Updating the Great Pyramid Internal Ramp Theory

[Music] welcome to history for granite join me to explore ancient Egypt together we'll uncover secrets that only stones from Antiquity can reveal please subscribe to the channel to get notified when new videos are published and thank you so much for growing the channel the Great Pyramid of Giza has always attracted curious minds to explain how exactly this Monumental Stone structure was built over 45 centuries ago the fact that it remained the tallest man-made structure for about four Millennia is almost unbelievable it's no wonder that the engineering required to raise all those massive Stones so high is a problem that has fascinated Humanity throughout history so interesting is the question of how the pyramid was built that there are more theories about its construction than I can manage to keep track of this tradition of inquiry goes all the way back to Greek historian Herodotus in 450 BC who remains the earliest written account explaining a method of its construction Herodotus claimed that the pyramid was first completed as a stepped structure just like the earliest large pyramids at Sakara and my Doom afterwards a series of wooden machines on each tier would raise the final blocks using the mechanical advantage of a lever he also claims with certainty that the pyramid received its final smooth dressing starting from the top down to the bottom modern historians assume that Herodotus received this information from the local Egyptian guides who had embellished or invented much of what was communicated to him after all they too were living in an era two thousand years after the pyramid was constructed and would be left to speculate a great deal indeed some of the other information contained in herodotus's account is now reliably refuted some pieces of his explanation may be factual but it cannot yet be determined which parts are the truth modern archeology has given us remarkably few clues about large pyramid construction techniques and so the gap between what is known and what is possible is frustratingly large the only building technique that most everyone can agree on is the employment of ramps to drag the blocks upward there remain a few isolated examples of ancient Egyptian construction ramps that were never dismantled but the size slope quantity and path such ramps might take on the Great Pyramid is highly controversial and there is nothing close to a consensus about them in egyptology a recent and Innovative proposed method of construction comes from French architect Jean-Pierre houdin in the early 2000s houdin developed a comprehensive construction model for the Great Pyramid using an internal ramp after having received the suggestion from his father Henry a retired civil engineer this work culminated around 2008 when hudan co-authored a book with egyptologist Bob Breyer presenting the idea of an internal ramp to The Wider public there was also a documentary made about this collaboration titled Khufu revealed and it's one of the more enjoyable stories told about investigating the Great Pyramid you can watch it on YouTube and I've linked it in the description just recently on October 25th of 2022 hudan published a long-awaited update to his Great Pyramid construction theory in a 154-page paper on academia.edu I've linked that paper in the description as well this new paper incorporates data and Analysis from the scan pyramids Mission which in 2017 announced the discovery of several hidden empty spaces within the Great Pyramid these spaces include a corridor-like void above the northern entrance an enormous cavity known as the big void above the grand gallery and a small void high on the northeast corner like the Notch and Cave that are visible lower on that Northeastern side with this new paper of hudan's now published it's a good time to take a closer look at his ideas but the story of Jean-Pierre houdin is far more than a novel approach for a ramp to drag blocks upward it's a story that touches upon all of the problems egyptology has with gatekeeping and that most fundamental question of who gets to tell the story of the pyramids an extremely concise synopsis of hudan's main ideas are as follows the Great Pyramid may have been constructed using an internal spiral ramp in combination with an external straight ramp on the South Side the external ramp would only reach about one-third up the pyramid and be responsible for transporting the heaviest granite and Limestone beams that make up the ceilings of the upper chamber the grand Gallery opposite the external ramp could leverage its size and slope to hold counterweights on a sled the weighted sled would use ropes to connect the largest blocks and assist hauling them upwards following completion of the king's chamber the internal ramp would facilitate the building of the upper two-thirds of the pyramid without needing an excessively large external ramp these two concepts an internal spiral ramp and the grand Gallery counterweight opposite an external ramp are hudan's most important ideas his construction model has other details and will analyze some of those as well but the ramp design and counterweights are the core of his theory these two main ideas solve some of the largest problems faced by the Builders of the Great Pyramid the internal ramp removes the need for a prohibitively large external ramp it also would allow the pyramid geometry to be constantly checked which would otherwise be obscured by a spiraling external ramp the straight external ramp opposite the grand gallery counterweight States allows the largest blocks to be elevated onto the pyramid without needing to change direction or be hauled by 600 workers per block combined human strength faces logistical problems when scaling to numbers that high Jean-Pierre hudan's ramp Concepts were Innovative but they were also supported by a reasonable amount of physical evidence that is plain to see the fifth Dynasty Sun Temple of nusura has a very clear internal ramp structure so the Building Concept is present in the archaeological record also the grand gallery has visible scratching and staining marks along its lower sides and these could only be caused by a great deal of repetitive Force but despite the worthiness of his ideas and the amount of detail presented by hudan almost everyone in academic egyptology ignored or dismissed his theories out of hand it was only egyptologist Bob Breyer a specialist in mummies with a little connection to the pyramids who was willing to give hudan consideration and help him get the access needed to further his work Breyer was granted access to climb the Great Pyramid and document the Notch and adjacent cavity on the northeastern Corner which corresponds to where houdin theorizes the internal ramp would have made a turn prior to hudan nobody had presented a plausible explanation for these interesting features after this pyramid climb however houdin was denied permission to follow up with thermal camera inspections within the cavity the Arab Spring revolution in 2011 also created enormous complications it would Mark The End Of His official collaboration with institutional egyptology but while hudan was greatly constrained with his ability to continue research his ideas were popular enough that scientists began contacting him about methods to investigate further the most important method proposed to further investigate the pyramids was moography this allows for the detection of internal spaces within the masonry based upon how many muon particles either pass through or get absorbed by the stonework the culmination of the collaboration between hudan and a group of physicists and Engineers from around the world was the Heritage Innovation and preservation Institute founded in 2015. this hip Institute led a Consortium to launch the scan pyramids Mission a scientific Expedition using non-invasive scanning techniques to analyze the internal structure of the pyramids but the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities is very protective about who it gives permission to conduct such research and who Dan writes in his new 2022 paper quote the only drawback the mission had obtained its authorizations under the condition of being agnostic and that the data of the possible discoveries being put at the disposal of the researchers for free consequence for me I was deprived of participating in the mission because of my work on khufu's Pyramid and I will not appear in any document published by scan pyramids end quote houdin elaborates that the mission of investigating the pyramids and the opportunity for Discovery was more important than any personal credit he might receive but as the old saying goes no good deed ever goes unpunished and a self-described scientific committee led by former Minister zahi hawas was appointed to oversee the work done by scan pyramids here is hawas explaining the process during an on-site visit of the mission when you have a report of the result of the work here yeah you should present it to the minister yes and the minister will give it to the committee the scientific commission it will be evaluated in 2016 the mission released its first discoveries on the Great Pyramid including a new hidden cavity high on the northeastern corner and a void behind the Chevrons above the pyramid entrance here is how zahi hawas described the scan pyramid's mission right after these findings guy who knows nothing because there's no evidence give me one evidence to support this actually the scanning pyramid project most of it is to support the theory I must say it is unfair that hawas prejudiced the scan pyramid's Mission based upon his personal opinions of Jean-Pierre houdin who had recused himself from participating in it that is not the scientific method despite the name given to hawas's committee the scan pyramid's Mission would go on to detect a huge cavity above the grand Gallery in the a Great Pyramid perhaps comparable in size and orientation to the Grand Gallery itself these findings of the big void were presented to hawas's committee on September 13 2017. hudan writes that in response to the report the committee imposed the following instructions one that no media disclosure was permitted at this stage two the results must be published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal before being revealed to the media and three the scan pyramids Mission could not continue scanning work unless the first two instructions were complied with these conditions would set the scan pyramid's Mission up for failure for many reasons it frequently takes up to a year to get a scientific paper published and it would not be easy to keep such a huge Discovery secret however due to the top level expertise of the scan pyramid scientists and the significance of the results the journal Nature agreed to fast-track the paper and the results were reviewed and then published on November 2nd 2019. the entire world was then captivated by the announcement of the scan pyramids big void and it was truly a landmark moment for the pyramids of Egypt it's easily the most important Discovery at the Great Pyramid since Howard Vice opened the so-called relieving Chambers in 1837 but while the world was enthralled by this surprising discovery a cohort of academics and egyptologists were quite saddened David lightbody who would later publish a paper questioning the scan pyramid's results posted this four days after the big void announcement quote it's been a very tough few days mentally for me although I love egyptology and Archeology at times it has caused massive headaches and heartaches for me and for people I know the last few days have been one of those times however ever today it seems that it just might have been the case that it's darkest before Dawn end quote later when lightbody opened his paper titled questioning the void for feedback other researchers found that he simply deleted comments which disagreed with his analysis I know we've wandered away from houdin's theories but the scan pyramid's big void is the most important part of this story it's necessary to highlight how notable critics have used the pretense of science to disguise their own personal agendas sadly this practice is not uncommon in egyptology and this bad behavior gives other biased individuals an excuse to dismiss scientific archeology that is essential to understanding the pyramids circling back to the big void it is this discovery that is the central piece of evidence for houdin's new update on his pyramid construction theory in my opinion the grand Gallery as a construction ramp was always the strongest aspect of hudan's ideas but the original design he presented didn't seem optimal most of the largest blocks in the Great Pyramid are above the king's chamber and thus the grand Gallery is not in an ideal place to help raise them that high in his original model houdin needed the builders to keep the roof of the grand gallery open so that the ropes could still pass through to the counterweight at a sharp angle however the big void could potentially resolve that problem if this void is a single inclined space similar to the Grand Gallery then it could be used to help drag those enormous stones to the highest levels above the king's chamber it's reasonable to say the big void is currently evidence in support of hudan's theory about the grand Gallery but even before the discovery of the big void I think that hawas and others were beginning to suspect that houdin's idea for the grand Gallery had Merit it was particularly interesting that in the 2017 book Giza and the pyramids there is not a single mention of the so-called great Step at the top of the grand Gallery you would think a stone with such a famous name placed exactly in the center of the pyramid's north-south axis would at least deserve a token of recognition in that definitive history of Giza in fact the so-called great step is the central focus of egyptologist John romer's 564-page book titled the Great Pyramid published in 2007. here he is on the TV show 60 Minutes obsessing about it when we get to this which is the Masterpiece of the whole bloody pyramid is the re-foundation of the pyramid you know this is like this is the center line we're setting it up again it can only be intentional that zahi hawas would omit mentioning the so-called great step in his Giza and the pyramids book and I think Jean-Pierre houdin is the reason why if hudan is correct and the great step is not a step at all but instead a trench as it looked over 100 years ago then Egypt's Antiquities department has greatly damaged the Great Pyramid with this inaccurate restoration a trench would better facilitate the passage of ropes through it rather than a step which would cause excessive friction in all likelihood the Arabic tradition of calling this Stone the great step is what led the Antiquities Department to assume it was a step and that the upper portion was missing due to damage zahi hawas is the former director of the ministry of Antiquities many restoration jobs were conducted by the ministry including some in the 1990s on under his Direction this gives plenty of motive for hawas to reject houdin's ideas because they implicate the ministry in destroying a critical piece of history but rather than acknowledging his conflict of interest and recusing himself like Jean-Pierre hudan sahi hawas had no problem asserting his authority over the scientific process this is why I'm hitting a team and with me are three foreigners who are expertise on the pyramids and we are correcting them in that context it is no surprise that institutional egyptology hasn't engaged with houdin's ideas in a serious way now I will say that after reading the new update to hudan's Theory I was a little disappointed the greatest strength slash weakness of hudan's approach is that he proposes an optimal method of construction that reduces the need for manual labor but the ancient Egyptians had an abundance of conscripted manual labor available I find it unlikely that the builders would over complicate the pyramid design just to cut back on required Manpower in hudan's latest model he adds vertical counterweights like the kind you find in a modern day elevator to help power the pulling force of the grand Gallery mechanisms I find this solution unlikely and I know of no archaeological evidence to corroborate it surely the big void acting as a second Grand Gallery with the assistance of human force would be sufficient to get the job done in hudan's defense he is attempting to account for all of the scan pyramids data which just isn't sufficient to model hidden structures yet houdin writes that in 2017 he suffered a heart attack it may be that given the glacial pace of egyptology he feels that this could be the last new data he has the opportunity to work with therefore he might be taking his theory as far as he can now instead of waiting for more information one aspect of hudan's construction model all that I've always found intriguing is the staging area for the largest blocks 43 meters high on the pyramid South Side in his latest revision the staging area is still used but needs to be elevated in several stages to about 58 meters high in order to utilize the big void as a counterweight space the unusual damage to the pyramid's southern side is evidence that this part of the pyramid had a less durable construction method the filling in of the staging area would be a potential cause there are a few details in houdin's theory that I still find highly illogical such as the insistence that every casing Stone would be dressed fully smooth before installation there are many examples of both granite and Limestone casing stones that were installed with the outer face undressed who Dan points out that the Torah limestone is soft when excavated and then quickly hardens but while cutting the stone is easier at the Quarry transporting stones with sharp edges would be prone to breakage during Transportation this could easily be more costly in the long run the countless patched casing stones at the bend pyramid prove how often such damage could occur the small shafts emanating from the king's chamber and queen's chamber are another aspect of hudan's theory which I am confident is incorrect he claims that the shafts would be used to amplify sound for workers coordinating the counterweights but the Queen's chamber shafts weren't originally open at their lower ends houdin's idea that the blocks surrounding them would be movable so that they could be opened and shut is quite ridiculous after all if the king's chamber shafts were left open there can be no justifiable reason why the Queen's chamber shafts needed such open and close functionality the theory of an internal ramp is not elaborated in hudan's latest paper but he foreshadowed those two additional papers which probably discuss it further but after reading this latest publication and thinking about it more I believe I can improve upon hudan's model I'm still not convinced for or against the idea of an internal ramp but here's the change that I would make a spiraling ramp doesn't need to start at the bottom of the pyramid's southern side it would be much more efficient to begin this ramp in the staging area where the straight external ramp ends this way you don't have to drag blocks an extra half a kilometer to reach the same elevation houdin begins his internal ramp at the bottom of the pyramid because he's attempting to Explain how other hypothetical Chambers and corridors might integrate with it but I don't believe such structures exist and I don't think the workers needed an escape route to seal the chambers beyond what has already been discovered I find it notable that physical evidence for a spiral ramp structure such as the northeastern cavities are only found high on the monument these anomalies are not found in the lower third of the pyramid furthermore the masonry where houdin supposes the internal ramp might begin shows no signs of unusual design finally houdin's idea that the external ramp could have been recycled to make the upper pyramid masonry isn't as practical as it sounds constructing the Great Pyramid would have generated enormous amounts of small Limestone chips this wasteful byproduct could have been used for the external ramp Consolidated with stronger retaining walls on the outside indeed that is the design we find for ramps in the archaeological record thus any spiraling ramp whether internal or external would be more efficient by starting from where the straight ramp ended but no matter how accurate hudan's extremely detailed model ends up being we are in his debt for the Monumental effort to push study of the Great pyramid forward the discovery of the scanned pyramid's big void began with his desire to solve a mystery of the Great Pyramid it took incredible perseverance to take his curiosity that far much of egyptology was aligned against his research and even today this accomplishment is casually dismissed for example in response to hudan's latest paper egyptologist Sarah parkac wrote quote the void is a noise Echo common issue the whole scan pyramids thing is utter nonsense I feel bad that houdin wasted his time end quote everything within that statement is lazy and false and one wonders how hudan could put up with such attitudes for over 20 years a noise Echo can't be a common issue for moography in pyramids because scan pyramids is the first mission to detect anything with it the skin pyramid's results showed in no Echo a wing from any internal spaces within the bent pyramid as a control nor from the chambers within the Great Pyramid the muigraphy was conducted by three independent teams using different angles of detection with different scanning methods all scanning teams reached a five Sigma level of confidence and a noise Echo isn't even what David lightbody's feeble questioning the void paper claims to cause the big void signal however when it came to her own research Sarah parkac lamented the dismissal of new technology it has been a struggle just because the technology is so new and when you show people facts and figures about sites you're finding or show them things that you're seeing people kind of roll their eyes and say well here Here Comes yet another gee whiz technology that you know it aims to solve everything in 2011 Sarah parkac claimed in international press to have found 17 hidden pyramids 7 17 17 pyramids using satellite imagery 11 years later not a single one has turned up as a pyramid no matter how outlandish any part of Jean-Pierre hudan's Theory might be institutional egyptology makes claims that are far more ridiculous there's still a lot of work to do before we can finally uncover how the Great Pyramid and other large Egyptian pyramids were built houdin has given us an idealized model of how they might have been constructed and there is much to learn from that approach it has led us to the big void and the confidence that there is a great deal more that can be learned from further study the real lesson of the story of Jean-Pierre hudan and the Great Pyramid is that the work is never finished it is still worthy of our time and consideration an unprecedented achievement from Antiquity that deserves further investigation there are real solutions to its Mysteries which are solve lovable and only by emulating the dedication of Jean-Pierre hudan can we hope to bring them to light thanks to everyone who watched this video to the end please subscribe to the channel to see more of this content give a like or comment as you see fit and above all remember to ask your friends if they take their history for granite [Music]

Channel: History for GRANITE

Views: 2,013,376

Keywords: Pyramids, Egypt, History, Granite, History for Granite, Ancient, Old Kingdom

Id: _JlnMs616Z0

Length: 26min 37sec (1597 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 23 2022