By Robert Bauval
The
Language Of Stone
The Great Sphinx of Giza is
probably the world's best known relic from the distant past. It is shrouded in
mystery. Indeed to many it is mystery itself.
he
Sphinx is not built with quarried blocks like the pyramids and temples it
guards, but carved out of the living bedrock. Its makers gave it a man's head
(some say it's a woman) and the body of a lion. It is 66 feet high and an
impressive 240 feet long. It has the most extraordinary expression, like a
hundred Mona Lisas all rolled into one. And its eyes gaze forever at the
distant horizon due east, at the equinox point...at something not of this
world but beyond it, in the sky. Something, perhaps, that is reflected or
'frozen' in the essence and age of the Sphinx.
Nothing
can prepare a first-time visitor for the awe-inspiring and humbling experience
of meeting the Great Sphinx face to face. No matter who you are, no matter
what your disposition and temperament are, the Great Sphinx of Giza will not
leave you unmoved. John Anthony West is a man who knows this phenomenon well.
He has stood in the shadow of this great statue many a time since he started
visiting Egypt some thirty years ago. To him the Sphinx had always appeared as
a monument apart, and much, much older than anything else he had seen either
at Giza or elsewhere.
West's strong 'gut feeling' had rarely
let him down. One day, while reading a book on Egypt by the French author and
mathematician Schwaller de Lubicz (Sacred Science, Paris 1961), an answer to
his intuitive hunch came shooting straight at him. Schwaller made a passing
remark on what appeared to be water erosions on the body of the Sphinx.
Turning to a close up photograph of the Sphinx, West suddenly realized that
the weathering patterns on the Sphinx were not horizontal as seen on other
monuments at Giza, but vertical. Now horizontal weathering is the result of
prolonged exposure to strong winds and sandstorms. There sure had been plenty
of those in this arid region of the Sahara. Could water have caused the
vertical weathering on the Sphinx? Water from where?
Something, clearly, was worth
investigating here. West knew, of course, that most Egyptologists believed
that the Sphinx was built in 2500 BC in the time of the pharaoh Chephren (of
Khafre), who is identified with the Second Pyramid at Giza. He also knew that
this belief was now so entrenched that it would take an intellectual bulldozer
to tug it out. Yet his study had shown him that this belief was more a dogma
than any-thing else. He asked himself if a proof-positive identification
between Khafre and the Sphinx would stand in an 'open court' under public
scrutiny?
The answer was no. The reason was,
quite simply, this. There was no inscriptions — not a single one — either
carved on a wall or a stela or written on the throngs of papyri that
identified Khafre (or anyone else, for that matter) with the construction of
the Sphinx and its nearby temples. As for the proximity of Khafre's pyramid to
the Sphinx (in fact it is 1700 feet away) this did not prove that both
monuments were built as one complex nor, more relevantly, at the same epoch.
By such standards future generations of archaeologists may one day allocate
ownership of the Sphinx to the builder of the Sound & Light theatre
because of its proximity to the Sphinx complex or — as someone else has put it
— attribute St. Paul's Cathedral to General Gordon of Khartoum just because
his statue was found in it. In short, Khafre may well be the quintessential 'Kilroy
was here' of antiquity. So could the Sphinx be much older than the reign of
Khafre, as West had long suspected it was? Could this hypothesis explain, for
example, the strange vertical weathering on the statue?
In 1991 John West rounded up a crack team of scientists who were not hampered by
an ingrained Egyptological consensus, and took them to Giza. Along came Dr.
Robert Schoch, a prominent geologist and professor from Boston University to
examine the unique weathering patterns on the Sphinx and its enclosure. His
conclusions, which came after several months of analysis, was to convulse the
world of archaeology. The vertical weathering patterns on the Sphinx and its
enclosure, Schoch argued, were not caused by wind effect, as had previously
been thought, but by water — water from torrential rains pouring down in
sheets over these ancient structures. But how could this be? Was Schoch saying
that such heavy rains only fell on the Sphinx area but nowhere else at Giza?
That was impossible, retorted the
Egyptologists. Not impossible, said Schoch, if it is conceded that the Sphinx
was built at an epoch when such rains were common in this region but that the
other monuments at Giza, however, were built long after these rains had
stopped occurring. Again impossible, replied the ruffled Egyptologists; such
heavy rains stopped occurring thousands of years before the time of Khafre.
Schoch politely shrugged his shoulders. This, he answered, was not his
problem.
The usual was to happened. John West
was branded a charlatan and a sensation-seeker, and Schoch was politely
shunned for not minding his own business and for stepping on the Egyptological
turf. John West, however, was relentless. True, he did not have the lofty
credentials of his learned opponents, but this did not deter him in the least.
Scientific logic was on his side, not credentials. He was now determined more
than ever to see that the Egyptologists either prove him wrong with equal or
better scientific arguments or concede that he, and not they, was right about
the age of the Sphinx.
To be fair, the implications of West's
theory are, of course, far-reaching. History books will have to be re-written
and scientists will have to reconsider the origins of civilization as a whole.
Well, so be it. Progress worked like that. In any case, it had been done many
times before. It could be done again. Yet going about to prove that the Sphinx
was much older than Khafre was one thing. The question was, how much older
exactly? How could science determine the true age of a stone monument?
Astronomy
Joins The Sphinx Debate
n
1989 I published a paper in the Oxford Journal, Discussions In Egyptology
(vol. 13), in which I demonstrated that the three Great Pyramids
and their relative position to the Nile created on the ground a sort of 3-D
'hologram' of the three stars of Orion's belt and their relative position to
the Milky Way. To support this contention, I brought into evidence the
inclined shaft in the Great Pyramid which were aimed at the south meridian
towards these group of stars as well as written evidence from the Pyramid
Texts that identified the afterlife destiny of the pyramid-kings with Orion.
Later in my book The Orion Mystery
(Heinemann-Mandarin) I also demonstrated that the best fit for the Giza
Pyramids/Nile pattern with the Orion's belt/Milky Way pattern occurred when
the sky was pushed back in time (i.e. precessed) to the epoch of 10,500 BC.
There were good reasons for doing so.
The ancient Egyptians, for example, constantly refer to a remote golden age
they called Zep Tepi, 'The First Time' of Osiris, which they believed had long
predated the Pyramid Age. Osiris was Orion, and the Great Pyramid had a shaft
directed to Orion at the meridian. To me, this 'silent' astro-architectural
language seemed to be spelling out 'here is Osiris in the sky when these
pyramids were built, yet know, too, that his origins are rooted in the First
Time.' But The 'First Time' of what? How could the stars of Orion have a
'First Time'?
Well they can. And they do. Provided,
of course, that you can read through the allegorical 'language' of the
ancients via the symbolic architecture and the related Pyramid Texts.
Allegory, to put it in another way, is the 'Q-Basics' of the master
astronomers who designed the Giza complex. When the stars of Orion are
observed at the meridian in the precise manner that the ancient Egyptian
astronomers did over many centuries, they could not help noting that these
stars crossed the south meridian at different altitudes at different epochs.
This is, of course, due to the phenomenon of Precession (see The Orion
Mystery, appendices 1 and 2). In short, the stars of Orion can be said to have
a starting point or 'beginning' at the nadir of their precessional cycle.
Simple calculations show that this occurred in 10,500 BC. Could the ancient
astronomers of the Pyramid Age have used their very clever 'silent language'
combined with Precession to freeze the 'First Time' of Osiris — somewhat like
the gifted architects of gothic cathedral froze in its allegorical stonework
the 'time of Christ'?
In the summer of 1993 Graham Hancock
and I got together to investigate this issue further. Graham was quick to realized the important implications this approach could have on the Sphinx
problem. He had a hunch that the curious harking back to the epoch of 10,500
BC by the pyramid builders of Giza was an invitation by them to consider the
actual age of the Sphinx. If this hypothesis was correct, then the Sphinx must
be an 'original' time-marker of that remote epoch using an obvious celestial
tag valid for 10,500 BC. But which tag? What could the Sphinx be representing
that was in the sky? Could this have something to do with the due east
direction of its gaze towards the horizon?
In his ground-breaking book Fingerprints of the Gods
(Heinemann-Mandarin), Hancock pointed out that the 'First Time' date of 10,500
BC also denoted the beginning or 'First Time' of the Age of Leo. This was when
the 'lion' constellation would have risen heliacally (at dawn before the sun)
on the day of the spring (vernal) equinox. This event brought the celestial
lion to rest due east, thus in perfect alignment with the Sphinx. The Sphinx,
in other words, was made to look at his own image on the horizon — and
consequently at his own 'time'. Hancock pointed out that 10,500 BC was no
random date. It very precisely denoted another beginning, that of Orion-Osiris
defined on the ground with the pattern and alignments of the nearby Pyramids.
Here, then, were not just the Pyramids but also the Sphinx luring us to the
same date of 10,500 BC. But were we dealing with a 'coincidence' — albeit an
astonishing one — or was all this part of a deliberate long term scheme set by
the ancients? Could it be possible that some blueprint was put into motion in
10,500 BC with the making of the Sphinx then to be completed much later by the
builders of the Pyramids? Was there evidence of a continuous presence here at
Giza through the ages of some master 'astronomers' who could have been
responsible to see this scheme through?
If so, who were they? Where had they
come from? Why here at Giza? Graham and I have spent the last two years
researching this fascinating issue. We believe that what we have uncovered
will change the perceptions of what Giza was (and still is) forever. The full
results of our investigation, as you might have guessed, are laid out in our
new book, Keeper of Genesis, available now at a discount through AA&ES.
Suffice at this stage to say that author Colin Wilson, who gave the book an
early review, thinks it's 'a much more satisfying tour de force' than
Fingerprints of the Gods or The Orion Mystery. Meanwhile let us take a look at
an intriguing archaeological discovery near the Sphinx that has very recently
made the news.
A Lucky
Turn Of The Spade
n
October 1995 the Egyptian Antiquities Organization finally decided to
refurbish the old parking lot east of the Sphinx. While clearing the area in
front of the Sphinx and the Valley Temple, a 'lucky turn of the spade' from
one of the laborers unearthed part of an ancient complex of underground
galleries and pathways. Hearing of this providential discovery, Graham Hancock
and I planned a short trip to Egypt to see for ourselves what was going on.
John Anthony West also was on his way there, and so we decided to meet
directly at Giza. When we arrived there we found the place swarming with
activity.
Several gangs of laborers and masons were digging and clearing the area in
front of the Sphinx and its temples. By a stroke of good fortune the Egyptian
authorities had not yet cordoned off this area, so we asked one of the inspectors
in charge if we could take a closer look. It was a little difficult to tell
what exactly was happening here. No one seemed to be sure. It looked as if
part of the area had already been excavated some years ago but then, for
reasons unknown, it was covered up again.
This was evident by the botches of
modern mortar and iron bars that were left embedded in the ceiling of the
ancient pathways, probably in an attempt to underpin or reinforce the relics.
An inspector standing by seemed to think that these modern-day additions were
made either when Egyptologist Selim Hassan was clearing the area for the
Egyptian Antiquity Organization in the 1930s or, perhaps, later in the 1950s
when the Sons Et Lumieres open-air theatre was constructed nearby. But why the
vestiges were covered up again, and why and how they came to be forgotten
remains a mystery.
These vestiges consisted of a major
artery cut into the natural bedrock (some 10 feet wide and 200 feet long from
north to south) which runs in front of the Valley Temple and the Sphinx. This
artery is itself intersected by two paved pathways coming from the Valley
Temple and going due east — vanished much like two small roads bridge over a straight
motorway. These pathways very oddly dip at their eastern end and then vanished
into the ground. We also noticed a very curious manhole set in the main artery
at the point where it intersects the southern pathway. Its lid, which is made
from a single piece of limestone, is broken at one corner and through it we
could see water flowing (mixed with the sewage from the nearby village) and
heading towards the Sphinx and the Valley Temple.
The whole complex was obviously very
ancient and almost certainly contemporary with the Sphinx. But what could its
function be? And what was the purpose of the underground waterway? According
to a prominent Ancient Egyptian myth, the legendary gates of the Afterworld
were guarded by two gigantic lions or sphinxes called Aker. In New Kingdom
tomb drawings the aker-sphinx of the eastern gate sits proud with its hind
parts in a hollow. Underneath it can be seen a curious underground stream or
duct. Behind the lion towers a huge mound or pyramid and under it is found a
large, oval chamber which appears to be hermetically sealed.
In this mysterious chamber is said to be some lofty secret, no doubt from the
'gods' who ruled the land of Egypt during the remote epoch of Zep Tepi —
'The
First Time'. This strange chamber was called the 'House of Sokar' in Rostau.
The resemblance with the Sphinx complex at Giza is uncanny. Giza in ancient
time was also called Rostau, and Sokar (a hawk-headed deity) was identified to
Osiris. Odd coincidences? Perhaps.
Or will astronomy make 'a lucky turn
of the spade' that will convert this supposedly cosmic myth into an historical
reality? Stay tuned.
Robert Bauval
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