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Egyptian pyramids might be more controversial, even though it makes a lot of sense that the clocks would have been molded in place from concrete. The large gran
by snidane 5y ago
Egyptian pyramids might be more controversial, even though it makes a lot of sense that the clocks would have been molded in place from concrete. The large granite blocks inside the pyramid don't seem to be concrete based.
The South America sites with extremely precisely fitting, non-rectangular shaped blocks seem to have been very highly likely formed by using concrete and carved later. Cusco walls, Sacsayhuamán or bottom layers of Maccu-Picchu walls.
The site of Baalbek on the other hand suggests that ancients had the ability to lift up 1000 tons stone blocks. The nearby quarry with unfinished stone blocks shows that these were not formed using cement.
Perhaps the Eyptian pyramids were a mixture of methods. Perhaps some of the blocks were lifted up to position using an elevator like mechanism (the long pyramid side shafts without stairs), but then the regular blocks made with the concrete method. The "elevator" shafts don't go beyond half of the pyramid, so the idea of transporting large blocks all the way up is less compelling than using concrete.
- ncmncm 5y agoIt is clear that various ancient peoples also moved large rock objects wholesale. Egyptians and Ethiopians cut, lifted out, and transported 500-ton obelisks. If you can move the obelisks, 70-ton granite blocks for the king's chamber, or the 100-ton empty boxes in Saqqara, are smaller projects. Whoever placed the 1000-ton trilithon blocks (before the Romans built temples on top) cut and moved them whole. The Baalbek temple entablature are, to my knowledge, the only example in the whole Roman Empire of handling rocks of more than 300 tons. Even when Rome looted Egyptian obelisks, they had to bust off the bottom third and leave it behind. So, I guess they had local help for Baalbek. The pre-dynastic Egyptians were cutting rock as hard as corundum (ruby/sapphire aggregate) like butter to make dishware, tens of thousands of which ended up in graves. The method was apparently lost before the pharaohs. It's not hard to understand technology being lost; but how it came to be invented first is a mystery. And, what exactly it was they invented, because we don't know. Archaeologists seem to lack any interest in finding out.