Chapter 45 Chapter 47 The Great Sphinx

"Ancient Egyptologists," said John West, "are the last people in the world to admit that exceptions exist." There are too many exceptions in Egypt.West was referring to buildings from the Fourth Dynasty.They are exceptions, because they are quite unexpected in comparison with the third, fifth and sixth dynasties.The Step Pyramid of Zeuse in Shaqqara (Third Dynasty) boasts of its grandeur, but the stones it uses are relatively small and easy to handle. Five or six people can carry one piece, and the structure of the internal rooms of the pyramid is relatively simple.Although amazing pyramid scriptures were found inside the pyramids of the fifth and sixth dynasties, the structure itself is very rough and has completely collapsed into a pile of rubble.Only the Fourth Dynasty Pyramids at Giza, so complete in construction that they survived thousands of years of devastation, are still standing in place.

West believes that ancient Egyptian scholars should pay attention to the significance of this change in construction technology. "After building fairly crude pyramids, suddenly changing styles, building unbelievably magnificent pyramids, and then going back to the inferior route again. It doesn't make sense, it's incomprehensible, it's like the car industry inventing the T After the T-Model Ford for personal use, it suddenly started to manufacture the 1993-model Porsche, but after making a few, it suddenly forgot how to make it, and then went back to making the T-Model Ford... The way of civilization is not like this. "

"So what do you think it should be?" I asked, "Do you think the Fourth Dynasty pyramids were not built in the Fourth Dynasty at all?" "My hunch does. They are completely different from the surrounding Mastaba tumuli. Not only that, they don't look like anything from the Fourth Dynasty...incompatible with each other..." "Is the same with the Sphinx?" "It's the same with the Sphinx. The difference is that with the Sphinx, we don't have to rely on intuition, there is evidence that it was built much earlier than the Fourth Dynasty. "

sky snake Sansa and I have admired John Anthony West since our trip to Egypt.His book "The Travelers Key" (The Travelers Key) introduced us to many unsolved mysteries in this ancient land.We carry it with us all the time.At the same time, his academic work, the famous "Serpent in the Sky" (Serpentin the Sky) opened our eyes to a revolutionary new concept: Egyptian civilization may not have developed from the Nile Valley, but from an earlier, Greater, thousands of years older than ancient Egypt, a legacy handed down from a civilization we don't yet know about.He also gave evidence and explained how the traces of high science that did not match that era were repeatedly found in the remains of ancient Egyptian civilization.

West, who came to meet us, is tall, about 60 years old, with a neat white mustache, a khaki Sahara suit, and a sun hat from the 19th century. Bright and bright. The three of us sat on the upper deck of a Nile cruise ship moored a few yards downstream from the Winter Palace Hotel in Luther.Across the river to the west, the sun, which was about to sink between the cliffs of the Vally of the Kings, seemed big and red in the refraction of the air.To the east of us are the ruins of Luthor and the temple of Karnak, which are crumbling but still noble.Below the cruise ship, we can clearly feel the river flowing gently towards the far estuary delta.

West first brought the question of the age of the Sphinx to the fore in The Serpent of the Sky.In his book, he explains in detail the discoveries of the mathematician Schwale Lubitz.Lubitz visited the Temple of Luthor between 1937 and 1952, and found that he could use mathematics to prove that the science and culture of Egypt were much deeper and more complex than scholars at the time were willing to admit.However, as West puts it, these evidences are "written in extremely difficult and complex language... There are probably few readers who can read it in one breath, as if they have never received relevant training, and want to easily read high-energy papers." as difficult as a physics book."

Lubitz's main works, a set of three volumes, focus on Luther's French masterpiece "Temple de L Homne" (Temple de L Homne) and the more popular "Roidelatheocratie Pharaonique" (Roidelatheocratie Pharaonique).The latter was later translated into English and published as Sacred Science.In his book, Lubitz mentions, almost by accident, that in 11,000 BC, Egypt was severely damaged by floods and rains.He said: A great civilization must have existed in Egypt before the Flood.The sphinx carved out of the stone on the west cliff of Kesha must have existed at that time - because the lion's body part of the sphinx, except for the head, clearly shows signs of erosion by water① .

Before writing "The Serpent in the Sky", West was shocked by this passage and determined to pursue it: "I found that I could use direct investigation and empirical methods to prove that the observation that Lubitz mentioned by the way is correct. .If it is proved that the Sphinx has indeed been eroded by water, wouldn't it be the most powerful evidence to prove that Egypt in the ancient times did have a very high civilization." "why?" "If we can prove that water is the medium that erodes the Sphinx, then the conclusion can be understood by even a child, what age it should actually belong to. Even readers who read gossip newspapers every day will have no difficulty accepting it .The Sphinx, according to the current statement, was built by King Khafre around 2500 BC, but since the dynastic era, that is, since 3000 BC, there has not been enough rain on the Gisha Plateau , causing the erosion marks on the Sphinx. We have to go back to 10,000 BC to find bad weather in Egypt that erodes large stones on such a large scale. Therefore, the Sphinx must have been built in AD Before 10,000 BC. However, since the Sphinx is such a large-scale and complex handicraft, we must deduce that they must have been completed by a high civilization, so in 10,000 BC, Egypt should have had a high civilization."

"But, John," Sansa asked, "how can you be sure that the weather that eroded it was rain? Could it not be the wind of the desert? After all, even Egyptologists of the classical school admit that the Sphinx is nearly 5,000 years of history. 5,000 years, should be long enough to be eroded by the wind?" "Wind was the first possibility I ruled out. I had to prove that wind erosion could not have caused the marks on the Sphinx today. It is meaningful to continue to pursue the topic of erosion." Unravel the mysteries of the Sphinx As a result, he found that the most critical problem should be the deep ditch surrounding the Sphinx: "Because the Sphinx was carved by digging out the excess rock in its original place, if it is left alone, Within a few decades, sand will accumulate on its head and bury it." West said, "Looking at history, we will find that it has been buried for a very long time. Even from the time when Khafre was generally believed to be established It has been 4,500 years since the beginning, and during this period, the Sphinx was buried in the sand for 3,300 years. It is not difficult to prove this from various documents and historical fait accomplis."

"In other words, so far, the Sphinx has been exposed to wind and sand for at most 1,000 years. For the rest of the time, it is actually protected in the sand. However, the point is that if the Sphinx If it was really built by Kafra during the ancient dynasty, and was eroded by wind and sand so quickly, then other limestone buildings of the same era should have suffered the same degree of erosion. However, it is not the case. Ancient Among the many hieroglyphs and inscriptions left over from the dynastic era, none of them have suffered from erosion as severe as that of the Sphinx."

Rob Schuch, a professor of geology at Boston University and an expert on rock erosion, played an important role in justifying West's theory.He agreed with West's conclusion very much, and believed that the erosion of the Sphinx and the stone walls surrounding it was not wind, but long-term and heavy rain erosion for thousands of years before the existence of the ancient dynasty. the result of. After being recognized by his peers at the American Geological Society Annual Meeting in 1992, Professor Xiu Qi republished his research results to experts in different disciplines (including ancient Egypt scholars) at the annual meeting of the American Advanced Science Association that year.He pointed out again: "The body of the Sphinx and the ditches have been eroded by wind and rain. In some places, at least on some walls, the erosion marks have a depth of about 2 meters, making the appearance look sinuous and curved, like waves. "③ This wavy appearance, both geologists and archaeological anthropologists, was quickly convinced that it was indeed the result of erosion by rain.As Sansa's photographs of the Great Sphinx and its surroundings show, erosion creates a combination of deep longitudinal fissures and horizontal hollows.Professor Xiu Qi believes that this is a "typical textbook example. Obviously, it is the trace of limestone after thousands of years of intense wind and rain." The erosion of wind and sand will cause erosion marks on the stone surface, which should be horizontal and sharp, and only soft rock formations will be damaged by wind and sand.The effect of rain erosion is completely different from that of wind and sand.Vertical erosion can only occur if "rainwater flows down the walls from above," and in large quantities, from the Giza Plateau to the ditches surrounding the Sphinx. "Only in this way will the hard rocks above have a higher degree of erosion, while the lower rocks near the lower hardness will have a relatively low degree of erosion due to protection." At the American Advanced Science Annual Conference, Xiu Qi made a conclusion: As we all know, the surrounding area of ​​the Sphinx is easily filled with sand and stones.Based on the flow of sand and rocks in the Sahara Desert, the wind and sand will completely fill the ditch every few decades, and people have been digging sand since ancient times.However, the walls surrounding the Sphinx have such deep undulations... So I'm going to offer my opinion here: I think the body of the Sphinx and the undulations on the surrounding walls, It's a remnant from a very old time, a time when there was a lot of rain and a lot of heat on the Kesha Heights. Xiuqi admits that he is not the first geologist to find "the rain erosion marks on the body of the Sphinx", but it is because of this evidence that he is involved in the history of the relevant age of the Sphinx Discussing geologists.Basically, he just wants to stay in his field of geology: I have heard countless times that predynastic Egyptians did not have the technology or social organization to carve the Great Sphinx.However, I don't think that's my problem as a geologist.I am not trying to place a burden on others.However, it should be the responsibility of ancient Egyptologists and archaeologists to discover who carved such a great work.If my findings are not consistent with the theory of the origin of human civilization, I think it is the theory of human origin that should be reviewed, not me.I'm not saying that the Sphinx was built by mysterious islanders like Atlantis, or Martians, or any other aliens, but just following the scientific truth.The truth tells me that the time when the Sphinx was actually built is much older than what we used to know... legendary civilization How much is "many" in "much older"? West told us that he and Xiuqi have been in a state of "good faith debate" about the birth date of the Sphinx: "Xiuqi believes that it should be at least 7000 BC to 5000 BC ( That is, the rainfall period of the Neolithic Age). This is the most conservative judgment he has made based on the information he has. As a professor of a famous school, I can understand his conservative position. However, no matter whether I infer from intuition or academics, Everyone thinks that the age should be older than this. Most of the traces of heavy rain on the Sphinx were engraved in 10,000 BC... And to be honest, if the Sphinx was really built in 7000 BC to 5000 BC is relatively recent, we should be able to find some other relevant evidence of the civilization of carving the sphinx. In Egypt, we have found a lot of evidence of that date. With a few exceptions Besides, most—I mean most—relics are pretty naive." "So, if the Sphinx wasn't built by predynastic Egyptians, who was it?" "My guess is that this has something to do with the legendary civilizations depicted in myths around the world. For example, the legend about the catastrophe, where only a few people survived the catastrophe and wandered to all corners of the world Tales of spreading knowledge etc... My hunch is that the Sphinx has something to do with all of this. If I had to bet on it, I'd bet the Sphinx was built at least before the end of the Ice Age, at least in It existed in 10,000 BC, but it could be older than 15,000 BC. I'm sure it's very, very old anyway." I'm getting more and more convinced of his claims - and reminding myself that most of the 19th century Egyptologists believed it.However, the appearance of the Sphinx is so similar to the works of the pharaohs that the intuitive statement is challenged. "If the Sphinx is really as old as you say," I asked West, "how do you explain that the figures carved in the work are dressed in the clothes of Ullaas and Menes from the standard dynastic era?" tiara?" "I don't particularly care about such things. And, you know, the ancient Egyptologists also said that the appearance of the Sphinx is very similar to that of Khafre, and they decided that it was built by Khafre. Yes. Xiu Qi and I have studied it carefully. We think that, judging from the relative proportions of the head and the body, the head part should have been re-sculpted in the dynasty era - so it looks like the dynasty has such a rich flavor. However, we I don't think it represents Khafre. As part of our research, we once hired Captain Frank Domingo, an expert in montage photos of suspects in the New York Police Department, to do a point-by-point comparison for us in the Pyramid of Khafre in the Cairo Museum. Khafre sculpture, and the face of the Sphinx. His conclusion is that the two are not only different in appearance, but may also be different in race④, and the Sphinx did not intend to imitate Khafre. Therefore, I think It's a very old monument, and it was re-sculpted after quite a while. Perhaps it wasn't a human face at all when it was first erected, but a lion's face and body." Magellan and the first dinosaur bone After my trip to Giza, I'm interested to know if West also has a problem with orthodox scholars' chronology of the buildings on the Giza plateau, especially the so-called riverside temples. "We think there are a lot of things there that are older than they are now," he told me, "not just the Riverside Temple, but also the Mortuary Temple on the hill and the Mancala ruins, as well as the Kafra King's Pyramid..." "What does it have to do with the remains of King Mancala?" "There is the Funeral Hall. I will state that I appended the Pharaoh's name in front of the pyramids only because we have traditionally called these pyramids by that, for the sake of convenience..." "Okay. You mean those pyramids could be as old as the Sphinx?" "It's hard to say. Where the pyramids are now, there was something else before - geometrically, we should be able to say that. The Sphinx is just part of the overall plan. From this point of view Look, the Pyramid of Khafre is probably the most interesting because it was built in two stages. Maybe you've noticed that their bases are made up of several layers of huge stone blocks. The form of the blocks, and the banks of the river The megaliths of the temple are very similar. However, the other parts of the pyramid built on this basis are not only smaller in size, but also inferior in shape and precision to the lower part. It is obvious that it was completed in two stages. From We can conclude that the megalithic part of the foundation must have been completed in a relatively early age—probably in the same age as the Sphinx, while the upper part was in a later period—but it is not necessarily the same age as King Khafre. Then it was built in a later period. The more you investigate these things, the more complicated they become. For example, maybe a transitional civilization once appeared in this area. This hypothesis coincides with the stories in the ancient Egyptian pyramid scriptures. According to the It is recorded in the text that there have been two very long periods in the past: the first is the period when the gods, that is, Netru, ruled Egypt; The period of the reign. The problem just kept getting bigger and bigger. Fortunately, the bottom line has always been simple: what we have to prove is that the Sphinx was not built by Khafre. Geology proves that it was long before that, A long time ago, it was built..." "But ancient Egypt scholars don't accept this statement. They put forward many objections. At least one of them, Professor Mark Reynard, once refuted you: If the Sphinx was built before 10,000 BC, Where are the other relevant parts of that civilization? That is, they want you to come up with evidence of the existence of that lost civilization other than a few large buildings built on the Giza plateau. What do you say about that? " "First, let's look at the buildings outside of Gesha. You just came from Othirion in Abydos. We think that amazing building is also related to the Sphinx. But even without Othirion , without any other evidence, and I'm not worried. I mean, it's unreasonable to not make a big fuss about further evidence and use it to get away with the correct dating of the Sphinx. I'm ok For one thing, it’s as if someone said to Magellan, who was the first in history to circle the world: Who else has circled the world except you? Since there is none, the world is of course flat. This is very unreasonable. In addition, I There is another analogy, just like in 1838, when dinosaur bones were excavated for the first time, some people said: only one bone was found, but where are the other bones? Since there is no such thing, of course there are no so-called huge extinct animals in the world Yes. After a while, more people understood that the bone could only be a dinosaur bone, not other animal bones. Within 20 years, museums all over the world began to display dinosaur skeletons. Sphinx It's the same with things like this. It's not going in the right direction, looking for information in the right place. I'm pretty sure that once more people think in the right direction, there will be more evidence soon—for example, along There must be more evidence on the banks of the ancient Nile, miles away from the present-day Nile, or on the bottom of the Mediterranean Sea, where the land was dry during the last ice age." The Mystery of Inheritance I asked West why Egyptologists and archaeologists are so reluctant to consider the Sphinx as the key to a forgotten piece of human history. "I think it's probably because they've been embedded in the linear pattern of human civilization and they can't extricate themselves. They can't believe that as early as 12,000 years ago, there were people more mature than modern humans in this world. Geology has It proves the age of the construction of the Sphinx. The technology of building the Sphinx has many places that human beings cannot do today. This fact is completely inconsistent with our belief that civilization and technology will develop in a straight line. Even with the most advanced modern technology, there are still many operations that cannot be done. If it is just to carve a Sphinx, it is not too difficult. As long as there are enough carvers, it is even necessary to build a 1 mile Long carvings, there is no difficulty. The difficulty is technically, how to cut the stone, separate the Sphinx from the site, and transport the cut stone hundreds of feet away , built a riverside temple..." I've never heard this statement: "You mean, the 200-ton stones on the stone walls of the Riverside Temple were cut from near the Sphinx?" "There is no doubt. Geologically, they are cut from the exact same stone layer. After the stones are cut out, they are transported to the side of the temple... As for the method of transportation, they are piled up to a height of 40 feet God only knows. I'm still talking about limestone blocks, not the granite cladding slabs laid on the surface. The granite was added later, probably at Kafra. But if we look closely at the center of the wall Limestone blocks, you will find erosion marks on them, very similar to those on the Sphinx. So the central building of the Sphinx and the Temple of the Banks was built at the same time, by the same people - whoever — built." "Do you think those people are related to the later dynastic Egyptians? In "The Serpent in the Sky", you think that these people must have inherited some heritage from their predecessors." "That's just an idea. The only thing we know for sure from our investigations is that the Sphinx is very old, and that there must have been a highly developed civilization in Egypt at that time capable of leading a construction project of this magnitude. But then it rained After thousands of years, in the same place, a pharaonic culture with a complete system and richness suddenly appeared out of nowhere. We can determine so much now. As for the knowledge possessed by ancient Egypt, whether it is related to I dare not say that the culture of the Sphinx was the same when it was built." "Do you think it is possible," I began to speculate, "that the civilization that built the Sphinx was not based here, or developed from here—Egypt. That civilization intentionally made the Sphinx Faces were placed in Egypt, as signs or outposts..." "Very likely. Perhaps the Sphinx was to that civilization what Abu Simbel (in Nubia) was to the dynastic civilization." "That high civilization was wiped out by a cataclysm of unknown cause. At that time, their mature intellectual heritage was handed down...Because of the Sphinx, they knew Egypt, they knew this place, they knew this country , has a connection with this land. Maybe when civilization died out, someone survived, and those people came here... What do you think of that?" "It is a possibility. Going back to myths and legends, in fact, there are stories in many parts of the world where only a few people survive after a catastrophe. For example, stories similar to Noah's Ark are repeated in civilizations all over the world. In my opinion, the biggest problem in this is the process of inheritance: after the era of the construction of the Sphinx, it took thousands of years for the dynastic era to bear fruit. How knowledge is passed from one era to the next Theoretically, we should have hit a dead end, right? Knowledge should be preserved for a long time, passed from one generation to the next, which is by no means a simple matter. But we also know how many generations the legend goes , Oral transmission, just passed down like this. In fact, oral transmission is more reliable than written transmission—because language, as spoken words, is always expressed in sentences that are most suitable for that era... After 5,000 years, and still be able to maintain its original form. So, knowledge can be passed on—using, for example, a secret society, or a sect of religion, and kept until it blossoms again. The point is, since the problem is We should not easily dismiss any possibility, even if it seems stupid and crazy on the surface, we should carefully investigate it before deciding whether to deny it." Seconded West was in Luthor to lead a group of people to study the Holy Land in Egypt.Early the next morning, he and his students traveled to Aswan and Abu Simbel.Sansa and I continued north, getting closer to Giza and the mysteries of the Pyramids and Sphinx.On our next stop, we'll meet archaeological astronomer Baufar in Gesha, and discover how his constellation studies complement the geological evidence in a striking way to prove Geza's antiquity. note ① "Sacred Science", p. 96. ②"We made an excerpt of our research results and handed it over to the Geological Society of America, which also invited us to publish a report at its annual meeting in San Diego. Geologists from all over the world came to our booth Come and watch our exhibition. They feel very puzzled. At least one or twenty experts in related disciplines offered their suggestions and expressed their willingness to help. Some geologists just laughed it off after seeing it. Some of them were speechless , because in two centuries of research, no ancient Egyptian expert or geologist has thought that the situation is caused by water, not by wind and sand." "Serpent in the Sky", 229 pages; "The Sphinx Mystery of the Sphinx (NBC) television program, 1992. ③The 1992 annual debate of the American Association for Advanced Science: How old is the Sphinx? ④"After carefully studying my drafts, notes, and a large number of figures, my conclusion is similar to the earliest intuitive reaction: two works represent two different people. Especially the proportion of the face, the frontal angle, etc., make people I feel that the Sphinx is not Khafre. If the ancient Egyptians had the high skill and ability to express the scene shown in their other works, then the two works of art would not express the same figure ’” Domingo, quoted in Narrative of The Serpent of the Sky, p. 232.