In an era when travel was limited to armies, merchants, envoys, royalty, a few eccentric wealthy individuals, and the occasional well-funded expert in their specific fields, there weren’t a lot of opportunities for cross-discipline collaboration. We can essentially boil down the mainstream theories I was taught in school, down to the following simplified thought processes:
- The Great Pyramids of Egypt are here, they exist, so they must’ve been built by someone. They are in Egypt and they look pretty old, so they must’ve been built in ancient Egypt by the Dynastic Egyptians.
- The Great Pyramids of Egypt are big and made up of lots of blocks, so they would have required lots of labour. We know from various writings that the Pharaohs of Dynastic Egypt used salves, so that must have benn the labour - countless unskilled slaves working under duress.
- The Great Pyramids of Egypt are huge, why do we usually build huge things like cathedrals and temples etc.? We know that ancient peoples loved their deities, and Pharaohs fancied themselves/were believed to be divine, so they must’ve had them built as tombs.
This is a little over-simplified and there have been some small adjustments (mainstream is finally anknowledgint that there may have been some skilled professionals involved), but I’m honestly not far off here.
At school, I was taught that the Great Pyramids of Egypt were built about 5000 years ago, by countless slaves, as tombs for the Pharaohs, using the tools of the time and some unknown techniques. (I was even shown some nice pictures)
Then, digging a little deeper, I find out that no mummies or human remains have ever actually been found inside the so-called burial chambers or "sarcophagi" in the Great Pyramids of Egypt. No writings or depictions describing the construction of the Great Pyramids of Egypt have ever been found, despite the ample descriptions and depictions of the construction of other things temples, boats and furnature. No tools ever found, depicted, or described, could be used to shape the blocks that make up the Great Pyramids of Egypt regardless of the techniques used (though an unknown technique could arguably have been used to move them – this is still a mystery).
Needless to say, I felt outright lied to! (perhaps you have too). Not only were the illustrations in these textbooks merely fictitious artist renditions, but the theories themselves were taught in spite of known contradicting evidence. And although some air of mystery was given, it fell very short of the true wonder that comes from understanding the sheer magnitude, complexity and precision with which these enigmatic structures were built.
This was fuel under the fire of my already blazing intrigue, so I did a little more digging. I noticed that in this (pre-COVID) day and age, when any curious traveller from any field or discipline can visit the Great Pyramids of Egypt and behold their awesomeness in person, there is now a much greater pool of diverse perspectives on the mysteries surrounding these amazing and ancient monuments.
From there, it didn’t take long for me to find various discussions on the subject. After sifting through the myriad outlandish conspiracy theories from aliens to time travellers or angels, I finally found some more rational discussions and presentations from similarly curious and objective individuals.
This growing community of architects, soldiers, builders, retirees, engineers, waiters, construction workers, teachers, geologists, explorers, chefs, climatologists, theologians, astronauts, entrepreneurs, historians, intrepid travellers, cosmologists, mathematicians, and other individuals from all disciplines and walks of life such as myself, are slowly coming together to not only debunk the current established and accepted mainstream theories (not a difficult task in itself), but also to start connecting the dots between ancient texts and modern scientific findings in order to come up with alternative and
more feasible theories! (a much more difficult task given the lack of evidence, the lack of research, and the lack of access that these people are privy to). There's even a really good documentary on Prime Video called Builders of Ancient Mysteries (BAM) which looks at the wider ancient world (I highly recommend it if you are at all intrigued by this sort of thing).
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