Date: Fri, 20 Sep 1996 02:47:26 -0700
From: Jiri Mruzek
Newsgroups: sci.archaeology
Subject: Re: Spiral ramp on GP (was: Neolithic Stonehenge road?

  Denial of the Pyramid's 70-ton blocks - The enemy self-destructs

> > What you write is, please forgive me, bloody utterly nonsense.

Forgiven, on the spot. Bloody, utterly nonsense is bloody sporting!

> > All your mails
> > are based on wrong numbers. With these, I can prove anything.
>> Please stick to
> > the correct numbers, found by egyptologists in this century, and please don't
> > argue on fossiline sources.

Don't generalize. Shoot!

> > Lets start with your 70 ton blocks. Please show me where they are. They are
> > not in the roof of the king's chamber. Anyone with a pocket calculator could
> > prove this! I will show you.

They are not? Show us then..

> > When you are in the king's chamber next time, please look up to the ceiling.
> > What do you see? Oops, the ceiling is made up from 9 blocks, spanning it from
> > north to south.

Why should I go "Oops"? But, otherwise you're doing fine. I am looking
at the same on p.62 of Tompkins' Secrets of the Great Pyramid. It says
that it is a vertical section of the King's Chamber looking North. The third
block from the west stands out for its height and breadth.

> > The blocks are between 1.00 and 1.7 meters wide.

So let's carry 1.7 meter in mind, as the breadth of the big tall block..

> > Each block is about 8.50 meters long.

Alright, 1.7 times 8.50 equals 14.45 square meters. Go on.

> > The largest block of the lower nine (the blocks of
> > the upper chambers are much smaller) is partially 2.60 meters high,but
> > because he is domed you can calculate with a medium height of 2 meters.

14.45 times 2 equals 28.9 cubic meters, and we discounted the volume
of the dome. The dome seems to have less than a fifth, or sixth, of the
block's height. With the dome, the block should have at least 32 cubic
meters.

> > This *largest* block has the volume of about 17 to 20 cubic meters.

So, where could the mistake be?
You counted the largest block, as one of the narrowest at 1.18 meter!

1.18 x 8.5 x 2 = 20.06 cubic meters.

I won't ask, how you got as little as 17 cubic meters.

> > These blocks are from Aswan granite, the so called Syenit. And
> > this material has a specific weight of 2.6 g per cubic centimenter.
> > So I get a weight of about 44 to 52 tons for this block.

28.9 times 2.6 equals 75.14 tons!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Hands up, boy!

With the three cubic meters for the dome we get 82+ tons..
The result makes a mockery out of your moralizing above.
This has happened before, but your tone never changes.
Please, accept it, as you say. Your superiority has a thin veneer..

> > The other blocks are much smaller, a
> > typicle block from the higher chambers has a volume of about 10 to 14 cubic
> > meters and a weight of 26 to 36 tons.

Knowing your margin of error, we may safely double your figures. Voila,
now we get 50 - 70 tons as the weight range for the blocks. And that's
just what they say..

One more thing about the higher ceiling beams. They are definitely
larger than what you say. For instance, there are only eight blocks
forming the ceiling of the Davison's chamber above the K.C. This must
increase their average breadth, and thus total weight. Howard-Vyse
says that all the blocks above Davison's chamber weigh over 50-tons..

> > But what *if* there was one 70 ton block, so what? I showed you, that with a
> > few hundred workers you could easily transport such a stone, too.

And I showed you how you couldn't turn corners! Remember F. M. Barber's
figures for a sixty-ton block? It would have to be hauled by 900 men,
if the incline of the slope were 1 in 25.

> > One theory says, that all the heavy blocks were transported
> > to the pyramid body itself at the beginning of the construction.
> >  They were stored somewhere on the gigantic square and when
> > the most part of the first layer was finished, a short ramp was built to the
> > begun next level, and all the blocks were pulled up one meter to be stored
> > elsewhere. Then the lower level could be finished. After this, the second
> > level was started. After a while, the heavy blocks were transported to the
> > already finished parts of the next level, to be again stored somewhere. With
> > each transport, the blocks hat only to me lifted one meter and pulled over a
> > distance of a few meters. And so on. So what?

This theory deserves one of my Atlantean Awards!
It is the most labor intensive proposition so far. Are you desperate,
or what? Basically, you have a little mountain of blocks in the middle
of the platform. Thus, to get a yard higher, you propose to carry these
blocks sideways and then elevate them to their spot on the pile.
Then you reverse the process to go a level higher.

Actually, it was not fair of me to dismiss the theory Doernenburg had presented
so fast. It seems to have its merits, which are the subject of the next chapter.