbing the casing with large flat stones, using the ever-present sand as an abrasive.

** UPDATE 9/1/2022: Again, this is exactly what they did. Polishing stone was done with other stones, simple as that.

What Did We Just Build? Math and Wonder in Hindsight. 

Isn't this an amazing structure? And though the construction took sweat and determination, the design itself was dead simple, requiring only integer math, a wheel, and some plumb bobs and string. But it was only simple because we looked at the problem through the eyes of a Bronze Age engineer. Imagine we show the finished product to a mathematician who had no experience with the engineering challenges that faced us. What does he see?
 

• The ratio of the base to the height is pi/2. 

Comment: Sure it is! We used half the number of turns of the odometer wheel as the number of cubits in height we'd planned. Since each full turn is of length pi, then the ratio of the base to height is one-half pi, or 1.570796326795. Our design is theoretically exact. Using the values of height and base from Wikipedia ( b=440, h=280), the calculated ratio for the actual Great Pyramid is approximately 1.571428571429. The difference isn't worth stressing over.

• The perimeter of the base equals the circumference of a circle whose radius is equal to the height of the pyramid. 

Comment: Naturally! The circumference of a circle is 2 * pi * the radius. We'll just call the height "one unit", so it simplifies to 2*pi. Since each side is to the ratio pi/2 (above), and we have four sides, then the perimeter is 2*pi. It couldn't possibly be otherwise. Of course, that's true for ours, but the actual Great Pyramid is an approximation. 

• The stones at the base are placed with high accuracy. The variance of the length of each side is on the order of scant inches. 

Comment: This is a result of using an odometer to do the measuring. On the actual Great Pyramid, the length of the sides vary by as much as 8 inches, which is fantastically good for a structure of this size, but hardly supernatural.

• The angles are 51°45'27" (see note)

Comment: Well, of course. This is because we took great care to build our angle surveying equipment (the angles and plumb bobs we used to sight with) from the original blueprints, which were created with a scale of our circular odometer. Using the measurements, 200 cubits of height and 100 turns of the cubit wheel at the bottom, we can calculate the angle as follows: 

base angle = ASIN((1/2 * base)/ height)
base angle = ASIN ((1/2 * 140 cubits * pi) / 280 cubits) = 51.75751851602 degrees = 51°45'27"

This is purely determined by the ratio of the height to the base. If it weren't this, then the height/base ratio we noticed above wouldn't be accurate. Again, our design is theoretically exact. Interestingly, the numbers given for the real Great Pyramid vary according to the source. Wikipedia gives it as 51°50'40". However, if we took the reported height (280 cubits) and width (440 cubits) values as accurate, then the calculated value should be 51°47'12.4" . Various sources give the value as any of these, plus a dozen more. Some are the result of approximation, poor observation, or are simply calculated using whatever values for height and width strike the fancy of the observer. 

Remember that the top of the Great Pyramid is missing and has to be calculated. so either the base/height ratio is off or the angle is. So much for supernatural accuracy.

NOTE: Actually it's going to be a little bit off due to the curvature of the Earth. See below.

• The geographical location is the "center of balance" of the landmass of the Earth. 

Comment: We had some requirements for the location, none of which involved surveying the entire Earth. Besides, we live where we live. It's not like we migrated to Egypt just to build this one pyramid. Go back to Wikimapia.org and look at the location again. How many other locations in Egypt match our requirements as well as this one? None. That's why so much of this megalithic work is centered at Giza. And there is no bloody "center of balance" for our globe, unless you count the center of gravity in the core. What's described by this observation is an artifact of the map projection being used. 

• The coup de grace: The sides bow inward ever so slightly. In fact, the arc of the bow is equal to the curvature of the Earth! Surely this couldn't possibly be a coincidence! 

Comment: If it were noticeable, this would be such an amazing effect that it's tempting to claim you actually were cleverly encoding your "astounding knowledge" of the exact curvature of the Earth. The reality is much more mundane. Our technique for leveling the plateau involved the flow of water under the influence of gravity. It ensured that all points on the plateau were equidistant from the center of the Earth. On the other hand, our method of measuring the sides (measuring out from a centerline), is valid only for plane geometry. On a curved surface like the Earth, though, the best definition of a "line" is a Great Circle route. Try this experiment yourself. Cut a perfectly square piece of paper. Then place it on a globe and pin down the corners. What happens to the sides? They appear to bow inward, to a degree that mirrors the curvature of the surface of the globe! So this "encoding" has nothing whatsoever to do with actual knowledge of the curvature of the Earth... rather, it's evidence that the engineer didn't even take it into account (and probably is totally ignorant of it!) This would be noticeable only in a monument of stupendous size. 

Update: OK, I've been asked to explain this one further, so I'm including a graphic to help folks visualize this: Start at the center and measure a line North/South, and another East/West. Now lay out a grid, starting from those center lines and working outward in both directions, making sure that all of the N/S lines are parallel to the original N/S line. Likewise, all the E/W lines are parallel to the original one (like lines of latitude on both sides of the Equator. When you look at the result you'll see that only the center lines trace Great Circle routes. The lines on the edges are bowed compared to a Great Circle route when viewed from above, just like lines of latitude. An azimuthal stereographic map projection illustrates this perfectly (think the Pan Am logo).

Compare this to Great Circle routes, which is what you'd get if you measured your straight lines with a line or surveying equipment. Great Circle routes are straight as you get on a globe, but appear to bow outward, like lines of longitude converging at the poles and spreading at the equator. Now, measuring with a wheel from a centerline might not be how the Pyramids were actually laid out, but it explains so much so easily that I double-dog-dare you to find a more elegant approach that matches the actual geometry of the Great Pyramid.

Closing Thoughts 

Prior to writing this page I looked up the dimensions of the Great Pyramid, and but pretty much discarded everything except the height in designing my building approach. Happily, the approach then pretty closely matched what was actually built for the Pharoah Khufu. Though they didn't have our advantage of 5,000 years of accumulated technology, the Pharoah's builders were no less intelligent than modern engineers. And if I can figure this out on my own, they could, too.

I didn't do any particular archeological research before writing this How-To. It wasn't necessary. My goal here isn't to tell you how the Egyptians did build the Great Pyramid, but to show that it could have been done with the technology of the time. And it absolutely could. No advanced technology, no alien visitors, no divine intervention need apply. In fact, the argument that the Egyptians conceived and built it themselves is so conclusive that to refute it you'd have to actually produce a witness to the intervention. Good luck.

That said, the building of such a structure is an astounding feat. And the coincidental relationships of its measurements, driven as they were by necessity, truly interesting. I don't care if somebody reads whatever meaning they want into them, and uses them to illustrate whatever message they have to give. Understand, though, that this is an exercise in retcon -- retroactively assigning intent where there was none by the builders. There's no evidence that the builders intended to encode anything beyond what we know of their culture... at all.

Postscript (2007): 

I think I ought to explain that, since this page has been online for half a day and I'm getting multiple feedback from multiple directions.

I think that, coincidental or not, such numerical relationships can be used in an instructive way, much as St. Patrick is said to have used the shamrock to explain the Trinity or Richard Middleton used a deck of playing cards as a prayer aid. Our ability to use patterns in this way does not provide evidence that this is the purpose of the object we're using as illustration. For instance, we are a race of people that see bunny rabbits in the clouds, yet we don't imagine that clouds were designed to display images of bunny rabbits. That said, the fact that something is used to illustrate a message in no way diminishes the message itself. The illustration should help you to understand the message; it is not the message itself.

Of course, just because there's no evidence of something doesn't necessarily mean it's not so, either. But it's always good to be clear about what we can and can't prove. In the case of the Pyramids, we can reasonably expect them to designed with the symbology of their culture in mind (and the same would hold true for structures built in Mesoamerica, or China, or anywhere else). I don't think it's necessary to ascribe to the builders of these objects an understanding of concepts that are foreign to what we know about their culture, anymore than we can reasonably say they were incapable of work that can clearly be demonstrated as possible using (again) what we know about their culture and technology.

• Must the Egyptians have known the exact value of pi? NO.  
• Must they have had help from aliens? NO. 
• Is it valid to use the Great Pyramid to illustrate the joining of the finite to the infinite? Definitely. Illustrate whatever you like. Just don't confuse your analogy with the builders' intent.
• Is the technique I describe sufficient to disprove that space aliens built it? Unless you introduce me to a space alien, I'll take that as my working assumption: YES. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

Postscript (2011)

On Hulu now is a miniseries entitled "The Pyramid Code". Although there is mixed in here some facts and a few valid conjectures, In my opinion this is, in aggregate, a huge honking sack of bovine excrement. In it is postulated all sorts of magical thinking under the very thinnest veneer of scientific language. This does a grave disservice to the ancients by taking their very real accomplishments, dismissing them as impossible, and replacing them with rainbow unicorn fantasies of resonant crystals and 'subtle energies'. Yes, it was written by a Ph.D, Carmen Boulter, and that's a very sad thing for her university.


Copyright 2007-2011 by David F. Leigh