Our Inheritance in the Great Pyramid (1880 Edition)

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II

LELAND·STANFORD JVNIOR·UNIVERSITY

913.32

86670 OUR INHERITANCE IN THE GREAT PYRAMID

PRINTED BY NOVELLO, EWER AND CO. DEAN STREET, SOHO, W.

FRONTISPIECE

PLAYE1.

PIAZZI SMYTH. DEL

PIAZZI SMYTH. DEL THE STONE ARCHITECTURE OF ALL AGES, IN TIME AND IN HEIGHT.

FRONTISPIECE

DATE

8000 TO 2000 B.C.

DATE

2000 TO 1000 B.C.

DATE

1000 B.C. TO 0

PLANETARY TEMPLE PYRAMID

AT BABYLON, 1000 TO 1000 B.C.

TEMPLE OF SOLOMON

ON THE MAGNIFIER SUMMIT OF THE

MILL OF ZION, 1000 B.C.

EARTHER MOUND OF ALYATTER, ASIA MINOR, 1000 B.C.

PHILADELPHIA TEMPLE

ATHENS

THE JEWISH TEMPLE OR ZION HILL

AS RESULT BY HERITAGE OF THE GREAT.

THE AMPHITHEATRE

AQUEDUCT.

THE PANTHEON

DONSTARTINOPLE

BY SOPHIA CHURCH

AQUEDUCT.

BIRN ROUND TOWER

CHOLULA TEMPLE

PYRAMID IN MEXICO.

PIAZZI SMITH, DEL

THE STONE ARCHITECTURE OF ALL AGES, IN TIME AND IN HEIGHT.

OUR INHERITANCE IN

THE GREAT PYRAMID

FOURTH AND MUCH ENLARGED EDITION

INCLUDING ALL THE MOST IMPORTANT DISCOVERIES UP TO THE TIME OF PUBLICATION

With Twenty-five Explanatory Plates GIVING MAPS, PLANS, ELEVATIONS, AND SECTIONS OF ALL THE MORE DIFFICULT AND CRUCIAL PARTS OF THE STRUCTURE

BY

BY PIAZZI SMYTH, F.R.S.E., F.R.A.S. ASTRONOMER-ROYAL FOR SCOTLAND

"O LORD GOD OF MOSTS . . . THE HEAVENS ARE THINE, THE EARTH ALSO IS THINE; AS FOR THE WORLD, AND THE FULNESS THEREOP, THOU HAST FOUNDED THEM."

PSALM LXXXIX. 8, II.

"BECAUSE THAT WHICH MAY BE KNOWN OF GOD IS MANIFEST IN THEM; FOR GOD HATH SHOWED IT UNTO THEM. FOR THE INVISIBLE THINGS OF HIM FROM THE CREATION OF THE WORLD ARE CLEARLY SEEN, BEING UNDEMSTOOD BY THE THINGS THAT ARE MADE."

ROMANS I. 19, 20.

LONDON WM. ISBISTER, LIMITED 56, LUDGATE HILL 1880 QC99

S65

"David, in a choice of evils similar to these, said, 'Let me fall into the hands of the Lord, for very great are his mercies; but let me not fall into the hand of man' (1 Chron. xxi. 13). The people of England know what it is to experience somewhat of the latter calamity; and though they are bound to acknowledge that their long-protracted griefs are to be preferred to the short but severe sufferings which the nations of the Continent had to endure, they must feel, after all, that it is a deep affliction which many have had to bear. But let them with Faith and Patience endure their troubles a little longer. Their redemption draweth nigh."

JOHN TAYLOR'S Wealth the Name and Number of the Beast, p. 149.

293779

VRAVELL CHOTWAT!

TO THE MEMORY OF THE LATE JOHN TAYLOR,

GOWER STREET, LONDON

(DEPARTED JULY,1864,AGED 83 YEARS),

AUTHOR OF

'THE GREAT PYRAMID: WHY WAS IT BUILT? AND WHO BUILT IT?'

THE NOW FOURTH EDITION OF

THIS FURTHER ATTEMPT TO APPLY ACTUAL

SCIENTIFIC EXAMINATION

TO TEST HIS

EXCEEDINGLY MOMENTOUS THEORY

AND MOST PRECIOUS DISCOVERY OF THE AGE FOR ALL MANKIND,

IF TRUE,—

IS DEDICATED BY

THE FRIEND OF HIS FEW LAST DAYS,

BUT ADMIRER OF ALL HIS LONG AND EARNEST CHRISTIAN LIFE,

PIAZZI SMYTH.

EDINBURGH, 1880.

"THE GREAT, THE MIGHTY GOD, THE LORD OF HOSTS, IS HIS NAME, GREAT IN COUNSEL, AND MIGHTY IN WORK: . . . WHICH HAS SET SIGNS AND WONDERS IN THE LAND OF EGYPT, EVEN UNTO THIS DAY." JEREMIAH XXXII. 18-20.

PREFACE.

When the late worthy John Taylor (publisher to the London University) produced, in 1859, his larger work entitled The Great Pyramid: why was it built, and who built it? and afterwards, in January, 1864, his smaller pamphlet, The Battle of the Standards (of Linear Measure): the ancient of four thousand years against the modern of the last fifty years—the less perfect of the two,—he opened up for archæology a purer, nobler, more intellectual pathway to light than that study had ever enjoyed before.

But academic archæology would not accept it; indeed the whole reading world stood askance; and I can hardly now explain how it came about that something induced me, in February, 1864, to commence an independent examination of Mr. Taylor's theory; and my publication in September of that year (i.e. the first edition of the present book) contained the findings so arrived at. Findings, in many points confirmatory of the principal thread of Mr. Taylor's chief and most startling discovery; but exhibiting in the general literature of the subject, and on which, unfortunately, he had been obliged to depend too much, a lamentable deficiency in the accurateness of almost all the numerical data required; and which necessary exactitude, nothing but practical examination and instrumental measure at the place could hope properly to supply.

Meanwhile John Taylor died, and with almost his last breath emphatically confided this, the most important labour of his long life-toil, to my most unworthy hands; and yet hands not altogether unused to some of the operations next required. How, then, with little help from any one, save a single subscription volunteered by a kind friend* in Edinburgh, my Wife and self did, on very scanty private means, sail for Egypt in November, 1864; and did, through a four months' residence on the Great Pyramid hill in 1865, employ a variety of surveying and astronomical instruments, in obtaining many measures of the mighty monument; some of them to far more exactness than had ever been attempted before, and others descending to numerous details unnoticed by former observers, though still leaving other large parts to the future efforts of the nation—all this was described by me, first in abstract to the Royal Society, Edinburgh, in April, 1866; and afterwards, at much greater length to the world in my three-volumed book, "Life and Work at the Great Pyramid" in 1867.†

That last publication, even from the very oppositions it called up, helped to spread a knowledge both of the importance of the question at issue, and the only means for solving it; especially as against the modern hieroglyphic scholars, the so-called Egyptologists; who, though exceedingly learned in their lettered way touching Egyptiàn remains of more recent times, have never much troubled themselves to examine the far more ancient, as well as purer, Great Pyramid in the mechanical and scientific manner now required.

Indeed, the literary Egyptologists seem, by their criticisms, rather angered than otherwise, to hear that such precise and strictly provable data, in merely modern instrumental measure, when at last collected by others than themselves, are most successful in showing a radical difference throughout between the Great, and every other, Pyramid in Egyptian land. In fact these measures tend to establish that the Great Pyramid, though in Egypt, is not, and never was, of Egypt—that is, of, belonging to, or instructing about Pharaonic, idolatrous, and chiefly Theban, Egypt. Also, that though built in the earliest ages, far before written history, the Great Pyramid was yet prophetically intended—by inspiration afforded to the architect from the one and only living God, who rules in heaven, and announced vengeance against the sculptured idols of Egypt (Ezekiel xxx. 13)—to remain quiescent during those earlier ages; and only, in a manner, to come forth at this time to subserve a high purpose for these latter days. That it, the Great Pyramid, was never even remotely understood, either by the Egyptian, or any other branch of the Cainite and anti-Israelite family of nations. But that it is able nevertheless to explain its grand, even Messianic, mission, most unmistakably. Not, indeed, in the usual manner of less ancient monuments, by the use of any written language, whether hieroglyphic or vulgar, but by aid of the mathematical and physical science of modern times applied to show the significance residing in the exact amount of its ancient length, breadth and angles; a means most efficacious both for preventing the parable being read too soon in the history of an, at first, unlearned world; but for insuring its being correctly read, and by all nations, when the fulness of prophetic time, in a science age, has at last arrived.

This confirmation of the main view arrived at by John Taylor, viz. that in the Great Pyramid the world now possesses a Monument of Inspiration, as it has long possessed a Book of Inspiration, one dating altogether, and the other partly, from primeval times—brought by degrees many able intellectualists of the mathematical and Christian, rather than the Egyptological and rationalistic, order into the field. And some of them have succeeded, or are succeeding, in demonstrating the purpose and meaning of so many successive parts of the structure, according to the measures taken in 1865,—that if a second and amended edition of my original work was called for in 1874, and a third in 1877, much more is a fourth required now, when there are so many additional discoveries by other workers to be cited; and when the whole is gaining shape, acquiring purpose and now almost day by day illustrating our modern history, our Israelitic brotherhood with America, the future of Egypt, Syria, and the way of the Kings of the East, in these eventful times so truly foreseen, and absolutely monumentalized of old, by supernaturally inspired men, by prophets of the living God.

CONTENTS.

PART I.

GEOGRAPHY AND THE EXTERIOR OF THE GREAT PYRAMID.

CHAP. I. INTRODUCTORY STATEMENT of the general question of the Great Pyramid . . . . .

PART IV.

MORE THAN SCIENCE AT THE GREAT PYRAMID.

CHAP.

XVI. THE SACRED CUBIT of the Bible opposes the ancient Cainite, everywhere; in Egypt, Babylon, Samos and Sinai . 331

XVII. TIME MEASURES, and the Great Pyramid's fixation of absolute dates, for early human history, by high astronomy . 359

XVIII. MOSAIC AND EGYPTIAN WISDOM, derived from opposite sources 389

XIX. MECHANICAL DATA, in Channels, Passages, and Chambers 414

XX. SABBATIC AND MESSIANIC TIME, in Queen's Chamber, Grand Gallery, First Ascending-passage, and Entrance-passage 446

(CHRONOLOGICAL PASSAGE-FLOOR MEASURINGS PP. 471.)

PART V.

XXI. HIEROLOGISTS AND CHRONOLOGISTS, Pyramids and Sphinx 483

XXII. THE SHEPHERD KINGS, Early Egyptian Dynasties; Palestinian Architect of Great Pyramid; Noachian Deluge date . 513

XXIII. SCRIPTURE TESTIMONY, and the sacredly Historic and Prophetic Christian Grand Gallery; the Gospel Mission step . 535

XXIV. PREPARATIONS FOR A SINGLE UNIVERSAL METROLOGY; but of which of two most opposite kinds? The rise of Manasseh; Apocalyptic injunctions to measure. The two Sabbaths . 559

XXV. GENERAL SUMMATION: Secular and Sacred, National and Future, in witnessing to God and his Christ . 593

APPENDICES.

APPENDIX I. Biographical Notice of John Taylor of "The Great Pyramid," by Mrs. Piazzi Smyth . 637

, II. The Royal Society, London; and its published Base-side length of the Great Pyramid: an American opinion upon it 653

, III. Time Indications of the Grand Gallery in the Great Pyramid; by Mr. James Simpson . 659

INDEX . . . . . . . . . . 667 GREAT PYRAMID GRAPHICAL ILLUSTRATIONS.

(ENGRAVED BY ALEX. RITCHIE, EDINBURGH.)

GENERAL FEATURES AND COMPARATIVE BEARINGS OF GREAT PYRAMID.

I. FRONTISPIECE: THE STONE ARCHITECTURE OF ALL AGES, IN TIME AND IN HEIGHT.

II. GEOGRAPHY OF THE GREAT PYRAMID, BOTH FOR EGYPT AND THE WORLD.

III. CHOROGRAPHY OF THE GREAT PYRAMID AND ITS NEIGHBOURS.

IV. VERTICAL SECTIONS OF ALL THE JEEZEH GROUP OF PYRAMIDS.

V. VERTICAL SECTIONS OF ALL THE RESIDUAL PYRAMIDS OF EGYPT.

EXTERIOR OF GREAT PYRAMID AND ENTRANCE THERETO.

VI. VERTICAL SECTION OF GREAT PYRAMID AND ITS ROCK-FAST HILL, Looking West.

VII. GROUND PLAN OF THE GREAT PYRAMID.

VIII. CASING - STONE REMNANTS OF THE GREAT AND SECOND PYRAMIDS.

IX. CHAMBER AND PASSAGE SYSTEM OF GREAT PYRAMID.

X. ENTRANCE INTO GREAT PYRAMID, FRONT ELEVATION, AND SIDE SECTION.

DETAILS OF PASSAGES AND PRELIMINARY CHAMBERS. XI. QUEEN'S CHAMBER, SO-CALLED, IN GREAT PYRAMID. XII. LOWER END OF GRAND GALLERY IN THE GREAT PYRAMID.

PLATE

XIII. END-ON VIEWS OF LENGTH IN THE GRAND GALLERY; Arabs ascending the Grand Gallery, southward; Arabs descending the Grand Gallery, northward.

XIV. UPPER END OF GRAND GALLERY AND THE ANTE-CHAMBER.

XV. THE ANTE-CHAMBER AND ITS WALLS, OPENED OUT; Also the Boss on the Granite Leaf.

DETAILS OF KING'S CHAMBER.

XVI. THE KING'S CHAMBER AND ITS ACCESSORIES.

XVII. WALLS OF THE KING'S CHAMBER OPENED OUT. The Coffer, Sunk portion of Walls, &c.

HISTORY OF THE GREAT PYRAMID.

XVIII. EGYPTOLOGICAL SIGNATURES OF EARLY EGYPTIAN KINGS; Also Doctors Grant's and Waller's Orders of Polish of the Great Pyramid's Granite Surfaces.

XIX. TOMB OF KING CHEOPS, FAR OUTSIDE THE GREAT PYRAMID.

PROPORTIONS AND GEOMETRICAL THEORY OF THE GREAT PYRAMID.

XX. SIZE AND SHAPE OF GREAT PYRAMID, MEASURED WITHOUT. XXI. SIZE AND SHAPE OF GREAT PYRAMID, FROM TESTIMONY WITHIN.

XXII. CONSTRUCTION HYPOTHESIS OF PASSAGE ANGLES AND CHAMBER EMPLACEMENTS IN GREAT PYRAMID.

ASTRONOMY OF THE GREAT PYRAMID.

XXIII. THE ANTEDILUVIAN STARRY SKIES, AS SEEN ON THE GREAT PYRAMID PRINCIPLES OF OBSERVING.

XXIV. THE STARRY SKIES AS SEEN AT THE GREAT PYRAMID AT ITS DATE OF FOUNDATION, 2170 B.C.

XXV. THE STARRY SKIES OF THE PRESENT TIME, AS SEEN AT THE GREAT PYRAMID ON ITS PRINCIPLES OF OBSERVING; viz. the old Dragon Pole-Star crossing the Meridian below the Pole, and thereby emphasizing the one Zodiacal constellation then on the Meridian above the Pole.

THE THREE KEYS

REQUIRED FOR THE OPENING OF THE GREAT PYRAMID.

KEY THE FIRST.

The key of pure mathematics, as supplied chiefly in mediaeval and modern times, and mostly by the labours of private philosophers in their own studies, sometimes to absolute truth, sometimes to such close approaches thereto, as to be certain up to the last figure of any fraction yet arrived at; as, for one example much used and illustrated in the Great Pyramid, or the value of the circumference of a circle in terms of its diameter, =

3.14159 | 26535 | 89793 | 23846 | 26433

83279 | 50288 | 41971 | 69399 | 37510

58209 | 74944 | 59230 | 78164 | 06286 + &c., &c., &c.

KEY THE SECOND.

The key of applied mathematics, or of astronomical and physical science, as furnished by the latest and best approximations of all the first-class nations of the world; who have been working publicly for centuries and at a cost of millions of money, and have attained, or are on the point of attaining, an accuracy, sometimes only in the second figure, sometimes in the third, fourth, fifth, or even lower figures, according to the greater, or less, difficulty in nature of the question concerned. As thus:—

Polar diameter of the earth = between 500,378,000 and 500,560,000 British inches.

Mean equatorial diameter of the earth between 502,080,000 and 502,230,000 British inches.

Mean density of the earth between 5.3 and 6.5; the two latest determinations by powerful government institutions.

Mean distance of the earth from the sun between 91 and 93 millions of miles, British.

Obliquity of the ecliptic in 1877 A.D. = 23°27′17′′·9 to 23°27′19′′·0. xvi

Length of the solar tropical year in mean solar days = 365.24222 to 365.24224.

Precession of the equinoxes in years, = 25,816 to 25,870.

KEY THE THIRD.

The key of positive human history—past, present, and future—as supplied in some of its leading points and chief religious connections by Divine Revelation to certain chosen and inspired men of the Hebrew race, through ancient and mediæval times; but now to be found, by all the world, collected in

THE OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS.

There is no twisting, no forcing needed in using any of these Keys; and least of all, is any alteration of them required for this particular purpose.

Wherefore no man who either vainly maintains a sensibly different value of π , or demands in these latter days new principles of Astronomy, or insists on having private interpretations of the open and published word of Scripture, need hope to arrive at the true explanation of

THE GREAT PYRAMID.

PLATE II.

Longitude East from Greenwich

Lat

North

32.0

Lat

North

32.0

LONGITUDE MERIDIAN

Ismailia

DESERT

ANCIENT MEMPHIS

DESERT

Suez

RED

SEA

THE GREAT PYRAMID IN THE CENTRE.

AND AT THE SAME TIME AT THE BORDER OF THE

SECTOR-SHAPED LAND OF LOWER EGYPT.

LOWER EGYPT IN THE GEOGRAPHICAL CENTRE OF

THE LAND SURFACE OF THE WHOLE WORLD

(on the Equal Surface Projection)

PIACEI SWITCH. DLL

A. RITCHIE & SON, EDIN.

MAP OF THE PYRAMIDS OF JEEZEH. ON THEIR FLAT TOPPED HILL OF ROCK, RISING JUST SOUTH OF THE LOW DELTA LAND OF LOWER EGYPT. AND WEST OF THE NORTHERN END OF THE SINGLE LONGITUDINAL VALLEY. BY WHICH THE NILE BRINGS ITS WATERS THROUGH 36' OF LATITUDE, FROM THE EQUATORIAL LAKES.

PLATE IV.

PIAZZI SMVIM, DIL

A. RITCHIE & SON, EDIN

PLATE IV.

THE GREAT PYRAMID.

THE SECOND PYRAMID.

GROUND PLAN OF THIS PYRAMID WHEN COMPLETE.

SOUTH.

NORTH.

GROUND PLAN OF THIS PYRAMID WHEN COMPLETE.

SOUTH.

NORTH.

THE THIRD PYRAMID.

THE FOURTH PYRAMID.

THE FIFTH PYRAMID.

THE SIXTH PYRAMID.

THE SEVENTH PYRAMID.

THE EIGHTH PYRAMID.

THE NINTH PYRAMID.

ALL THE PYRAMIDS OF JEEZEH IN VERTICAL AND MERIDIAN SECTION.

THEIR ANCIENT SIZE AND SHAPE BEING SHOWN BY THE DOTTED TRIANGLES OVER THEM.

Scale scale of Nature.

PLATE V.

The more finished Pyramid of Abou Roash Lat.30'4

Pyramid of Zarret el Arrian Lat.29'57

Pyramid of Reegeh Lat.29'56

Abooseir N. Pyr Lat.29'54

Abooseir Middle Pyr Lat.29'54

Abooseir G. Pyr Lat.29'54

Abooseir Small Pyr Lat.29'54

Saccara Pyr.1 Lat.29'53

Saccara Pyr.2 Lat.29'53

Saccara Pyr.3 or 4 Lat.29'53

Saccara Pyr.4 Lat.29'53

Saccara Pyr.5

Saccara Pyr.6

Saccara Pyr.7

Saccara Pyr.8

Saccara Pyr.9

Pyramid of Mustabet of Faroon Lat.29'53

Northern Stone Pyramid of Dashoor Lat.29'19

Southern Stone Pyramid of Dashoor Lat.29'4

N. Pyr of Dashoor

Small Pyramid of Dashoor

Northern Pyramid of Light Lat.29'38

Southern Pyramid of Light Lat.29'37

Pyramid of Illahoon Lat.29'17

Pyramid of Howam Lat.29'18

Pyr.1 of Biahmo Lat.29'26

ALL THE PYRAMIDS OF EGYPT. /other than those of Jeezah/

beginning from the North and going to the South of the country:

SCALE - SCALE OF NATURE

PIACE SMITH. DEL

PLATE VI.

PLEASE SAVE IN DLL!

A RITCHIE & SON EDIN

PLATE VII.

NORTH-SIDE

NORTHERN VENTILATING

Channel

Lane of Grand Gallery

1st Ascensory Passage

King's Chamber

Southern Ventilating Channel

Howard Vyse's resultless hole.

SOUTH-SIDE.

SCALE 2500 OF NATURE

GROUND PLAN OF THE GREAT PYRAMID,

TOGETHER WITH ITS HORIZONTAL SECTIONAL AREA AT THE LEVEL OF

THE KING'S CHAMBER

SCALE OF BRITISH INCHES

PLATE VIII.

EXAMPLE OF THE CASING-STONES OF A PYRAMID, SUPER-POSED ON THE RECT-ANGULAR MASONRY COURSES: FROM A PHOTOGRAPH BY PS. OF THE SUMMIT OF THE 2 n PYR.

REMNANT OF THE ORIGINAL CASING-STONE SURFACE OF THE GREAT PYRAMID.

NEAR THE MIDDLE OF ITS NORTHERN FOOT. AS DISCOVERED BY THE EXCAVATIONS OF COL HOWARD VYSE IN 1837

PIONEER SWIMM DEL!

PLATE IX

CHAMBER AND PASSAGE SYSTEM OF GREAT PYRAMID, enlarged from the Frontispiece.

Horizontal Masonry courner from the base upwards.

FIRST ASCENDING PASSAGE

NATURAL ROCK

levelled on top previous to building

1542 - 285 or floor distance in P. Inches from North beginning of Grand Gallery to North beginning of Entrance Passage.

SCALE OF BRITISH INCHES.

FRONT ELEVATION Looking South.

OF THE ANGLE STONES AND PRESENTLY DILAPIDATED MASONRY.

OVER THE ONE AND SOLE ORIGINAL ENTRANCE PASSAGE INTO THE GREAT PYRAMID.

From a Photograph by P.S.

VERTICAL LONGITUDINAL SECTION.

looking West.

OF THE UPPER, NORTH. END. OR BEGINNING OF THE ENTRANCE PASSAGE

INTO GREAT PYRAMID.

SCALE OF BRITISH INCHES.

11422 3007M. DELL

A. RITCHIE & SON, EDIN*

PLATE XI.

FIRST LINE EMERGENCY DEPT

a R = (C + H) C + H O = C O + N^{2-}

PIAZZI MVTH. DELT

A RITCHIE & SON. EDIN

VERTICAL TRANSVERSE SECTION. LOOKING SOUTHWARD. FROM THE LOWER, OR NORTH END. OR BEGINNING OF GRAND GALLERY. GR. PYR?

VERTICAL TRANSVERSE SECTION LOOKING NORTHWARD. FROM NEAR THE UPPER OR SOUTH END. AND TERMINATION OF GRAND GALLERY. GR. PYR?

SCALE OF BRITISH INCHES FOR THE SECTIONAL PARTS ONLY

A RITCHIE & SON, EDIN

VERTICAL MERIDIAN SECTION From Gir Gallery through ANTE-CHAMBER to Kings Ch' Looking Eastward

PIAZZI SMITH, DLL?

A. RITCHIE & SON, EDIN

THE BOSS ON THE GRANITE LEAF

It real size.

SOUTH WALL

NORTH WALL

L

L

L

G

G

G

CEILING

G

G

G

EAST WALL

G

G

G

WEST G

WALL

BOSS

Granite

NORTH WALL

In Sectional parts.

single line shading = Lime stone

crossed lines = Granite.

SOUTH WALL

SIDES OF ANTE-CHAMBER.

OPENED OUT ON PLANE OF EAST WALL.

Lime stone blocks marked L; others are Granite.

Scale of British Inches

D14222 9MPOW DELY

A RITCHIE & SON. EDIN 9

PLATE XVII.

KING'S CHAMBER

THE COFFER

SOUTHERN END OF GRAND GALLERY.

VERTICAL SECTION (Looking West) OF KING'S CHAMBER; ALSO OF ANTE-CHAMBER, SOUTH END OF GRAND GALLERY, AND VYSE'S HOLLOWS OF CONSTRUCTION, ABOVE KING'S CHAMBER. CROSSED LINES INDICATE GRANITE.

Scale of British Inches.

PIA22: SMITH DELL

D $ J A & GRANTS EXAMPLES or ORDERS of GRANITE WORKED-SURFACES in the interior of the Great Dynmid.

ALTES REICH

Dynastie I-V.

No. 1-21.

PLATE XVIII.

DYNASTIE I

MEMPHIS

DYNASTIE II

MEMPHIS

DYNASTIE III

MEMPHIS

DYNASTIE IV

MEMPHIS

DYNASTIE V

MEMPHIS

CHEOPS. (XUFU.OR SUPHIS.) THE FIRST EGYPTIAN KING WHO ADOPTED THE SYMBOL OF A PYRAMID

AFTER HIS NAME.

Photo lithographed from D'Lépsius, Königs Buch der Allen Adjypter, 1838. by W.B. Doris.

PLATE XIX.

PLAN OF TOMB

NORTH SIDE.

AN ANCIENT TOMB. 1000 B.S.S.E.

of S.E. foot of Gr Pyramid.

FULFILLING THE DESCRIPTION OF HERODOTUS.

as to the place where KING CHEOPS

was buried; viz. not in Gr Pyramid

but in a subterranean island.

surrounded by the waters of the "NILE," which filter through the intervening rock up to their level in the River at the time.

WEST SIDE.

D VYGE IN 1837 AND 1838 A.D.

1837 AND 1838 A.D.

IN 1837 A.D.

1837 A.D.

NORTH OF PYRAMID HILL IN 1865 A.D.

Subterranean Chamber Great Pyramid.

PYRAMID'S PAVEMENT BASE.

HIGH NILE LEVEL AT DATE 2170

HIGH NILE LEVEL OBSERVED BY HOWARD LOW NILE LEVEL OBSERVED BY HOWARD VYBE IN WATER LEVEL IN VYBES "Sweet Water" WELL WATER LEVEL IN SHAFRES TOMB WELL IN 18

LEVEL OF SAND PLAIN TO THE EAST AND NORTH

Lowest part of the bermouth the vertical depth in inches below the plane of great P

PIAZZI SIMPIN DELT

A. RITCHIE & BON, EDIN a

VERTICAL SECTION or TOMB. (LOOKING WEST.) HYDRAULIC REFERENCE DATA FOR SAID TOMB.

PLATE XX.

9131·05 P. I. or

365·242 S.C.

DIRECT VERTICAL SECTION OF

GREAT PYRAMID.

12913·26 P. I. or

516·530 S.C.

DIAGONAL VERTICAL SECTION OF

GREAT PYRAMID.

EQUALITY OF BOUNDARIES.

128° 8' 45.7

51.61.14.3

π ANGLES OF CASING STONES OF

GREAT PYRAMID;

Great Pyramid's square base and circle with radius-Pyr. Vert height

GREAT PYRAMID.

As affected by its external slope and horizontal masonry courses.

π = 3 · 14159 · 26535 + &c.

= \log 0 · 49714 · 98726 + &c

EQUALITY OF AREAS NO.1.

EQUALITY OF AREAS NO.2.

10303.30 P.I.

11626.02 P.I.

Area of square base of Great Pyramid=area of a circle whose diameter is given+100 in the Ante-chamber

Area of Circle with G.Pyr. height for radius=Area of square whose length of side is given+100 in the Ante chamber

P1 PYRAMID INCHES

S.C-SACRED CUBIT

10303 30 P. I

PIAZZ: SMITH DELL

A RITCHIE & SON, EDIN

EQUALITY OF AREAS N: 3.

Circle with Diameter

Vert. Height of G. Pyr.

Square with side

computed by π.

11626·02 = Ante chamber length × 100 = Sun's distance from the earth

in terms of the "breadth of the Earth" from Pole to Pole.

365 · 242 + &c. =

= Base side length of Gr Pyr²

in Sacred Cubits.

412 · 132 King's Ch Length

in P inches

EQUATION OF BOUNDARIES AND AREAS.

CIRCLES AND SQUARES INCHES INSIDE AND SACRED CUBITS

OUTSIDE GREAT PYRAMID

P A Z Z I S M Y T H D E L

GENERAL PASSAGE ANGLE OF GR?

PYR

ADB = Direct or right vertical section of Great Pyramid from North to south.

EFGH = Square and Circle of equal area to above.

Angle BCS = 26° 18' 10"

LENGTHS AND PLACES OF PASSAGES IN GREAT PYR

Add to Fig. 1, IC trisected & CK bisected by horizontal lines, then

ZY parallel to CS, marks entrance passage.

WT at an equal but opposite angle marks First Asounding Passage and the Ground Gallery.

Angle BCP where CP is side of equal area square = 30° = Latitude, approx.

GROUND PLAN OF THE CIRCLES OF THE HEAVENS ABOVE THE SITE OF THE THEN UNBUILT GREAT PYRAMID: AT THE ANTEDILUVIAN DATE OF 3440 B.C. a DRACONIS ON MERIDIAN BELOW POLE, AT ENTRANCE PASSAGE ANGLE; PLEIADES AND VERNAL EQUINOX NOWHERE VISIBLE.

GROUND PLAN OF THE

CIRCLES OF THE HEAVENS ABOVE THE GREAT PYRAMID, AT ITS EPOCH

OF FOUNDATION, AT MIDNIGHT OF AUTUMNAL EQUINOX

2170 B.C.

Q. DRACONIS ON MERIDIAN BELOW POLE, AT ENTRANCE PASSAGE ANGLE: AND PLEIADES ON MERIDIAN ABOVE POLE IN O.M.R.A.; OR COINCIDENTLY WITH VERNAL EQUINOX.

GROUND PLAN OF THE CIRCLES OF THE HEAVENS ABOVE THE PRESENT GREAT PYRAMID IN THE AUTUMN OF 1881 A.D.

Q DRACONIS ON MERIDIAN. BELOW POLE, BUT AT SEVEN TIMES EN. PASS. ANCLE;

PLEIADES FAR FROM MERIDIAN. EASTWARD

VERNAL EQUINOX FAR FROM MERIDIAN. WESTWARD;

BUT THE DISTANCE OF THEIR MERIDIANS APART. INDICATING ON THE PRECESSIONAL DIAL

THE AGE OF THE GREAT PYRAMID.

PART I. THE GEOGRAPHY, AND THE EXTERIOR, OF THE GREAT PYRAMID.

"IN THAT DAY SHALL THERE BE AN ALTAR UNTO THE LORD IN THE MIDST OF THE LAND OF EGYPT, AND A PILLAR AT THE BORDER THEREOF TO THE LORD.

"AND IT SHALL BE FOR A SIGN AND A WITNESS UNTO THE LORD OF HOSTS IN THE LAND OF EGYPT."—ISAIAH XIX. 19, 20.

"WHO HATH LAID THE MEASURES THEREOF, IF THOU KNOWEST? OR WHO HATH STRETCHED THE LINE UPON IT?

"WHEREUPON ARE THE FOUNDATIONS THEREOF FASTENED? OR WHO LAID THE CORNER STONE THEREOF;

"WHEN THE MORNING STARS SANG TOGETHER, AND ALL THE SONS OF GOD SHOUTED FOR JOY?"—JOB XXXVIII. 5,6,7.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY STATEMENT:

Of the General Question of the Great Pyramid.

THE ancient pyramids of Egypt form somewhat of a long clustering group of gigantic monuments, extending chiefly over about a degree of latitude. They begin in the north, at the apex, or southern head of the triangular-shaped "Delta" land of "Lower Egypt," and stretch thence further southward along almost seventy miles of the western side of the Nile.

Within that nearly meridian distance, one traveller claims to have noted thirty-five, another rashly says sixty-seven; and another still, but in his case going beyond what is strictly Egypt, and ascending its colossal river as far as Meroe, Noori, and Barkal in Ethiopia, mentions one hundred and thirty as existing there. But they are mediæval rather than ancient, small instead of large, and with very little about them either in form or material to remind of the more typical early examples entirely in stone; or those really mathematically shaped old pyramids, which, though few in number, are what have made the world-wide fame of their land's architecture from before the beginning of history.

Now it is precisely with those grander specimens only, or the oldest examples of the country (not more, even including some that are positively ruinous, than thirty-eight in number), that we have to do in this book; and selecting even further amongst them, we find, that of all the more important instances that have yet attracted the attention of mankind as being really typical, there are none to equal the combined fame and antiquity: the purity of shape and excellence of both preservation and construction, of the several stone pyramids near Jeezeh;* a hill in view of the ancient Memphis, and not far, though separated by the river, from the present city of Cairo.

The Jeezeh pyramidal group is situated, like all the others, on the western, or more thoroughly African, lone, and desert, side of the river; but close to the southern apex, and as it were the very point of origin of the sector-shaped plain of Lower Egypt. The group, in its strangely massive, yet crystalline shaped, architecture, is conspicuously planted there on the utmost northeastern edge of an elevated rocky steppe; so that while it overlooks on one side the sand-strewn wastes extending back to the great Sahara, it beholds on the other the green and fertile plains of Nile, about 130 feet in level below. But amongst these Jeezeh Pyramids, again, there is one that transcends in intellectual value all the rest; one that has been involuntarily by all the world named for ages past the "Great Pyramid"; and which stands out, the more it is examined into, distinct and distinguished from all its fellows by its not only giant, but particular, size, its wondrous internal structure, its superior age, more frequent historical notice by men of various nations, and yet, the hitherto inscrutable destiny of its purpose; the greatest of the seven old wonders of the world in the days of the Greeks, and the only one of them all, which is still in existence on the surface of the earth.

With many of the smaller and later pyramids there is little doubt about their objects; for, built by the Egyptians as sepulchres for the great Egyptian dead, such dead, both Pharaohs and their relatives, were buried in them, and with all the written particulars, pictorial accompaniments, and idolatrous adornments of that too graphic religion, which the fictile nation on the Nile ever delighted in. But as we approach, ascending the stream of ancient time, in any careful chronological survey of pyramidal structures, to the "Great Pyramid," Egyptian emblems are gradually left behind; and in, and throughout, that mighty builded mass, which all history and all tradition, both ancient and modern, agree in representing as the first in point of date of the whole Jeezeh, and even the whole Egyptian,* group, the earliest stone building also positively known to have been erected in any country,—we find in all its finished parts not a vestige of heathenism, nor the smallest indulgence in anything approaching to idolatry; no Egyptology of the kind denounced by Moses and the prophets of Israel; nor even the most distant allusion to Sabaism, and its elemental worship of sun, or moon, or any of the starry host of heaven.

I have specified "finished parts," because in certain unfinished, internal portions of the constructive masonry of the Great Pyramid broken into by Colonel Howard-Vyse in 1837, there are some rude Egyptian markings, in a few daubs of red paint only, and for a mere temporary mechanical purpose to be presently explained; and I also except, as a matter of course, any inscriptions inflicted on the same pyramid by modern travellers, even though they have attempted, like the Prussian savants of 1843 A.D., to cut their names in their own happily shallow ideas of the ancient hieroglyphics of the old, thorough-paced, Egyptian idolaters elsewhere. But with these simple exceptions we can most positively say, that both exterior and interior are absolutely free from all engraved or sculptured work, as well as from everything relating to any known form of idolatry or erring man's theotechnic devices. From all those hieratic emblems, therefore, which from first to last have utterly overlaid every Egyptian temple proper, as well as all Egypt's obelisks, sphinxes, statues, tombs, and whatever other monuments they, the Egyptians, did build up at any certain historical and Pharaonic epoch in connection with their peculiar, and, alas! degrading religion.

Was the Great Pyramid, then, erected before the invention of hieroglyphics, and previous to the birth of the false Egyptian religion?

No! for there, both history, tradition, and recent exploratory discoveries elsewhere, testified to by many travellers and antiquaries, are perfectly in accord; and assure us that the Egyptian nation was established, was powerful, and its spiritually vile hieratic system largely developed, though not arrived at its full proportions, at the time of the erection of the Great Pyramid; that that structure was even raised by the labour of the Egyptian population ruled over at the time by an Egyptian king;* but under some remarkable compulsion and constraint which positively forbade them from putting their unmistakable decorations and elsewhere accustomed inscriptions on the finished building; more especially too from identifying it in any manner, direct or indirect, with their impure and even bestial form of worship.

This very important conclusion results from the "quarry marks" of the workmen (see Colonel Howard-Vyse's volumes, "Pyramids of Gizeh," London, 1840), being found in red paint on concealed parts of the stones, and in interior places of the structural mass of masonry never intended to be seen. The marks are superficial and rude in the extreme, but are evidently in the Egyptian language or manner freely handled; and in so far prove that they were put in by Egyptians, and of the age or under the reign of that Egyptian king variously called Shofo, Khufu and Cheops. They are excessively rough, no doubt, but quite sufficient for their alleged purpose, viz. checks for workmen, whereby to recognize a stone duly prepared according to orders at the quarry, miles away, and to see it properly placed in its intended position in the building.

Still further that these marks were not meant as ornaments in the structure, or put on after the stones were built into it, is abundantly evidenced by some of them being upside down, and some having been partly pared away in adjusting the block into its position (see Colonel Howard-Vyse's plates of them); and, finally, by the learned Dr. Birch's interpretation of a number of the marks, which seem from thence to be mostly short dates, and directions to the workmen as to which stones were for the south, and which for the north, wall.

These markings, moreover, have only been discovered in those dark holes or hollows, the so-called "chambers," but much rather "hollows of construction," broken into by Colonel Howard-Vyse above the "King's Chamber" of the Great Pyramid. There, also, you see other traces of the steps of mere practical work, such as the "bat-holes" in the stones, by which the heavy blocks were doubtless lifted to their places, and everything is left perfectly rough. Nor was there the least occasion for finishing it up, rubbing out the marks, or polishing off the holes, for these void spaces were sealed up, or had been built up outside in solid masonry (excepting only the lowest one, known for a century as "Davison's Chamber," and having its own small passage of approach from the south-east corner of the Grand Gallery), and were never intended to be used as chambers for human visitation or living purposes. In all the other chambers and passages, on the contrary, intended to be visited, and approached by admirably constructed white-stone passages, the masonry was finished off with the skill and polish almost of a jeweller; and in them neither quarry marks nor "bat holes," nor painted marks, nor hieroglyphics of any sort or kind, are to be seen: excepting always those modern hieroglyphics which Dr. Lepsius put up over the entrance into the Great Pyramid, "on a space five feet in breadth by four feet in height," in praise of the then sovereign of Prussia; and which have recently misled a learned Chinese envoy, by name Pin-ch'-un, into most absurdly claiming a connection between the Great Pyramid and the early monuments of his own country. (See Athenaum, May 21, 1870 p. 677.) According to Herodotus, Manetho, and other ancient authorities, the Egyptians hated, and yet implicitly obeyed, the mysterious, and coercive though nonmilitary, power that made them work on the Great Pyramid; and when that power was again relaxed or removed, though they still hated its name to such a degree as to forbear from even mentioning it except by a peculiar circumlocution,—yet with involuntary bending to the sway of a really superior intelligence once amongst them, they took to imitating in other buildings, as well as they could, though without understanding, a few of the more ordinary mechanical features of that great work on which they had been so long employed; and they even rejoiced for a time to adapt them, so far as they could be adapted, to their own more favourite ends, egotistic glorifications, and other such congenial ideas.

Hence the numerous quasi-copies, for sepulchral purposes, of the Great Pyramid, which are now, in the shape of other pyramids, to be observed further south, along that western side of Egypt; always betraying, though, on close examination, the most profound ignorance of their noble model's chiefest internal features, as well as of all its niceties of angle and cosmic harmonies of linear measurement. And such mere failures, as those later tombic pyramids, are never found, even then, at any very great number of miles away from the site, nor any great number of years behind the date, of the colossal parent work on the Jeezeh hill.

The ostensible architectural idea, indeed, of that one grand primeval monument, though expensively copied during a few centuries, yet never wholly or permanently took the fancy of the ancient Egyptians. It had, or rather simulated before them to have, some one or two suitabilities to their favourite employment of lasting sepulture, and its accompanying rites; so they tried what they knew of it, for such purpose.

But they soon found that it did not admit of their troops of priests, nor the easy introduction of their unwieldy "sacred" animals. Nor bulls, nor crocodiles, nor the requisite multitudes of abject worshippers, could enter a pyramid with the facility of their own temples; and so, on the whole, mature Egypt preferred them. Those accordingly more open and columned, as well as symbolically sculptured and multitudinously inscribed structures, of their own entire elaboration, are the only ones which we now find to have held, from their first invention, an uninterrupted reign through all the course of ancient and mediæval Egyptian history, or that period when Egypt was most rich, most powerful, most wicked; and to reflect themselves continuously in the placid, natural Nile, from one end of the long-drawn Hamitic land to the other. They, therefore, those Karnac and Philc temple, with all their sins of idolatry on their heads, are, architecturally, Egypt. Thebes, too, with its hundred adorned Pylon templegates, and statues, and basso-relievos, and incised outlines of false gods, must be confessed to be intensely Egypt. But the Great Pyramid is, in its origin and nature, something pure and perfectly different.

Under whose direction, then, and for what purpose, was the Great Pyramid built; whence did so foreign, and really untasteful, an idea to Egypt come; who was the mysterious carrier of it to that land; and under what sort of special compulsion was it that, in his day, to his command though he was not their king, the Egyptians, King and people all alike, laboured for years in a cause which they appreciated not; and gave, in that primeval age of generally sparse, and pastoral, population only, their unrivalled mechanical skill and compacted numerical strength for an end which they did not at the time understand; and which they never even came to understand, much less to like, in all their subsequent national ages?

This has been indeed a mystery of mysteries, but may yet prove fruitful in the present advancing age of knowledge of all kinds to inquire into further: for though theories without number have been tried and failed in, by ancient Greeks and mediæval Arabians, by French, English, Germans, and Americans, their failures partly pave, and render so much the safer, for us the road by which we must set out. Pave it poorly, perhaps, or not very far; for their whole result has, up to the present time, been little more than this, that the authors of those attempts are either found to be repeating idle tales, told them by those who knew no more about the subject than themselves; or skipping all the really crucial points of application for their theories which they should have attended to; or, finally, like some of the best and ablest men who have given themselves to the question, fairly admitting that they were entirely beaten.

Hence the exclusive notion of temples to the sun and moon, or for sacred fire, or holy water, or burial-places, and nothing but burial-places, of kings, or granaries for Joseph, or astronomical observatories, or defences to Egypt against being invaded by the sands of the African desert, or places of resort for mankind in a second deluge, or of safety when the heavens should fall, have been for a long time past proved untenable; and the Great Pyramid stands out now, far more clearly than it did in the time of Herodotus (no less than 2,400 years ago), as both a prehistoric monument, and yet rivalling some of the best things of modern times, not only in practical execution and workmanship, but in its eminently grand design and pure conception; or in forming a testimony which, though in Egypt, is yet not at all of, or according to, historical Egypt, and whose true and full explanation must be still to come.

Under these circumstances it is, that a new idea, based not on ancient hieroglyphics, profane learning, old Egyptian sculpture, or modern Egyptology springing therefrom, but on new scientific measures of the still remaining actual facts of ancient masonic construction in number, weight, and measure, was recently given to the world by the late Mr. John Taylor, of London, in a book published in 1859.* He had not visited the Pyramid himself, but had been for thirty years previously collecting and comparing all the published accounts, and specially all the better-certified mensurations (for some were certainly poor indeed) of those who had been there; and while so engaged, gradually and quite spontaneously (as he described to me by letter), the new theory opened out before him.

Though mainly a rigid induction from tangible facts of scientific bearing and character, Mr. Taylor's result was undoubtedly assisted by means of the mental and spiritual point of view from whence he commenced his researches, and which is, in the main, simply this:—

That whereas other writers have generally esteemed that the unknown existency who directed the building of the Great Pyramid (and to whom the Egyptians, in their traditions and for ages afterwards, gave an immoral and even abominable character) must, therefore, have been very bad indeed,—so that the world at large, from that time to this, has ever been fond of standing on, kicking, and insulting that dead lion whom they really knew nothing of,—he, Mr. John Taylor, seeing how religiously bad the idol-serving Egyptians themselves were, was led to conclude that he, whom they hated (and could never sufficiently abuse) might perhaps have been pre-eminently good; or was, at all events, of a different and very much purer religious faith from that of the land of Ham.

Then, remembering, with mutatis mutandis, what Christ himself says respecting the suspicion to be attached when all the world speaks well of any one, Mr. Taylor followed up this idea by what the Old Testament does record touching the most vital and distinguishing part of the Israelitish religion; and which is therein described, some centuries after the building of the Great Pyramid, as notoriously an "abomination to the Egyptians": and combining this with certain unmistakable and undisputed by any one, historical facts, he successfully deduced sound and Christian reasons for believing that the directors of the building, or rather the author of its design and those who under his more immediate guidance controlled the actual builders of the Great Pyramid, were by no means Egyptians, but of the chosen race, descendants of Shem, and in the line of, though preceding, Abraham; so early indeed as to be closer to Noah than to Abraham. Men, at all events, who had been enabled by Divine favour to appreciate the appointed idea, as to the absolute necessity of a sacrifice and atonement for the sins of man by the blood and the act of a Divine Mediator, as in the most modern and Evangelical form of Christianity. This very crucial idea was nevertheless of an antiquity coeval with the contest between Abel and Cain, and had descended through the Flood to certain predestined families of mankind; but yet was an idea or principle in religion which no one of Egyptian born would ever contemplate with a moment's patience. For every ancient Egyptian, from first to last, and every Pharaoh of them more especially, just as with the Ninevites and Babylonians generally, was an unmitigated Cainite in thought, act, and feeling to the very backbone; confident of and professing nothing so much, or so constantly, as his own perfect righteousness, and absolute freedom by his own innate purity, and by his own invariable, complete, and unswerving rectitude throughout his whole life, from every kind of sin, large or small, against God or man.

On this ground it was that Mr. Taylor took his stand; and, after disobeying the world's long-formed public opinion of too passively obedient accord with profane Egyptian tradition, and after thereby also setting at nought some of the most time-honoured prejudices of modern Egyptological scholars, so far as to give a full, fair, and impartial examination to the whole case from the beginning, announced that he had discovered in some of the arrangements and measures of the Great Pyramid—when corrected for injuries of intervening time—certain scientific results, which speak of neither Egyptian nor Babylonian, nor Roman nor Greek, but of something much more than, as well as quite different from, any ordinary human ways. For, besides coming forth suddenly in the primeval history of its own times without any preliminary period of childhood, or known ages of evolution and preparation, the actual facts at the Great Pyramid, in the shape of builted proofs of an exact numerical knowledge of the grander cosmical phenomena of both earth and heavens, not only rise above, and far above, the extremely limited and almost infantine knowledge of science humanly attained to by any of the Gentile nations of 4,000, 3,000, 2,000, nay, 1,000 years ago; but they are also, in whatever of the physical secrets of Nature they chiefly apply to, essentially above the best knowledge of man in our own time as well.

This is indeed a startling assertion, if true; but, from its subject, admits of the completest and most positive refutation, if untrue. For the exact science of the present day, compared with that of only a few hundred years ago, is a marvel of development; and is capable of giving out no uncertain sound, both in asserting itself, and stating not only the fact, but the order and time of, the invention of all the practical means humanly necessary, to the minutest steps of all separate discoveries yet made.

Much more then can this modern science of the mathematical kind speak with positiveness, when comparing its own presently extended knowledge against the little that was known to man, by his own efforts and by his then school methods, in those early epochs before accurate and numerical physical science had begun, or could have begun, to be seriously cultivated at all; that is, in the truly primeval day when men were few on the earth, and the Great Pyramid was built, finished, sealed up, and left as we see it now, dilapidations only excepted, awaiting its intended purpose, whatever that was to be, in a long subsequent day.

Let us proceed then to exactly such a scientific examination of all known Pyramid facts. Rather a dull proceeding perhaps at the beginning, to some, but necessary to all who would understand; and not too difficult for any, if taken step by step, and in order, more or less as follows.

CHAPTER II. GEOMETRICAL PROPORTIONS Of the outer surfaces of the Great Pyramid. John Taylor's First Discovery.

John Taylor's First Discovery.

MR. TAYLOR'S first-discovered theorem with regard to the Great Pyramid's shape, as derived from modern measures and calculations of it, is, that the Pyramid's height, in the original condition of the monument, when each one of its four sloping triangular sides was made into a perfect plane by means of the polished outer, sloping, surface of the bevelled casing-stones (see Plates VIII. and XX.), and when those sides, being continued up to their mutual intersections, terminated at, and formed the summit in, a point,—that its central, vertical height then was, to twice the breadth of its square base, as nearly as can be expressed by good monumental work, as the diameter to the circumference of a circle.

Or, that the vertical height of that Pyramid was to the length of one side of its base, when multiplied by 2, as the diameter to the circumference of a circle; i.e. as 1:3'14159+&c.; this last number being no other than our "Key the first" of page xv.

Or, again, as shown more recently by Mr. St. John Day, the area of the Great Pyramid's right section (i.e. a vertical, central section parallel to one of the sides of the horizontal base) is to the area of the base, as 1 to the same 3'14159, &c.

Or, as the same fact admits again of being differently expressed, the vertical height of the Great Pyramid is the radius of a theoretical circle, the length of whose curved circumference is equal to the sum of the lengths of the four straight sides of the actual and practical square base of the building.

Now this is neither more nor less than that celebrated practical problem of the mediæval and modern ages of Europe, "the squaring of the circle"; and the thing was thus practically done, truly and properly at the Great Pyramid, thousands of years before those mediæval days of our forefathers. For it was so accomplished by the architect who designed that pyramid, when,—over and above deciding that the building was to be a square-based pyramid,—with, of course, all the necessary mathematical innate relations which every square-based pyramid must have,—he also ordained that its height, which otherwise might have been anything, was to bear such a particular proportion to its breadth of base, as should bring out the nearest possible value of π as above mentioned; and which proportion not one out of any number of square-based pyramids would be otherwise necessarily endued with; and not one out of all the thirty-seven other measured pyramids in Egypt has been proved to be endowed with even approximately.

If, therefore, the quantity is really found built into the Great Pyramid with exactness, as well as magnitude, characterizing and utilizing the whole of that vast mass, it not only discriminates that building at once from all the other pyramids of Egypt, but proves that such a distinguishing feature must have been the result either of some most marvellous accident, or of some deep wisdom and settled, determined purpose; in this case, too, not less than 3,000 years in advance of the learned world in the building's own time. And that wisdom of the Great Pyramid's founder was apparently working in a peculiar confidence of scientific knowledge and historical trust, not for its contemporaries, to whom it explained nothing and showed very little, but for a most distant posterity; knowing well that a fundamental mathematical truth like π , would infallibly come to be understood both in and by itself alone, and be appreciated in the fact without any written inscription, in that then distant day when mathematics should at last be extensively and successfully cultivated amongst mankind, even as they are now.

A most just conclusion too; for experience has shown that neither mathematics nor mechanics can progress in any country in modern times without knowing well the numerical value and calculational quantity of π. In testimony whereof I may mention that in Dr. Olinthus Gregory's "Mathematics for Practical Men," third edition thereof by H. Law, C.E., at page 64 of Appendix, there is a Table 5, of "useful factors in calculation" (the calculations, be it remembered, of the hard-headed, strong-handed, exemplary working-men who construct our steam-engines, iron ships, railways, docks, and all other modern engineering), and consisting in each case of the few first figures, of that invaluable, but theoretically interminable, number or proportion π ,or 3'14159, &c., in no less than fifty-four different mathematical forms.

Inquiry into the Data.

Now of this scientific value of π there is, and can be, in the present day, no doubt in any good school or university all the world over; neither of the Great Pyramid's chronological priority over all the existing architectural monuments raised, and much more over all known books ever written, anywhere by any of the sons of men; nor again that the numbers which Mr. Taylor gives for the vertical height and double breadth of base of the Great Pyramid do realise the π proportion very closely.

But, as we are to take nothing for granted that we can inquire into ourselves in this book, it becomes our duty to ask what foundation John Taylor may have had, for the numbers which he has employed being really those which the Great Pyramid was anciently constructed to represent, or does contain within itself, when duly measured and corrected for modern dilapidations.

In this research I soon found it necessary to read rather extensively in a particular branch of literature, where the respective authors are not only numerous, but their accounts of mensurations, as a rule, most strangely contradictory. Colonel Howard-Vyse, in the second volume of his important work,\* published in 1840, gives either extracts from, or abstracts made with admirable fairness of, no less than seventy-one European and thirty-two Asiatic authors. Many more are now to be added to the list, and it is extremely instructive to read and compare them all. Unless, indeed, a very great number be read, no sufficient idea can be formed as to how little faith is often to be placed in the narratives even of highly, though too exclusively mentally, educated men of modern university, and competitive examination, times, on a very simple practical matter.

Thus it would be easy to string together a series of so-called measures, made by successive travellers (each of whom has published a-book), on the same parts of the Great Pyramid, which should show its blocks of solid stone expanding and contracting between different visits to it, like elastic india-rubber air-bags. But it will suffice for the present to indicate the necessity of

"The Pyramids of Gizeh." (Frazer, Regent Street, London.) CHAP.

II.] GEOMETRICAL PROPORTIONS.

weighing the evidence in every case most scrupulously; to have a large quantity of evidence, a great variety of observers, and to place in the first rank of authors to be studied in the original, closely in every word they have written, but not necessarily to be always followed therein :

Professor John Greaves, the Oxford astronomer in 1638.

The magnificent French, or Napoleon Bonaparte Expedition in 1799.

The princely Colonel Howard-Vyse in 1837; and

The learned, experienced, and amiable Sir Gardner Wilkinson from 1840 to 1858.

At present the Great Pyramid is, externally to the sight, a rough, huge mass; a gigantic cairn, as it were; but of a strikingly crystalline figure on the whole; and, on closer examination, regularly and masterly, built of worked and cemented limestone blocks, in extensive and admirably horizontal sheets, or courses of masonry;* their outer, and now broken-off edges necessarily forming in these days a sort of rectangular steps up the sloping sides; and, with a platform of sensible area on the top, forming at a distance an abnormally blunted summit. But this spurious or adventitious flattened top, as well as the spurious and adventitious steps on the sides, have all of them merely resulted from the mediæval dilapidations and forcible removal of the Pyramid's once polished white-stone casing (with its outer surface bevelled smoothly to the general slope, see Plate VIII.), which had stood for more than 3,000 years, and had in its day given to the structure almost mathematical truth and perfection.

This state of things was that described by Greek, Roman, and early Arabian writers; and it existed until the Caliphs of Egypt, about the year 1,000 A.D., profiting by the effects of a severe, and for Egypt very unusual, earthquake, recorded to have happened in 908 A.D., began methodically to strip off the polished and bevelled casing-stone blocks; built two bridges to convey them more easily to the river, after chipping off the prismoidal angles and edges; and then employed them in building mosques and palaces; for the lining of the great "Joseph" well, and for other public structures which still adorn their favourite city El Kahireh, or the victorious—the Cairo of vulgar English.*

It is evidently then the original, not the present, size and shape which we require, and must have, for testing Mr. Taylor's proposition; and for approximating, by whatever degree of exactitude may be reached, to whether it was accident or intention which decided the shape of the building; and he has well pointed out that no one had any pretence to have obtained the old base-side length until the French Academicians, in 1799, cleared away the hills of sand and debris at the north-east and north-west corners, and reached beneath them the levelled surface of the living rock itself on which the Pyramid was originally founded. There, discovering two rectangular hollows carefully and truly cut into the rock, as if for " sockets" for the basal corner-stones, the said Academicians measured the distance between those sockets with much geodesic refinement, and found it to be equal to 763.62 English feet.

The same distance being measured thirty-seven years afterwards by Colonel Howard-Vyse, guided by another equally sure direction of the original building, as 764.0 English feet,—we may take for the present solution of our problem, where a proportion is all that is now required, the mean, or 763.81 feet, as close enough for a first approximation only to the ancient base-breadth.

…