Building the Pyramids – It’s Not a Mystery

Posted on March 28, 2011 by MSH

Well, it’s that time of year again. The Ancient Egypt class that I teach at the local university is set to begin on Wednesday. I devote a full week to pyramids. The articles below are part of the readings. Two of these have appeared on this blog before, but the ones by Isler and Lally are new. I have students read these because I don’t want anyone leaving my classroom thinking aliens were needed for pyramid construction. Absolute paleobabble.

Fitchen, “Building Cheops’ Pyramid” – Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, Vol. 37, No. 1 (Mar., 1978), pp. 3-12

Isler, “On Pyramid Building” (Part 1) – Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, Vol. 22 (1985), pp. 129-142

Isler, “On Pyramid Building” (Part 2) – Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, Vol. 24 (1987), pp. 95-112

Lally, “Engineering a Pyramid” – Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, Vol. 26 (1989), pp. 207-218

Isler, “Egyptian Methods of Raising Weights” – Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, Vol. 13 (1976), pp. 31-42

Isler, “An Ancient Method of Finding and Extending Direction” – Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, Vol. 26 (1989), pp. 191-206

And when someone asks, “well, how come those guys on NOVA couldn’t build a small one – huh?” the answer is simple: “that’s because they were inept.” These articles are written by people who actually understand ancient engineering, not NOVA scientists who want to be on TV.

Technorati Tags: building, construction, Egypt, Pyramids

Secret Egypt?

Posted on February 15, 2011 by MSH

An interesting report on an Egyptological exhibition “aiming to quash some of the more bizarre Hollywood theories.”

Technorati Tags: aliens, Egypt, fringe archaeology

Using Google Books to Combat PaleoBabble

Posted on January 13, 2011 by MSH

I mentioned a while back that I was reading a book called Building in Egypt. It’s about construction and masonry techniques in ancient Egypt. I’m still hitting it (among other books) a few pages here and there. But the thought struck me today that I could share some of it with you all via Google Books. For those unfamiliar with Google Books, you can see a lot of the content of books on the site — even those under copyright. You can navigate to specific chapters, so it’s better than Amazon’s viewing (even though you may not always get all the pages). Let me suggest that you peruse Building in Egypt. You can see specific examples of ancient texts and artifacts that enlighten us as to how Egyptians did what they did, without the aid of aliens! For example, if you go to chapter three the author discusses a mathematical text that deals with Egyptians moving large stones by water barges on the Nile. No UFO transport required for the long trip. There’s another such book that goes into these sorts of issues as well entitled Architecture and Mathematics in Ancient Egypt. Have a look!

Technorati Tags: building, construction, Egypt, Google Books, mathematics, Pyramids

Alien Technology Not Needed in Britain, Either

Posted on January 1, 2011 by MSH

Boy, the ancient aliens just can’t catch a break. Now a researcher of Stonehenge and Britain’s other famous bluestones has discovered a workable technology for moving huge stones with the materials available to the prehistorical humans who erected megalithic sites.

2011 isn’t starting well for ancient astronaut acolytes.

Cuneiform Astronomy: The Planets in Mesopotamian Cuneiform Sources

Posted on December 29, 2010 by MSH

I get asked all the time, “How do you know Sitchin is wrong about aliens in Sumerian tablets?” Short answer: Because I get my information from the actual ancient scribes. Here’s one example among many that could be offered. It’ s a free PDF paper (28 pp) on the planets in Mesopotamian sources (i.e., the actual cuneiform astronomical texts — also known as the stuff Zecharia Sitchin hides from his readers). I thought those of you interested in divine into the actual source material for this sort of thing might like it. If you are committed to the ancient Anunnaki astronaut nonsense already, you might want to avoid that link. Actual sources have a way of demolishing this belief system.

A few things to notice as you read:

1. Take this information back to Zecharia Sitchin’s works and check and see if the way he explains the gods and astronomical bodies align with the source texts (Hint: it doesn’t — but don’t rely on my word). Then ask yourself why Sitchin didn’t get this right. I’ll leave it to you to speculate on why.

2. Look at page 9 – the list of planets and their deity names. Notice anything? Count them. According to Sumerian sources, the Sumerians did *not* know twelve planets, contra Sitchin. And the chart shows no knowledge of a planet beyond Saturn (they are all visible to the trained naked eye). This is devastating proof that from their own tablets that the Sumerians had no advanced astronomical knowledge from aliens.

Technorati Tags: ancient astronauts, astronomy, cuneiform, Mesopotamia, planets, Sitchin, Sumerian

The Pan-Babylonian Approach to the Hebrew Bible by Ancient Astronaut Theorists: Still Dead After All These Years

Posted on December 24, 2010 by MSH

I’ve blogged before about “Pan-Babylonianism” — the idea that the content of the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) is basically plagiarized from Babylonian (more widely, Sumero-Mesopotamian) material. No serious biblical studies scholar or Assyriologist believes this today, but this approach became a majority paradigm in the late 1800s and early 1900s in the wake of two events: (1) the decipherment of cuneiform and (2) Friedrich Delitzsch’s “Babel und Bible” lectures delivered in 1902 to the Deutsche Orient-Gesellschaft attended by Kaisar Wilhelm II and his staff. In other words, anyone (like Zecharia Sitchin) who supposed or still supposes this approach is novel or cutting edge or “research the mainstream cannot cope with” is behind the curve by 100 years.

The death pf Pan-Babylonianism actually came shortly after it’s rise to prominence due to the famous German scholar Hermann Gunkel’s classic rebuttal-essay, Babylonien und Israel (1903). Gunkel was *not* an evangelical or fundamentalist. He is well know to many people in that crowd as a “liberal” scholar. Regardless of labels, his famous work initiated the lethal injection to Pan-Babylonianism.

Gunkel’s important work is now available in a new English translation. Readers can read a review here, as well as get information for ordering this new work. Bear in mind this is a scholarly work; it is not light reading.The review alludes to an earlier translations of Gunkel’s work by published in 1904 by John Joseph McVey. That earlier translation is available online for free here.

Technorati Tags: ancient astronauts, Babel, Bibel, Bible, Delitzsch, Gunkel, Mesopotamia, Pan-Babylonianism, Sitchin, Sumerian

Aliens Visited Ancient Wales? Nope

Posted on November 27, 2010 by MSH

Archaeologists working in southwest wales have discovered an ancient prehistoric star map (scroll down at link). I’m sure this will leave the ancient astronaut community breathless with more tales of ancient alien technology transfer. For those of us who think more clearly, it’s actually a good teaching point.

How do I know this wasn’t alien knowledge? Simple. Here’s the part of the article that makes it clear:

Following the complete exposure of the capstone through excavation, it is now considered by several astronomers that the distribution of the cupmarks may represent a section of the night sky that includes the star constellations of Cassiopeia, Orion, Sirius and of course the North Star.

The point of clarity is the constellations. This standing stone is recording naked eye astronomy. And that’s basically always the case with artifacts used by ancient astronaut theorists with respect to “advanced ET knowledge” presumably given to humans in prehistoric or ancient times. They had eyes and used them. Instead of reality TV, they were glued to the heavens. It’s impressive, but it isn’t mysterious.

Technorati Tags: ancient, astronomy, dolmen, prehistoric, star map, stars, Wales

Ancient Planes, Rockets, and Helicopters?

Posted on November 3, 2010 by MSH

I feel a little embarrassed. I can’t believe I forgot to blog this, though I probably intended to redo the page and make it look nice. Oh well.

The last time I was on Coast to Coast, I threw this page together (in about an hour – I know, it shows) since I knew people would ask about “the alien technology” of ancient flight. The page sketches some of the “evidence” for planes/gliders in ancient Egypt, helicopters at Abydos, and rockets at Byblos. Pure PaleoBabble. As brilliant as some ancient engineers were, there is no evidence that their technology moved in this direction.

My apologies for letting this go months without posting it

Technorati Tags: Abydos, ancient astronauts, Byblos, cone, Egypt, Egyptian, glider, glyphs, helicopter, hieroglyphs, lintel, Mesopotamia, Naram-Sin, palimpset, plane, rocket, Seti, Tut

Zecharia Sitchin Passes Away

Posted on October 26, 2010 by MSH

Everyone here knows I am no fan of Sitchin, but good grief – this announcement could at least spell the man’s name correctly.

Technorati Tags: dead, obituary, Sitchin

Recent Essay on Nibiru

Posted on October 12, 2010 by MSH

Most of what you’ll read on the internet about Nibiru comes from Zecharia Sitchin’s noggin and those of his cyber-acolytes. In other words, most of it’s nonsense. Here is an exception. I’ll have to admit some of it is over my head (I’m not an astronomer), but this strikes me as an earnest attempt to make sense of the Mesopotamian material on Nibiru (read: the real stuff, not what Sitchin invents in his books). It may be helpful for readers to have these other links handy:

MUL.APIN

Enuma Anu Enlil

Technorati Tags: astronomy, calendars, Mesopotamia, MUL.APIN, nibiru

PaleoBabble

Your antidote to cyber-twaddle and misguided research about the ancient world.

Category Archives: Ancient Astronauts