8-2009 The Great Pyramid

The Great Pyramid James L Bradley August – 2009

The main attraction at the “Giza Necropolis” on the outskirts of Cairo, Egypt is the “Great Pyramid” (“Pyramid of Cheops” / “Khufu’s Pyramid”) the oldest and largest of the three pyramids in the Giza Necropolis – it is the only surviving member of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. To this day it has remained and enigma, it is not a tomb, it doesn’t appear to be a monument, yet it was constructed to endure the ravages of time. All conventional attempts to find a reason for its existence, other than the simple one of a personal monument to Cheops have failed!

A number of bizarre and fantastic alternative theories have been proposed and investigated, with some conclusions bordering on science fiction that discuss strange and inexplicable forces, observing events that defy the laws of physics and molecular biology, along with unknown energy fields that have an extraordinary effect on the human mind. An enigma! Conventional theory holds to the thought that it was constructed as a tomb for the 4th dynasty Egyptian King Cheops over a twenty-year period finishing around 2560 BCE. It remained the tallest man-made structure in the world for over 3,800 years. Its construction is based on man moving huge stones from a quarry and dragging and lifting them into place, a theory that doesn’t sit too well with numerous construction engineers. There are some basic truths that exist with the Pyramid that no matter when it was constructed or how most deal the with math, albeit some of the numbers are simple anal supplied, there is a group that make little sense and borders on the mysterious – what I intend to do is walk through, not as a mathematical guru but a man in the street with a simple curiosity and desire how and why these numbers came about. I will make an attempt at keeping it simple, and yet prove that the civilization that built this landmark had a pretty good idea what they were doing, and have made an effort to pass the information to those who followed after, either as an educational tool or a warning – take your pick! Our enlightenment begins with the Golden Ratio (Golden Mean) a ratio that has fascinated intellectuals of diverse interests for at “least” 2,400 years, such as Pythagoras and Euclid in Greece and the medieval Italian mathematician “Leonardo of Pisa” (Fibonacci) and the Renaissance astronomer Johannes Kepler along with Roger Penrose a leading physicist of Oxford. As you can see, you and I are walking in the company of some impressive members of our civilization, albeit not the same caliber we’re still walking with them. It is more than fair to say that the “Golden Ratio” has tickled the brains, in all disciplines of science, like no other number in the history of mathematics, now that I did not know. The first written definition of the “Golden Ratio” was provided by Euclid, “a straight line is said to have been cut in extreme and mean ratio when, as the whole line is to the greater segment, so is the greater to the less.” Make sense, to me as about much sense as a pink elephant in a department store.

And what has this to do with the Great Pyramid, well it turns out that its shape incorporates the Golden

Mean,

The pyramid has a height of square root of “PHI” (“1.272”) and remember PHI is equal to “1.618034” and a base of 2 (1+1, and each triangular face intersects the ground at an angle of a little less than 52° {arcsin(sqrt (Phi) /

Phii}.

Further 4/sqrt(PHI)= PI

(approximately) 3.144606 and PI is 3.1415927 a difference of over .003013 – close for stone blocks. Hang in there, now we understand when they say the circumference of a circle whose radius is the height to the Pyramid is 2 x PI x radius = 2 x 3.1416 x (sqrt (PHI) or 1.272 = 2 x (4/sqrt(PHI)) x sqrt (PHI) = 2 x 4 = 8 and since the parameter of the base of the Pyramid is 2+2+2+2 = 8

- The Great Pyramid approximately squares the circle.

Many scholars maintain it was all an accident! Exterior measurements of the Great Pyramid are today very uncertain, because the casing of limestone blocks have been removed over the years, local construction practices and some are even in European museums with most of them are now in Cairo, parts of dams, bridges and mosques, such as the Sultan Hasan Mosque. Each side of the Pyramid is about 440 Royal Cubits (a Royal Cubit is 523.5mm or 20.61 inches making each side around 755’8.5” or 230.34 meters. The total perimeter of the base is 3,022’10” (using the standard Royal Cubit).

Its height (if it had the capstone)

would be approximately 480’ which is the total perimeter divided by 2 PI, maintaining the ratio. Okay, so the guys who had crawled out of their caves long enough to build a structure that when done permitted intellectuals thousands a years in their future to figure out there was a Golden Mean, were just fooling around with a tremendous budget in their makework society. The “accuracy” of the workmanship displays that the four-sides have a mean-error of only 58mm (2.28”) in length and 1 minute in angle from a perfect square. The base is horizontal and flat to within 15mm (0.59”) and the sides of the square are closely aligned to the four points of the compass within 3 minutes of arc based on True North (NOT Magnetic North) – it is written that the 1 st precision measurements were done by Sir Flinders Petrie in 1880-1882, measurements that have been cited in numerous articles of the structure. Okay, okay so these primitive people constructed a pyramid with detail towards accuracy, for what purpose we ask? It is has been found that if we take the original height of the pyramid (original is suspect, but let hazard a guess based on recent estimations), which is 481.3949 feet (481’ 4.72”) and multiply it by 43,200 (precession number-ratio) we get 3,938.686 miles, the average Polar Radius of Earth is 3,949.9, a difference of 11.214 miles, in my book the error is in estimating the height. If the height was 482’ 9.2” the difference would be zero. Forget all the finite numbers, let’s find out if they knew their surrounding – planetary and astronomically; •

The four faces are slightly concave, the ONLY pyramid to have been built this way

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The centers of the four sides are indented, forming with extraordinary degree an 8-sided pyramid

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This is NOT visible from the ground or from a distance, only from the air

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The granite coffer in the “Kings Chamber” is too big to fit after construction, placed during

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Analysis of the coffer shows that it was made with a fixed point drill, with a drilling force of 2 tons

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The coffer was sawn out of a block of “solid” granite, this would have required bronze saws 8-9 feet with long-sets of teeth made of sapphires, hollowing out the interior would have required tubular drills of the same material applied with a tremendous vertical force

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It had a swivel door entrance, doors that were only found in two other pyramids, it is reported that when the pyramid was 1st broken into that the swivel door, over 20 tons, was so well balanced that it could be opened by pushing out from inside with a minimal force, but when closed was so perfect a fit that it could scarcely be detected and there was NOT enough crack or crevice around the edges to gain a grasp from outside

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If the height of the pyramid is taken as the RADIUS of a circle, then the circumference of this circle is the same as the perimeter of the base. To obtain the measurements, the builder had a knowledge and relationship of PI, and designed the angle of the Pyramid to be exactly 51° 51’ 14.3”

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Calendar Year – the base side is 9,131 Pyramid Inches or 365.24 Pyramid Cubits, the number of days in one year, (9131/25 = 365.24), the perimeter of the base divided by 100 = 365.24. The length of the “Antechamber” used as the diameter of a circle produces a circumference of 365.24

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It wasn’t until the 8th century BCE that parts of our civilization stopped using 360 days for our calendar year – so the Pyramid cave builders were a little ahead of their time But is this all so much BS, on-line at “skeptic’s world” we find the following:

Papyrus documents and existing “cubit measuring rods” relate the units of measure used to specify the “plan of the Pyramid”, with this it is believed that at construction the Great Pyramid was 280 Egyptian royal cubit tall (146.6 meters/480 feet and 11.65 inches), but with erosion and the removal of its topmost stone its current height is 138.8 meters (455 feet and 4.6 inches) which translates into the capstone being some 7.8 meters (25

feet and 7 inches) in height. Each base side was 440 royal cubits with each royal cubit measuring 0.524 meters (20.63 inches) or each side was (440 x 20.63)/12 = 756 feet and 5.12 inches.

The entire pyramid covered “approximately)” 53,000 square meters

(570,487.25 sq feet) – taking the above 756’ 5.12” I get 572,187 square feet or 53,157.9 square meters. – Now whether this makes a big difference in the overall scheme of things I don’t know, but it shows how “writers” round off their numbers to make an article fit their position/opinion. (?) In the 14th century (1301 AD) a massive earthquake centered on Ischia Island (southern Italy) broke loose many of the outer casing stones, some of which measured up to 2.5 meters thick (8.2 feet) and weighed more than 15 tons (30,000 lbs). The stones that broke loose were later (1356 AD) carted away by “Bahri Sultan An-Nasir Nasir-ad-Din al-Hasan” in order to construct mosques and fortresses in nearby Cairo. It is known that in modern times that the 1 st precision measurements of the “wonder” were done by Sir Flinders Petrie in 1880-1882 whereas they were published at “The Pyramids and Temples of Gizeh”. In his measurement he found the pyramid is oriented 4 minutes west of True North with the 2nd pyramid of the Giza complex similarly oriented, he also found a different orientation in the “core” vs the “casing” by some 193cm +/- 25 cm (75.98” +/- 9.84”). Petrie’s suggestion for the difference (core vs casing) was that during the construction a re-determination of North was made, as a mistake had been made and the casing was built with a different orientation. The deviation from the North is based on the position of the stars “Ursae Minoris and Ursae Majoris around 3,000 years ago, this determination takes into account the “precession” of the axis of the Earth. Kate Spence (Egyptologist) has shown how the changes in orientation of eight pyramids corresponds with the changes of position of those stars through time – therefore it has been determined that start of the construction to be around 2467 BCE, or 4,467 years ago. Over 1,500 years before King Solomon built his first temple. But what of the other stars, whereas it is said that the “Descending Passage” pointed to the pole star “Alpha Draconis” (pole star around 2170 to 2144 BCE), called the North Star at this time. The 344 foot length of the passage provides an angle of view of only +/1/3 of a degree, Alpha Draconis has not been in alignment for thousands of years – the Next Star that will precisely alignment will be “Polaris” around 2004 (five years ago), in Greek Polaris is “Satan”.

The southern shaft in the “King’s Chamber” [45° 00’ 00”] pointed to the star “Al Nitak (Zeta Orionis)” in the constellation Orion around 2450 BCE, Orion constellation was associated with the Egyptian god Osiris. The northern shaft in the “King’s Chamber” [32° 28’ 00”] pointed to the star “Alpha Draconis” around 2450 BCE. The southern shaft in the “Queen’s Chamber” [39° 30’ 00”] pointed to the star “Sirius”, 2450 BCE. The northern shaft in the “Queen’s Chamber” [39° 00’ 00”] pointed at “Ursa Minor”. Now for reasons unknown, the Pyramid complex

seems

Constellation”,

to

mirror

whereas

the

the

“Orion pyramid

positions on the ground reflect the positions of the stars in the Orion Constellation some 10,400 BCE,

5 of the 7 brightest stars have

pyramid equivalents. The three (“3”) great pyramids of Khufu, Khafra, and Menkaura for the “Belt of Orion”, the pyramid of Nebka at Abu Rawash corresponds to the star “Saiph”, and

the

pyramid

at

Zawat

al

Aryan

corresponds to the star “Bellatrix”, there are two missing star positions for “Betelgeuse & Rigel”. You tell me! Albeit the accuracy of the construction has never been questioned as has the workmanship, which demonstrates that the four sides of the base have a mean error of only 58mm (2.28 inches) and 1 minute in angle from a perfect square, the base is horizontal and flat to within 15mm (0.59 inch), most impressive to me the sides of the square are aligned to the four cardinal points of the compass, to within 3 minutes of arc and they are based on True North, not magnetic north. Workmanship, the casing stones of the Great Pyramid and Khafre’s Pyramid next to it were cut to such optical precision as to only be off a “true plane” over the entire surface by 0.55 mm (0.022 inches) and were fitted together so perfectly that the tip of a knife “cannot” be inserted between the joints even today. With a total estimated weight of 5.9 million tons and an estimated volume of 2.6 million cubic meters (91.82 million cubic feet) it was constructed of cut and dressed blocks

of limestone, basalt or granite.

The core was made mainly of “rough” blocks of low-

quality limestone taken from a quarry located a short distance away, these blocks weighed from 2 to 4 tons on average, and estimated 2.4 million blocks were used. The casing used for the outer covering were of higher-quality limestone, some blocks weighing up to 15 tons, this limestone came from “Tura”, about 14 km (7.6 miles) distant on the other side of the Nile. The granite used for the King’s Chamber was quarried at “Aswan”, some 800 km (432 miles) distant. It is the largest Pyramid in Egypt and the tallest in the world, and is only surpassed in volume by the Great Pyramid of “Cholula” in Puebla, Mexico which is lower in height! The passages inside are extremely straight and precise, such that the longest one (descending passage) at 107 meters long (351’) deviates from being truly straight by less than 6mm (0.24 inch) and one of the shorter passages at 15 meters (50 feet) deviates by only 0.5 mm (0.02 inches), not bad for a construction project started over 4,000 years ago. Found within this item of perfect form is some “graffiti”, the most famous one being “year 17 of Khufu’s reign”, some maintain it was written on a block before it was placed while others have said some prankster later in history wrote it – a hotly debated inscription even to this day, as it seems to reaffirm the date of the construction. Another inscription reads, “the friends of Khufu”, it is assumed it refers to one of the gangs of workers. Although the graffiti does not offer indisputable proof that Khufu originated the construction, the graffiti is the only writing found within the Great Pyramid which leads many to believe it was either part of the construction or at least sometime later if any repair had been made – the 2nd reason I find doubtful in that over the span of history there cannot be found any evidence of repair to this huge structure. On the other side of the globe the ancient Maya people believed that the Universe had been renewed four previous times, each a prior attempt of improving upon human creation, sadly each previous civilization had been destroyed by a different catastrophe. The present “astronomically-based” Mayan calendar will be completing its first great cycle in approximately 5,200 years on December 21st, 2012 – although we have no substantial evidence that the ancient Maya considered the date of any great importance, many have “postulated” that this date will be the “end of the Universe”, from the Mayan’s view, while others believe that the Mayans’ meant this date to symbolize the “coming of great

change,” or it could simply mean they needed to start a new calendar, like we do on New Years Day! Why 12-21-2012? Eric S Thompson determined that 0.0.0.0.0 corresponded to the “Julian” date of 584283, which translated to our “Gregorian” calendar is Aug 11th, 3133 BCE, and that adding the 5125 years gives us an end-date of 13.0.0.0.0 or Dec 21 st, 2012. Terence McKenna “suggests that the position of the winter solstice sun within 3° of the Galactic Center in the year 2012 [a once-in-a-precessional-cycle event] and that it may provide the eschatological end-point for his theory of time known as “Timewave and Zero”, whatever that means. What about the Egyptians? It is noted that 12,500 as indicated by the Great Pyramid was an era that early Egyptians were especially interested in the date – I guess by the placement of the Pyramid threesome lining up with Orion some 10,500 years ago as the “air shafts” were sight tubes aligned with the stars of Orion’s Belt, and we’re guessing that the Great Pyramid is a “precessional star-clock”, one big leap for me to make but some have made it! Heading back to Mexico the “Pyramid of the Sun”, said to have been built by the “Toltec” civilization in the Valley of Mexico somewhere around 300 - 100 BCE, referring to the age of Pisces. The location, at its height had a supposed population of over 125,000 – interestingly its rise was in lockstep with the classical Romans’ who were constructing their grand monuments around the Mediterranean and in step with the cultures in Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula, Oaxaca and Puebla,

Although the Toltecs’ are generally

credited with constructing the Pyramid of the Sun, which by the way was aligned to coincide with two days, the 19th of May and the 25th of July, days when the Sun is directly overhead at noon, it is believed they were influenced by the “Olmec” people, who are considered the “mother civilization” of Mesoamerica, you probably know them for their giant heads with Negroid features. During the 1970’s civil engineer Hugh Harleston Jr made over 9,000 measurements of the Pyramid of the Sun’s complex, his conclusions? He figured that the entire complex was a precise scale-model of the solar system. He calculated that if the center line of the “Temple of Quetzalcoatl” is taken as the position of the Sun, markers laid out towards the north from it along the axis of the Avenue appear to indicate the correct orbital distance of the “inner planets” with the asteroid belt, Jupiter, Saturn (Sun Pyramid), Uranus (Moon

Pyramid) and Neptune and Pluto (represented by two mounds further north). The grand buildings of Teotihuacan are laid out in accordance with celestial movements. The front wall of the “Pyramid of the Sun” is exactly perpendicular to the point on the “horizon” where the Sun sets at the “equinoxes” (twice annually).

The remaining “ceremonial

buildings” are laid out at right-angles to the Pyramid of the Sun. According to his findings the site was constructed to a system of measurements he named the “STU”, Standard Teotihuacan Unit, which equals 1.0594 meters (3.4757 feet), whereas the STU fits into the length of a side of the Pyramid of the Sun and the Pyramid of the Moon, and into the distance “between” the two pyramids. He also named this “unit” of measure the “Hunab” after the Aztec God of Measure (Hunab Ku), in addition one “STU” is the approximate width of the Stonehenge Lintels and to the Jewish Rod (3.4757485 feet). The “Internet” today has its advantages, in going to the Stonehenge site I found that each “Lintel” is around 3.2 meters (10’6”) long, 1 meter (3’3”) wide and 0.8 meters (2’7.5”) thick and rest on top of the stones at 4.9 meters (16’0.9”) above the ground – the width is certainly “approximate” at 3’3” vs the STU is 3’6”. I mention “Precession” as I wander about in this article, precession means a couple of things, mainly it deals with the positions of the south and north celestial poles as they move in circles against a space-fixed backdrop of the stars, completing a full circle every 25,771.5 years (recalculated in 2000) – this means (to us) that the star “Polaris” is approximately at the north celestial pole, a condition that will change over time. As the poles spin we from a fixed point on earth perceive a changing of the stars, as the constellation Orion no longer lines up with the Giza pyramid complex (viewing ports). Simple. And Yet, not so simple. Fortunately or unfortunately modern scholarship is bases to a large degree, among the historians of science, is that civilization has progressed in a Darwinian model, in other words from a lesser to greater degree of sophistication. Whereas the progression believes that no “primitive” culture could know and understand things that “modern” man does not. Following this line of reasoning, most scholars today

ignore any deviation from the norm, in fear of being ridiculed and banned from “legitimate science” hence immense volumes that have been composed in hopes of expanding our knowledge of primitive man are ignored and labeled as myth. On the other side of the fence, scholars remark, “for all you know they (ancient civilizations) may be the degenerate numbers of higher cultures that decayed when human leadership moved in the wake of the Ice.” Consider, it was not too long ago that “modern man” thought that Greece was the unique cradle of Western Science, whereas today these same modern scholars know that Pythagoras, Plato and other influential Greek thinkers obtained their knowledge from dying Egyptian Mystery Schools, whose knowledge went back millennia – the cosmological and philosophical insight taught by the Mystery Schools inspired the scientific brilliance of Greece, Byzantium and Islam. Well here we are, all that has been written about our ancient societies, as you see has been based on some pretty broad assumptions – where “modern man” is shooting in the dark when we describe what we believed happened some 7,000 to 15,000 years ago. Ten people witness an accident in downtown America, how will their descriptions of that event post? The material data collected from archaeological digs paint a pretty shabby picture of Neolithic life – an assertion that any “gaudy” museum show will demonstrate. It is more than difficult to reconstruct the perceptions, myths, and intellectual life of these far-off people in the past. We know that humans have, basically, remained unchanged for at least 40,000 years, how is it the mainstream academia can say with a straight face that our ancestors did not understand precession.

We look at our own difficulty in

understanding the event, but our esteemed scholars understand it perfectly, so in believing that ancient society couldn’t have understood the concept of the “Wheel of Time” is lumping into one bag the belief that “all” men/women of the ancient age were of the same intellect. If we can admit that some of our remote ancestors were intelligent enough to conceive of the complex doctrine of World Ages, our scholars of today “might” be smart enough to let-go of destructive tendencies and move into a healthier era – you think!