Posted on 10/26/2007 11:30:23 AM PDT by blam
Canal Linking Ancient Egypt Quarry to Nile Found
Steven Stanek in Cairo, Egypt
for National Geographic News
October 24, 2007
Experts have discovered a canal at an Aswan rock quarry that they believe was used to help float some of ancient Egypt's largest stone monuments to the Nile River.
It has long been suspected that ancient workers moved the massive artifacts directly to their final destinations over waterways.
Ancient artwork shows Egyptians using boats or barges to move large monuments like obelisks and statues, and canals have also been discovered at the Giza pyramids and the Luxor Temple. (Related: "Ancient Flowers Found in Egypt Coffin" [June 29, 2006].)
But the newfound canal, which has since been filled in, is the first proof discovered at the granite quarries in Aswan. Almost all obelisks, including those at the Luxor and Karnak Temples, were originally hewn in the Aswan area.
"What you have is very strong evidence that they may have loaded these stones in at the quarry ... and as a result not dragging and hauling them over land," said Richard R. Parizek, a professor of geology at Penn State University who led the scientific tests confirming the canal's existence.
"It eliminates that land connection."
Heavy Workload
Larger obelisks can weigh more than 50 tons, said Adel Kelany, an inspector with Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities who led the team that first dug up the site in 2002.
And a well-known unfinished obelisk at the quarry is thought to weigh more than 1,100 tons. It was the largest such monument ever attempted but was abandoned after latent cracks emerged, revealing a rare glimpse of ancient construction practices.
"We have actually long suspected the existence of a canal linking the Nile to the quarry site, and it's very nice to find this real confirmation," said Salima Ikram, an Egyptologist at the American University of Cairo.
"If they had just been using rollers and dragging things each time, everything would have been much more time-consuming and far slower."
Experts said the canal likely filled in with water during the one of the Nile's annual floods. Workers would have dragged the large stone monuments onto rafts at a point below the floodwater level, allowing the artifacts to float when the water level rose.
The canal was probably a natural split in the quarry granite, exploited and shaped by workers to make it more functional, the scientists added. Geologists found tooling marks along the canal similar to those where obelisks were removed.
The findings were announced at the Second International Conference on Geology of the Tethyr at Cairo University in March and will be published in advance of the next meeting in January.
Kelany and his team first were prepping the area for tourists in 2002 when they discovered a small trench about 27 feet (8.25 meters) deep and 8.2 feet (2.5 meters) wide at its narrowest point in an otherwise flat area of solid granite.
The workers suspected the trench was part of a larger canal or harboring area. But digging was forced to halt when the excavation hit groundwater, and much of the site was then backfilled with gravel for safety reasons.
"We were unable to remove the water from the canal, and if we left it like that it would be quite dangerous for a tourist site," Kelany said. "The water would not move, and it will not change ... it would have bacteria."
The site was left untouched until 2004, when a team of scientists set out to verify the canal's existence through a series of less invasive scientific tests.
Mapping the Canal
The researchers used shallow seismic surveys to test for variations in the area's topography by sending energy into the ground along lines that were at right angles to where the canal was thought to be.
The team also tested the underground temperature, thinking the area of the canal depression would be cooler due to the presence of groundwater.
"Both techniques showed that this anomaly did exist—it did go beyond what was previously excavated," study leader Parizek said.
Scientists were able to map about 456 feet (139 meters) of the canal but could not go farther because the site runs into a modern highway and then an Islamic cemetery. (Related: "Ancient Pharaoh Temple Discovered Inside Egypt Mosque" [September 27, 2007].)
But the site is roughly 1.2 miles (2 kilometers) from the Nile gorge, and scientists believe the canal becomes wider and deeper before possibly linking up with a main channel.
Salty Dilemma
Along with the discovery of the canal, the archaeologists also turned up ancient graffiti left behind by quarry workers and gridlines used in the obelisk-sculpting process.
The depictions, which include images of dolphins and ostriches, are now endangered by rising water levels and an accumulation of salts, according to experts.
Many sites in Egypt have been threatened by salt deposits since the building of the Aswan Dam in the 1960s, which prevents the Nile from flooding each year and washing away the minerals. (Related: "Rising Water Table Threatens Egypt's Monuments" [May 31, 2002].)
"Generally, Egypt has always been salty because of course it used to be under the ocean," said Ikram, the Egyptologist.
"When the Aswan Dam was built ... the regular washing out of the salt from the land also ceased and therefore the overall problem in Egypt is destruction by salt."
The dilemma is magnified in part by the gravel used to fill in the original excavation site. The rubble allows groundwater to rise to the level of the drawings, which were left uncovered.
Granite, a porous rock, is not normally affected by water infiltration as much as other rocks like limestone.
In this case, however, "the capillary moisture is coming back out of the gravel since they backfilled the excavation," Parizek said.
Scientists have proposed various solutions to stem the water flow. A clay barrier, for instance, could dam the previously excavated area and allow experts to pump out the existing water.
"It's just falling into ruin," Parizek said. "There are artifacts there that are so unique that it would be a crime to lose them."
GGG Ping.
Very interesting. Now Calypso Louie will have to re-think his pyramid building scenario............
Gosh, I've had this backwards all these years, picturing limestone as porous and granite very much less so.
Well, all those black granite surface plates we use for inspection of mechanical pieces are flat to within several millionths of an inch, so I guess that’s porous.......
And all those old books by Von Daniken just dropped in value a wee bit more.
Probably had a canal street like in New Orleans that would flood whenever the Storm Goddess ANKatrina was angry.
It was all Bushnaten’s fault.
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Thanks Blam.But the newfound canal, which has since been filled in, is the first proof discovered at the granite quarries in Aswan. Almost all obelisks, including those at the Luxor and Karnak Temples, were originally hewn in the Aswan area... Larger obelisks can weigh more than 50 tons, said Adel Kelany, an inspector with Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities who led the team that first dug up the site in 2002.Kelany must spend too much time listening to Zahi "Zowie" Hawass, who claims that the Great Pyramid is made up of half-ton stones, with a few weighing as much as two tons. During the Roman Empire, the Romans grabbed quite a few obelisks and moved them to the Eternal City. More of them can be found there than can be found in Egypt, or so I've heard. And one particularly large one exceeds 300 tons. The Emperor Caligula had a bunch of 200 ton columns quarried in Egypt for a temple (I think it was the one he was having built for himself), and transported by sea (same goes for all those obelisks) to Rome. |
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Von Daniken is actually still around in Europe. There are various groups in France, Switzerland, and Germany who will still pay $20 to sit for an hour to hear him speak. They usually run a lunch and film episode...and then he gives a short lecture on his ideas. He hasn’t written anything since 2000...and I doubt that the publishers really care to pay up front any amount of cash for his work.
Interesting aspect though...he got some investment money and built a huge hotel down in Switzerland in 2003. No one came...so it closed in late 2006. Hasn’t reopened since. The courts are trying to clear ownership and I think the Banks are trying to reclaim some money off the deal. They were supposed to have 500,000 a year visiting...but never got past the 200,000 range.
You have to admire the guy...he could tell a story and convince you of almost anything.
You may be ankh to something.
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