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Sphinx and GP dates from 10 500 BC?


Big Bad Voodoo

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But for these early writers, relating history was done in a format of story telling; if facts were unknown, it was permissible to invent them.

It was not just early writers, that custom kept on till the beginning of the 20th century in history, and just when we thought we had surpassed that von Daniken pops up.

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I have one account, and as I've remarked before I don't have the spare time to come in and argue back and forth every single day on every single point as many of you (on both sides) seem to. It's quarter to 11pm on a Saturday night and I'm just catching up.

Believe me, I would dearly love to come in daily and put you over my knee and give you the spanking you deserve. It would, I think, do you good in the long run because you are by no means a hopeless case but you clearly need some sense knocking into you.

As it is, I merely responded to your rather absurd assertions about the unassailability of Thutmose IV as an historical source. If you can counter this with some detail about Thutmose's sources - primary, secondary, tertiary, anything - used to produce a historical account of events one millenium before his own time I would be delighted to hear about them.

By the way... dreams don't count.

As for my "arrogant and pompous attacks"... well, in the words of Sir Thomas More, "I do none harm, I say none harm, I think none harm." I'm just another guy looking for the truth.

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And you need the arrogance and patronising attitude knocking out of you :)

Nowhere have I said that the dream stela is "unassailable". It is arraogance, by many, to think we know more about his culture than he did. It does not matter about his reasons for having the stela erected, his personality does not matter. What matters is that he was closer to the construction of the Giza complex than we are. It is our conceit that, with our TVs, cellphones etc etc, that we are somehow better than the ancients. You have taken the name of Alcibiades, would any think we are better than him because he is 2,500 years in the past, or better than his contemparies in Athens at that time?, no. Yet when it comes to AE there seems to be a certain patronising attitute to them, from fantasists and realists, about their politics and knowledge of themselves. The dream stela may well have been propoganda, but the point I made was that Thutmosis IV most certainly knew more about Giza than we do, and if he says X for for purpose Y and Z is for purpose X, then, without 100% evidence to the contrary, should we not believe him on those points, points that as far as I can see have no propaganda value, and probably were taken as obvious back in the days.

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...... It is arraogance, by many, to think we know more about his culture than he did. It does not matter about his reasons for having the stela erected, his personality does not matter. What matters is that he was closer to the construction of the Giza complex than we are......

One of the first things that is stressed when learning how to interpret historical texts is that context is essential. To ignore this will often lead to erroneous conclusions. Who wrote it, why they wrote it and intended audience are basic questions you should ask of any text you wish to understand. It is not modern arrogance to accept that the motivations for writing something will influence the information presented. To ignore this and take everything at face value based on it being written closer to a certain period in history than we are will lead to many incorrect assumptions.

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One of the first things that is stressed when learning how to interpret historical texts is that context is essential. To ignore this will often lead to erroneous conclusions. Who wrote it, why they wrote it and intended audience are basic questions you should ask of any text you wish to understand. It is not modern arrogance to accept that the motivations for writing something will influence the information presented. To ignore this and take everything at face value based on it being written closer to a certain period in history than we are will lead to many incorrect assumptions.

Not taking the politics behind the dream stela at face value. My main point is that Thutmosis IV knew more about his culture and history than we do, how can that not be so?. We are not him, we cannot know what knowledge was in his head, so how can we say what he did or didn't know. I am not, as others are, counting angels dancing on the head of a pin over this. My point is quite direct. The arrogance is us saying that we know better than him. It is no difference, to me, than various agents of whatever state you live in, saying that they know what is best for us. Or invading various countries for "Their own good" because we know better than them.

Likely I will wite a blog about my exact position about AE, "orthodox" and alternaviks, as I suspect there is a clash of cultures and some misunderstanding here....

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Nowhere have I said that the dream stela is "unassailable". It is arraogance, by many, to think we know more about his culture than he did. It does not matter about his reasons for having the stela erected, his personality does not matter. What matters is that he was closer to the construction of the Giza complex than we are. It is our conceit that, with our TVs, cellphones etc etc, that we are somehow better than the ancients. You have taken the name of Alcibiades, would any think we are better than him because he is 2,500 years in the past, or better than his contemparies in Athens at that time?, no. Yet when it comes to AE there seems to be a certain patronising attitute to them, from fantasists and realists, about their politics and knowledge of themselves. The dream stela may well have been propoganda, but the point I made was that Thutmosis IV most certainly knew more about Giza than we do, and if he says X for for purpose Y and Z is for purpose X, then, without 100% evidence to the contrary, should we not believe him on those points, points that as far as I can see have no propaganda value, and probably were taken as obvious back in the days.

I'm pretty much in agreement except on one thing. I don't think we should accept any

evidence at all of any type as being 100% accurate. The best evidence we ever achieve

is to know the methodology and techniques employed to obtain scientific evidence such

as the CO2 levels in the boat pits. We all have a tendency to jump to conclusions and

we have a tendency to accept proclamations from "good sources" without question. We

tend to discount valid information simply because of its source.

That a concept appears in the historical record is exactly the kind of information we'd do

well to consider. For instance multiple sources say the pyramid was built in steps or bat-

tlements and the gravimetric scan can be interpreted to agree completely with this. Dreams

shouldn't be accepted at 100% any more than modern technology like gravimetric scans.

The bottom line is that just as subatomic particles have probabilities of being in a given lo-

cation reality can only be assigned probabilities.

The evidence suggests a high probability that there was a plan of some sort at Giza. The

nature of this plan is probably deducible with more evidence and the deductions might lead

to knowing where to seek more evidence still. Archaeology isn't merely about digging but

knowing where to dig and what to look for. It's knowing what you're seein once you find it.

The work at Giza in the last few decades has probably destroyed more evidence than it's

located. They're digging for all the wrong reasons in all the wrong places. If it were a snake

it would have bitten them.

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Not taking the politics behind the dream stela at face value. My main point is that Thutmosis IV knew more about his culture and history than we do, how can that not be so?. We are not him, we cannot know what knowledge was in his head, so how can we say what he did or didn't know. I am not, as others are, counting angels dancing on the head of a pin over this. My point is quite direct. The arrogance is us saying that we know better than him. It is no difference, to me, than various agents of whatever state you live in, saying that they know what is best for us. Or invading various countries for "Their own good" because we know better than them.

Likely I will wite a blog about my exact position about AE, "orthodox" and alternaviks, as I suspect there is a clash of cultures and some misunderstanding here....

I do not think we should regard the Dream Stela as an historical document. That's not the purpose it served for Tuthmosis IV. Alcibiades's earlier point about Tuthmosis VI's separation in time from the Old Kingdom is valid: people living in Dynasty 18, royals included, would've known very few real facts about what had happened back in Dynasty 4, a thousand years earlier. Histories were not recorded, fact-checked, and stored in a manner similar to what we take for granted today. This is why I sided with Alcibiades earlier.

At the same time, however, what Tuthmosis IV recorded at the end of the stela is significant. Fortunately Karl Lepsius carefully drew the monument in the nineteenth century, before it deteriorated further. The bottom several registers were already in a fragmented state. I have Lepsius' carefully rendered drawing in my digital library, and although the name of the king in the cartouche near the end is badly damaged, there is no mistaking two glyphs: N8 (sound value xa) and I9 (sound value f). This produces xaf, "Khaf." I can't think of another king with this arrangement of glyphs in his name, so there's no sense in arguing against the fact that the name in full was Khafre.

That said, while I don't regard the Dream Stela as an historical document, it's clear that Tuthmosis IV himself regarded the Sphinx as the work of Khafre from Dynasty 4. We can confidently state that much.

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I do not think we should regard the Dream Stela as an historical document. That's not the purpose it served for Tuthmosis IV.

Jut a picky point. While I agree it is not entirely a historical document it should not be excluded from being treated as such due to its purpose. If we were to exclude all sources created for propaganda or that used erroneous information common to contemporaries we would be left with very little that can be defined as a historical document. The label 'historical document' does not mean a text is accurate. That aside the problem here is its being treated by some as a primary source which it is not as far as the subject matter goes. It was not written at the period in question but long after. Then of course we must remember that even primary sources cannot always be entirely trusted as fact. The only way the Stela serves as evidence about the giza pyramids is when the information on it can be verified by other sources, which of course some aspects of what it states have been.

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SC: Hmm… interesting idea. Why then do you think North Americans call Autumn ‘Fall’? Why do some European countries still refer to Autumn as ‘Harvest’? And the season of ‘Spring’ when new life springs forth. It rather seems to me that the closer a culture is to its natural environment the more it seems to name things (like seasons) after defining events occurring within that natural environment. You cannot have the ‘Fall’ season without falling leaves and you cannot have the ‘Akhet’ season without the flooding Nile. ‘Akhet’ is inextricably linked to the concept of ‘flood’, in particular, the Nile flood.

KMS: I agree Akhet was inextricably linked with the flood, but the fact remains it wasn't a word for "flood." When speaking of the inundation specifically—that event during which the margins of the river were flooded every spring—the Egyptians employed three different terms: baHw, iwHw, and wDnw. These bear no similarity in hieroglyphic spelling to Axt.

SC: I have no problem with ‘season of flood’, ‘time of flood’, ‘period of flood’ or whatever. The central element, however, is ‘flood’ as in the arrival of the Nile inundation.

SC: And just as ‘Akhet’ is named after the defining event of the Akhet season – the Nile flood – the other two AE seasons were named after the defining events of those seasons ‘Peret’ (growing) and ‘Shemu’ (harvest). Each season was named after the defining event of the season ergo ‘Akhet’ is equated unequivocally with ‘flood’ or ‘inundation’ (of the Nile).

KMS: "Shemu" (Smw) is a good example for your case because it was the word for "harvest." However, the same doesn't work for Akhet (for reasons already explained) or for Peret ("growing" was rendered as rd in the language). These were the names of seasons.

SC: I disagree. Call it ‘seasons’ if you like but the terms represent a particular duration of time in which certain events occurred. It is the key event that took place in that period of time that defined the name for that period of time hence the period of time when the flood arrived is ‘akhet’, the period of time when the harvest was gathered is called ‘shemu’. I suspect there may be another root word for ‘growing time’ that gives ‘peret’. It may even be a word that has become lost. However, it is no big deal—the concept of naming a duration of time after the key event/activity that took place within a duration of time is quite evident and is to be expected. We still do it today.

SC: I have looked and the orthography of ‘flood’ and ‘horizon’ are very similar (see image below) and variant spelling of a word is not unusual or uncommon in AE.

KMS: The only similarities here are the phonetic complements (namely, Aa1 and X1). Phonetic complements were commonly employed for glyphs possessing more than one sound value, but that has nothing really to do with the meaning of words.

SC: I am not saying it does.

KMS: The pool with lilies (M8, first example above) often was used as a stand-alone and sometimes wasn't equipped with phonetic complements in the meaning for the Akhet season. In context the meaning would've been obvious.

SC: The M8 glyph could mean simply ‘fertile land’ since we observe the strip of land (the oval glyph) with plants growing out of it. Thus the oval glyph (N17), the strip of land without the growing plants could simply mean ‘barren land’.

KMS: However, while the crested ibis (G25, second example) most often possessed the sound value Ax, it was used in a variety of other words and did not always represent that sound, so it was accompanied by phonetic complements in many more cases. In your example the word Axt is also accompanied by the determinative of a strip of land (N17, the final glyph) to help reinforce the meaning: this was something physically associated with the landscape, as the horizon certainly is. The determinative is not always present in the spelling of Axt, however.

SC: Or associated with a ‘barren land’ as opposed to M8 ‘fertile land’.

SC: And, as you noted previously, there are other AE words that spell ‘Akhet’ (Axt) hence, of course, the importance of the determinative. In the image above, for example, we find G25 (crested-ibis) which I believe to be a determinative for flood since this particular bird spends much of its time wading in the waters of the Nile flood (Akhet). This bird also has symbolic connections with rebirth and with the AE god, Thoth – all of which I believe is important to the understanding of this particular group of glyphs.

KMS: The ibis was certainly associated with Thoth, but note the positioning of the glyph. In orthography, a glyph employed as a semantic determinative always appeared at the end of a word and did not possess a phonetic value. It was an aid in determining meaning, given the prevalence of homophones in the language. A word might even possess more than one determinative, but they did not begin a word. A glyph which began a word invariably possessed a phonetic value. In this Old Kingdom spelling, the ibis glyph is read as Axt and its phonetic complements (x and t) reinforce that principle. Remove the ibis or place it at the end of the word as a determinative, and you have the entirely different word xt.

SC: Yes, you are quite right. I should have said ‘logogram’ or ‘ideogram’ rather than ‘determinative’. Not all logograms require a vertical stroke to indicate such use and given that G25 and M8 are neither phonograms or determinatives, they would not require such.

KMS: In any case, right now I'm looking through Faulkner's translations of words with the SA root. Faulkner translates the same word as field, meadow, marsh, and the like. I'm not sure where "flooded country" comes from but, in all sincerity, don't use Budge. As Daniel Jackson quips in the movie Stargate, "Why do they still publish Budge?" I couldn't agree more.

SC: A marsh is water-logged ground i.e. flooded ground or ‘flooded country’. I think it is somewhat splitting hairs with Budge’s interpretation (if, of course, this is Budge’s interpretation).

SC: Indeed, except the deluge the AEs were anticipating wouldn’t be anything like the annual Nile inundation that would bring new silts from the south to re-fertilize the land and enable new growth (glyph M8 above). This was an ‘end of time’ deluge (flood) that would strip the land bare, hence why there is no growth spouting forth from the land glyph (Z8) in the image above. (And I have to say here, how Consensus Egyptology arrives at 'horizon' and 'tomb' from these glyphs is simply beyond reason).

KMT: Growth sprouting from the strip of land would've made it a different hieroglyph, and hence a different meaning.

SC: As an ideogram for ‘fertile land’ (which is what the annual inundation brought) I think it literally ‘speaks’ for itself. The only interpretation I have found for Z8 is the determinative for ‘round’ and this glyph certainly isn’t round. The Z8 glyph very much looks to me like it should be the N17 glyph which, in my opinion, relates to the land glyph i.e. without plant growth it is ‘barren land’ as opposed to M8 strip of land with growth, ‘fertile land’.

KMS: This spelling of "horizon" seems to be the Old Kingdom norm, in so far as I have been able to determine. I've reviewed Kurt Sethe's hieroglyphic transcriptions of the Pyramid Texts (sources here and here) and this appears to be the way "horizon" is spelled in most if not call cases. As for why Akhet was used as a word for the royal tomb, it goes back to the belief that the king's "akh" or heavenly manifestation would be formed in the horizon, and the tomb is what made this possible.

SC: That this series of glyphs (G25-Aa1-X1-Z8?) is interpreted by Consensus Egyptology as ‘horizon’ I think is severely flawed. It does not really know what the Ibis (G25) glyph represents but thinks it has something to do with ‘ effective transcendent light’ or something along those lines. As you know, such ideograms are supposed to make there phonetic complements better understood – they are supposed to make the meaning of the word much clearer. How an Ibis is regarded as ‘effective transcendent light’ is quite beyond me and I think that the true interpretation of this particular G25 glyph is much more rooted in the natural environment of the Ibis that relates it clearly and unequivocally to the inundation (akhet).

So what is there that can link the Ibis to the ‘time of inundation’, to the word ‘akhet’? Well, it so happens that in ancient Egypt the Ibis was regarded as the ‘harbinger of the inundation’. Thus we have a clear connection between the Ibis and the ‘time of inundation’, to wit:

”People knew from long experience that this was about the time for the level of the Nile to start rising. Just before this, flocks of white ibises would have appeared on the fields as they returned from the south. If they came late or not at all, farmers would see this as a bad omen foreshadowing low floods and a poor harvest. So they regarded the wise bird that knew the secret of this vital phenomenon as an embodiment of the learned god Thoth”. (From http://www.cartage.o...Egyptology/LifeAncient/lifeinEgypt11.htm]here[/url]).

“In Ancient Egypt, sacred ibis were heralds of the flood, and symbolised the god Thoth, god of wisdom and master of time. They were also of practical use to the villagers, making pools safe to bathe by feeding on the water snails that carried the bilharzias liver parasite.” (From here).

“In Africa also we meet with the great Ibis (Tantalus ibis, fig.30), and the sacred ibis (I. religiosa), which is venerated in Egypt as the harbinger of the annual Inundation of the Nile, and was frequently embalmed and mummified.” (From here).

SC: I do not think there is any doubt that the G25 Ibis glyph (as the harbinger of the flood period) is an ideogram for the ‘coming time of flood’ or ‘imminent time of flood’, something along those lines. The N17 ‘barren land’ glyph at the end of the sequence (perhaps as a determinative) makes sense in this context too since this is what the outcome of this particular flood would bring hence why the pyramid at the end of some Akhet sequences is understood as ‘ptotector against flood’ or something like that. And why would the AEs have understood the pyramid in such a way since we are told by the Aran chroniclers that this was in fact the function of the pyramid—to protect the kingdom against the coming flood time and to ensure its rebirth thereafter. This meaning of the G25 ibis glyph as ‘harbinger of the flood time’ is clear and uncomplicated. Consensus Egyptology has completely misunderstood the meaning of G25 Ibis glyph, associating it with some obscure concept rather than opting for clarity which was, at the end of the day, the purpose of such ideograms.

In short, that Consensus Egyptology insists the Ibis symbolises ‘effective transcendent light’ (or something along those lines) is about as obscure an interpretations as one could imagine. It would be simpler for the AEs to symbolise such an abstract concept with the sign for a star. The Ibis as a symbol of imminent or impending flood is clear, uncomplicated and attested within the culture. And if we apply the simple principle of Occam’s Razor whereby the simplest and most obvious answer to a question tends to be the right one. There is little doubt—G25-Aa1-X1-Z8(?) is connected to an impending flood time. The ibis symbol surely confirms this. Which then begs the question—if these glyphs mean ‘impending time of flood’, why is this linked to ‘Khufu’ as in ‘Akhet Khufu’? Doesn’t take a genius to work it out.

SC: I don’t think anyone denies this understanding of ‘Akhet’ as it pertains to the annual cycle of the Nile inundation. It was absolutely essential for the viability of the kingdom. However, keep in mind here too that if the Akhet (flood) was too high or too low it would spell disaster. There was an inherent danger that if the annual Nile flood (Akhet) was too high, it would wash away villages and farms—there would be no growth upon the land thus a bare land glyph (Z8). The Akhet came with an inherent danger as would the anticipated deluge.

KMS: I agree with you, but I don't know of any such forebodings in Dynasty 4. One of the primary sources for this would be the Palermo Stone, which recorded yearly Nile measurements, and I don't recall imminent threats of a devastating flood for this time period.

SC: The Palermo Stone is incomplete and, actually, can almost be read as an ‘Obituary’ to a kingdom that believed their demise was imminent; a final ‘will and testament’ so-to-speak, recording its long succession of kings stretching far back into antiquity for posterity, that those who would take benefit from the Pyramid Recovery Vaults might know their ancestors. Also, it seems rather curious that a list of Kings, ancient and contemporary (from and AE perspective) should be itemised along with measurements of the Nile flood. I can understand why the AEs would wish to keep an eye on the flood level but to place this on something that is essentially an historical document seems rather odd.

SC: A number of early Arab chroniclers tell us that when the stars in the heavens suddenly altered their course, the Egyptian King asked his priests and astronomers what this altered state of the heavens would mean for the kingdom. His advisors told the king that, 300 years hence, it would first bring a great flood followed by fire. The king, upon hearing this, ordered the construction of the pyramids to safeguard what was of most esteem in the kingdom; that the pyramids would protect and ensure the rebirth of the kingdom from the anticipated deluge. That the skies had altered would have been regarded as a bad omen, a sure sign that the ‘end times’ were close at hand, that the great deluge promised by Thoth would soon become a reality with the Nile rising up (a Great Akhet) to engulf the entire kingdom.

KMS: I'm not familiar with these stories from the early Muslim period but I don't put a lot of stock in the myths devised by the early Arabs who inhabited Egypt after the conquest in the seventh century CE. Many misconceptions borne of the early Muslim period persist to this day, and the Arabs could not read hieroglyphs or hieratic or demotic (at that point no one could) so I don't know where they were getting their information.

SC: We could speculate endlessly where the Arab chroniclers obtained their information. But there is scientific evidence emerging that supports parts of these texts with regards to the stars shifting from their normal course. I agree that much of what they write is somewhat fantastic but I detect an underlying truth to them. And it would seem some quite remarkable coincidence that the pyramid name ‘Akhet Khufu’ is, in my opinion, related to an impending time of flood and these texts state that a great deluge would drown the land 300 years from when the heavens altered its appearance i.e. that the pyramids were built to protect the kingdom from an impending flood time (Akhet). I do not see that this is coincidental and that we may indeed we uncovering the true purpose for the early, giant pyramids as instruments of rebirth for the kingdom. This idea of rebirth of the kingdom could, of course, have inspired new religious ideas whereby the Afterlife that was once regarded as a metaphysical resurrection in the realm hereafter became an Osirian Afterlife which was seen as a corporeal rebirth on this side of the hereafter. Religious ideas often germinate from some actual, physical event.

SC: I understand your point here but I see no problem in reading this as: ‘May he (the king) protect [his kingdom from the] flood’. By building the Great Pyramid, it is Khufu himself who ensures that the kingdom is protected from the anticipated flood. The king’s abbreviated name offers the term ‘protect’ – Khufu himself is (in this instance) the Protector, the ‘Saviour’ (noun with capital ‘S’). Why repeat ‘Khu’ (protect) twice just because the first instance happens to be the king’s (partial) name within his royal cartouche? We can easily extrapolate the meaning from the king’s name without having to have the meaning repeated; this is to say that we can easily read ‘Akhet Khufu’ as ‘Khufu protects against the flood’ or ‘[the King] protects against the flood' (through the agency of his Pyramid Recovery Vault’).

KMS: The bolded portion is a prospective form that doesn't require an introductory particle for "May," but you're still facing serious problems with your version. For one thing, your brackets contains critical sense-meanings that would render the phrase nonsensical if absent (i.e., "May he protect flood"), and the name appears only as Akhet Khufu without ever bearing the words in your brackets.

SC: I am aware of that—my interpretation given above is merely an example of how we might read ‘Akhet Khufu’. We cannot know with any certainty how this phrase was meant to be read but I am convinced it involves an ‘imminent flood time’ and ‘protects’. And with the pyramid as a determinative, this makes perfect sense.

KMS: There's actually no word of which I'm aware for "kingdom" in the ancient language, so let's substitute it for tAwy, "Two Lands," which was a common way to express both the country and the state apparatus which governed it. The phrase would have to be spelled as xu.f tAwy m baHi, "May he protect the Two Lands from the flood." Referring to the king simply as "he" was not common in such a short phrase, so realistically it would more likely be rendered as xu Hm.i tAwy m baHi, "May my majesty protect the Two Lands from the flood." Nothing like this is evidenced at the pyramid complex of Khufu.

SC: The king was the kingdom and the kingdom was the king. And Khufu’s Golden Horus name ‘Horus Medjedju (Hrw mDdw’) has been interpreted as ‘‘he who gives’ goods to his people’. From here.

SC

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I do not see that this is coincidental and that we may indeed we uncovering the true purpose for the early, giant pyramids as instruments of rebirth for the kingdom.

This is an idea I never heard before. Is this simply your own thoughts on this affair, or has this been laid out by another? Is there more to this that can be read?

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I do not think we should regard the Dream Stela as an historical document. That's not the purpose it served for Tuthmosis IV. Alcibiades's earlier point about Tuthmosis VI's separation in time from the Old Kingdom is valid: people living in Dynasty 18, royals included, would've known very few real facts about what had happened back in Dynasty 4, a thousand years earlier. Histories were not recorded, fact-checked, and stored in a manner similar to what we take for granted today. This is why I sided with Alcibiades earlier.

At the same time, however, what Tuthmosis IV recorded at the end of the stela is significant. Fortunately Karl Lepsius carefully drew the monument in the nineteenth century, before it deteriorated further. The bottom several registers were already in a fragmented state. I have Lepsius' carefully rendered drawing in my digital library, and although the name of the king in the cartouche near the end is badly damaged, there is no mistaking two glyphs: N8 (sound value xa) and I9 (sound value f). This produces xaf, "Khaf." I can't think of another king with this arrangement of glyphs in his name, so there's no sense in arguing against the fact that the name in full was Khafre.

That said, while I don't regard the Dream Stela as an historical document, it's clear that Tuthmosis IV himself regarded the Sphinx as the work of Khafre from Dynasty 4. We can confidently state that much.

Yet we live about 4,500 years after GP was built and he only 1,000. He lived when the language, religion, culture, everything, was still alive. Much of what he would have access to on papyrus is long dust. Many buildings and inscriptions are damaged or also dust. There is information he would have known, that we do not even know existed. Rather like the famous "Known unknowns and unknown unknowns". We can apply scientific method to excavations and so forth, even know something about construction of some tomb or building that he was not aware of because it was complete in his time. He would not have thought to destroy a building just to scrabble about in the ruins to see that some workman left the remains of his dinner in the foundations, or scrawled some rude remark on a surface that would never have expected to be seen until the end of time. My basic premise is good, and is not about the stela, it is about his knowledge. We cannot possibly know what he knew or didn't know, and some 3,500 years after him, how can we say we know more than him about his own culture, it is just not credible. There may well have been two intermediate periods between the pyramids and him, but there was no great fracture, no fundamental change, even with the Hyksos interlude, in Egyptian culture, as there was, for instance, within Britain between the building of Stonehenge and modern times. I believe he would have had reasonably good knowledge of his past. I cannot prove it, but it also cannot be disproved, and he should, as an actual AE, be given the benefit of the doubt. I think if any of them could see what all us of write about them, then they would be roaring with laughter.

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Yet we live about 4,500 years after GP was built and he only 1,000. He lived when the language, religion, culture, everything, was still alive. Much of what he would have access to on papyrus is long dust. Many buildings and inscriptions are damaged or also dust. There is information he would have known, that we do not even know existed. Rather like the famous "Known unknowns and unknown unknowns". We can apply scientific method to excavations and so forth, even know something about construction of some tomb or building that he was not aware of because it was complete in his time. He would not have thought to destroy a building just to scrabble about in the ruins to see that some workman left the remains of his dinner in the foundations, or scrawled some rude remark on a surface that would never have expected to be seen until the end of time. My basic premise is good, and is not about the stela, it is about his knowledge. We cannot possibly know what he knew or didn't know, and some 3,500 years after him, how can we say we know more than him about his own culture, it is just not credible. There may well have been two intermediate periods between the pyramids and him, but there was no great fracture, no fundamental change, even with the Hyksos interlude, in Egyptian culture, as there was, for instance, within Britain between the building of Stonehenge and modern times. I believe he would have had reasonably good knowledge of his past. I cannot prove it, but it also cannot be disproved, and he should, as an actual AE, be given the benefit of the doubt. I think if any of them could see what all us of write about them, then they would be roaring with laughter.

Could you tell me about any exact words Henry the VIII uttered when he fell off the horse breaking his leg? That is only 450 years ago.

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Could you tell me about any exact words Henry the VIII uttered when he fell off the horse breaking his leg? That is only 450 years ago.

Maybe he said "Ouch!" or "Gadzooks!", I do not know. But this does not invalidate my point, which seems to be very misunderstood here, that Thutmosis IVwould have known more about his culture than we do. I am not about politics of dream stela, or it being some "historical" document, which it is not. Would someone 3,500 years into the future know more about us than we do ourselves? no.

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Maybe he said "Ouch!" or "Gadzooks!", I do not know. But this does not invalidate my point, which seems to be very misunderstood here, that Thutmosis IVwould have known more about his culture than we do. I am not about politics of dream stela, or it being some "historical" document, which it is not. Would someone 3,500 years into the future know more about us than we do ourselves? no.

and questionmarks point I believe was that he doesn't necessarily know about things that happened 1000 or more years before he lived. The closer proximity in time does not mean everything stated is accurate or true and as i said before it can only be validated by corroborating evidence. He would know more about HIS culture but culture is not static over large periods of time. What is stated MAY be accurate but it is not inevitable that it is.

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Another problem compounding any remnants of knowledge Thutmose IV may have been privy to during his lifetime is the fact that there were some 160+ kings of Egypt, itself often divided between two or three different ruling lines/cities simultaneously, which left very few (if any) extant written records. Yet we're supposed to believe that Thutmose IV was somehow special and had knowledge from 1000+ years prior. Not likely.

cormac

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Another problem compounding any remnants of knowledge Thutmose IV may have been privy to during his lifetime is the fact that there were some 160+ kings of Egypt, itself often divided between two or three different ruling lines/cities simultaneously, which left very few (if any) extant written records. Yet we're supposed to believe that Thutmose IV was somehow special and had knowledge from 1000+ years prior. Not likely.

cormac

Indeed, and to add to that we can consider the inaccuracies in histories created in the past by western cultures to see how unreliable such information can be. Geoffrey of monmouth's work can not be considered an accurate history of the kings of Britain yet was written closer to the periods he covers than the present day. Again, a study of his works can be enlightening but not if taken at face value.

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One more time for luck. I have not said Thusmosis IV had any special knowledge. I have not said the dream stela is an historical document. I have only said that he will know more about his own culture than we do. This point will be self evident to any rational person.

спокойной ночи

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One more time for luck. I have not said Thusmosis IV had any special knowledge. I have not said the dream stela is an historical document. I have only said that he will know more about his own culture than we do. This point will be self evident to any rational person.

спокойной ноч

His own culture was 1000 years removed from that of Khufu. But no doubt, he knew a lot about his culture.

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Yet we live about 4,500 years after GP was built and he only 1,000. He lived when the language, religion, culture, everything, was still alive. Much of what he would have access to on papyrus is long dust. Many buildings and inscriptions are damaged or also dust. There is information he would have known, that we do not even know existed. Rather like the famous "Known unknowns and unknown unknowns". We can apply scientific method to excavations and so forth, even know something about construction of some tomb or building that he was not aware of because it was complete in his time. He would not have thought to destroy a building just to scrabble about in the ruins to see that some workman left the remains of his dinner in the foundations, or scrawled some rude remark on a surface that would never have expected to be seen until the end of time. My basic premise is good, and is not about the stela, it is about his knowledge. We cannot possibly know what he knew or didn't know, and some 3,500 years after him, how can we say we know more than him about his own culture, it is just not credible. There may well have been two intermediate periods between the pyramids and him, but there was no great fracture, no fundamental change, even with the Hyksos interlude, in Egyptian culture, as there was, for instance, within Britain between the building of Stonehenge and modern times. I believe he would have had reasonably good knowledge of his past. I cannot prove it, but it also cannot be disproved, and he should, as an actual AE, be given the benefit of the doubt. I think if any of them could see what all us of write about them, then they would be roaring with laughter.

This is the basic assumption of Egyptology; that nothing in the culture changed between the

Egyptians of the 27th century BC and those of the 18th century BC. There is virtually no evi-

dence of any sort to support this assumption. The assumtion is very convenient since they

otherwise have almost nothing on which to understand the more ancient people. They need

this assumption to translate and interpret the Pyramid Texts.

The problem is that the assumption is probably in error. It has led to the assumptions that the

great pyramids were tombs built by people of religious fervor using little besides their fervor

to build these structures. There is no evidence for any of this. Everything that exists to sup-

port these assumptions is interpretation derived from the assumption that no change ocurred.

Yet, when we look at the evidence it is quite apparent that no facts want to stick to any of the

assumptions. No direct evidence exists to support that the pyramids were tombs which leaves

the door wide open to interpret the weak and very direct (and more pervasive) evidence that

the pyramids were recovery vaults. No evidence exists they were built with religious fervor

which leaves the door open to interpret direct, albeit weak evidence, that they were built by

little green men.

So long as there is no direct evidence to support the assumption that there was no change in

the people the best guess is that there was a very large change in the "religion" and their cul-

ture. I believe this culture underwent the mother of all changes. I believe all the assumptions

are in error and some have already been overturned by overwhelming evidence. It's true that

there is little depth to the overwhelming evidence but there is great breadth to it. "Religious Fer-

vor" has been disproven. Evidence virtually proves beyond doubt that modern understanding

of how they must have done it are wrong. The lack of evidence to support for the other conten-

tions and the evidence that denies these contentions is nearly sufficient to deny them and they

are falling as well.

The bottom line is there's no reason to believe that Thutmose would have the ability to access

any old writings and hence would not necessarily know anything more about how and why G1

was built than the average sixth grader who is told they were tombs built with ramps. Indeed,

there is no evidence at all that any ancient Egyptian ever believed any great pyramid was a

tomb. This appears to be an idea that enterred the consciousness much later. It wasn't really

firmly established until the 19th century though it has been a prevailing view for a few hundred

years longer. Now you can't even be an Egyptologist if you hold a different view. This is pretty

remarkable in view of the fact no direct evidence exists and there's no reliable historical claim

that any such evidence ever existed. There's not any any evidence that the word for the way

"it mustta been built" existed during the time they were actually built. It appears that there is

a void where we are told there is total knowledge and no doubt. Rather than presenting evi-

dence to suppport their contentions we just get references and semantics.

Rather than experimentation and measurements to prove alternative theories wrong or their

own assumptions correct they continue to drill holes and dig for ramps. They find evidence fre-

quently that supports other theories but this is invisible to them because they are only looking

for what they know they'll find if they just dig long enough.

Since these probably weren't tombs any cogent theory that says what they really were just

might be right on the money.

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Since these probably weren't tombs any cogent theory that says what they really were just

might be right on the money.

Yet if they were not tombs, then where are the missing bodies, where were they buried, where are the tombs of the pyramid building kings?

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This is the basic assumption of Egyptology; that nothing in the culture changed between the

Egyptians of the 27th century BC and those of the 18th century BC. There is virtually no evi-

dence of any sort to support this assumption...

Of course there's no evidence to support that, because no one in Egyptology believes it. The change is very evident in many factors, but you've narrowed your entire interest in ancient Egypt to one small window in Dynasty 4 so I wouldn't expect you to be familiar with the changes, which is why you're applying inaccurate assumptions. Egyptology isn't.

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Yet if they were not tombs, then where are the missing bodies, where were they buried, where are the tombs of the pyramid building kings?

This is a perfectly legitimate question even though many alts don't believe the great pyramids

were tombs so it hardly seems to impinge on them to locate the kings' remains. But it is a fair

question since every indication is that the disposition of dead kings appears to be of supreme

interest to the builders as evidenced by the Pyramid Texts. One doesn't need to understand

the translations or the language to see that that the dead king is of great importance and they

wouldn't have lost, misplaced, or forgotten the remains.

I believe the Pyramid Texts are quite specific about how the mummy (dead king) was handled.

This work is simply ritual that was read aloud to the people at the various ceremonies involving

the ascension of the dead king. I believe they specifically stated in many lines that the king was

cremated in a ceremony but even if you don't accept that there is a coherent meaning to these

words it is still strongly implied that the body was cremated. The disposition of the ashes is no-

where mentioned and I believe this implies that they were not of great importance once the king

was reborn (essentially as the pyramid/ kingdom/ etc/ etc). This is presumptive and it's entire-

ly possible the remains were of at least minor import and they might have even been left in the

pyramid. But this is no minor point because the people did not believe these were tombs whet-

her the king was inside or not. Not one individual working on building the pyramid would consider

himself to be building a tomb. It was a house of life and not death. It was a living king(dom) and

not a tomb. There was no limit to the number of kings who might live in a great pyramid but the

number of dead kings was capped at "zero" in every single instance*.

* possibly excepting S1 (the first great pyramid).

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Of course there's no evidence to support that, because no one in Egyptology believes it. The change is very evident in many factors, but you've narrowed your entire interest in ancient Egypt to one small window in Dynasty 4 so I wouldn't expect you to be familiar with the changes, which is why you're applying inaccurate assumptions. Egyptology isn't.

We are looking at different pictures from different perspectives and vastly different

levels of knowledge. I'm sure you know a great deal more about details of the pre-5th

dynasty Egyptians and infinitely more about the Egyptians of the book of the dead.

From your perspective you can see countless changes in the language as well as some

in the culture and the "religion". You can see vast changes in politics and archetecture.

Egyptologists see many changes that are invisible to me since I know very little about

these later times and the way words are spelled. Most of this stuff I'm simply in no pos-

ition to argue or dispute the words of experts. I generally accept most of their pronoun-

cements at face value.

But I can quite easily dispute mainstream interpretations of the people and culture that

built G1. This is because all the evidence for the people and culture is interpretative. It

is being misinterpreted and the proof is that the orthodox theory doesn't work. It never

worked. It's not broken but was ill concieved. It was invented broken and built broken so

it doesn't work and never will. The metaphysical meaning of theory is that it is capable

of making accurate predictions but mainstream assumptions have never created anything

but more mysteries. It is through these predictions that theory is reinforced by means of

experiment or by means of news events. If you jettison the assumptions the evidence has

other ways to fit together more coherently and more capable of explaining news since the

1880's, modern news, and the physical evidence.

Figuring out all the details of the lives and ideas of the builders will be a monumental task

but so far mainstream is simply obsessed with tring to get all the evidence to fit tombs. It's

never going to fit because they weren't tombs and simple science can prove it. Rather than

employing such simple science they keep drilkling holes and desicrating graves.

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But this is no minor point because the people did not believe these were tombs whet-

her the king was inside or not. Not one individual working on building the pyramid would consider

himself to be building a tomb. It was a house of life and not death. It was a living king(dom) and

not a tomb.

Though with pyramids we see an evolutionary process from mastaba to true pyramid that mitigates against anything other than them being tombs. Now, clearly GP is somewhat different to the others. It's so very clever exactness and dimensions, it extra features, cause us to scratch heads. If it were not for that pyramid, then I suspect there would not be nearly so much debate about them being tombs or not, and possibly not as much debate about the esoteric affairs that have been heaped upon them. Perhaps to look at GP as some sort of deluxe model, with the true purpose of the expensive extras still lost to us. G1 is the Zil of pyramids, while G2 is a Chaika and all the others Ladas, yet all are still autos/tombs and so on and so forth ad infinitum.

Пока!

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Yet we live about 4,500 years after GP was built and he only 1,000. He lived when the language, religion, culture, everything, was still alive. Much of what he would have access to on papyrus is long dust. Many buildings and inscriptions are damaged or also dust. There is information he would have known, that we do not even know existed. Rather like the famous "Known unknowns and unknown unknowns". We can apply scientific method to excavations and so forth, even know something about construction of some tomb or building that he was not aware of because it was complete in his time. He would not have thought to destroy a building just to scrabble about in the ruins to see that some workman left the remains of his dinner in the foundations, or scrawled some rude remark on a surface that would never have expected to be seen until the end of time. My basic premise is good, and is not about the stela, it is about his knowledge. We cannot possibly know what he knew or didn't know, and some 3,500 years after him, how can we say we know more than him about his own culture, it is just not credible. There may well have been two intermediate periods between the pyramids and him, but there was no great fracture, no fundamental change, even with the Hyksos interlude, in Egyptian culture, as there was, for instance, within Britain between the building of Stonehenge and modern times. I believe he would have had reasonably good knowledge of his past. I cannot prove it, but it also cannot be disproved, and he should, as an actual AE, be given the benefit of the doubt. I think if any of them could see what all us of write about them, then they would be roaring with laughter.

Roaring with laughter? I think they would be spinning in their graves. Or tombs. Or mastabas. Or pyramids... if we ever found a body in a pyramid that is. I think kmt-sesh put it perfectly when he wrote: "Tuthmosis VI's separation in time from the Old Kingdom is valid: people living in Dynasty 18, royals included, would've known very few real facts about what had happened back in Dynasty 4, a thousand years earlier. Histories were not recorded, fact-checked, and stored in a manner similar to what we take for granted today."

We will clearly have to agree to disagree, but I will say this. My father served in the Second World War, but talking to him I was always surprised to find that he seemed to know a lot less about the war than I did. He didn't, for instance, know that Soviet Russia also invaded Poland in 1939. He didn't know anything about Bletchley Park. He had never heard of the battle of Kursk. He had, generally, very little idea about various aspects of the broader scope of the war at all. And yet he was there, actually in it, and his experience was detailed and undeniable, and all his day to day actions and involvement and subsequent memories were more direct and real than anything I ever learned or will learn from a history book. And yet I knew more about the Second World War than he did. Saying that is not dsrespectful to him and it does not in any way denigrate him or his personal knowledge or experience. He was there, in the actual event, but I, long after the actual event ended, was able - through the myriad of sources available - to put together a better and more complete picture than he had himself.

So, I think, it is with Thutmose IV. It is tempting to think of ancient Egypt as a linear and stable civilisation, but by Thutmose's time, the Sphinx was long buried and abandoned... the power, importance and truth of Giza had been obscured for centuries. He was entitled to draw whatever conclusions he did from the questionable evidence available to him... but we are no more obliged to accept it just because of his proximity in time to 2500BC that we are obliged to say that Budge must know slightly more about the AEs than us because he is 80 years nearer to them than we are.

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Though with pyramids we see an evolutionary process from mastaba to true pyramid that mitigates against anything other than them being tombs. Now, clearly GP is somewhat different to the others. It's so very clever exactness and dimensions, it extra features, cause us to scratch heads. If it were not for that pyramid, then I suspect there would not be nearly so much debate about them being tombs or not, and possibly not as much debate about the esoteric affairs that have been heaped upon them. Perhaps to look at GP as some sort of deluxe model, with the true purpose of the expensive extras still lost to us. G1 is the Zil of pyramids, while G2 is a Chaika and all the others Ladas, yet all are still autos/tombs and so on and so forth ad infinitum.

I can agree that if not for the existence of G1 there there would be less debate probably.

But, the facts would not necessarily be any different. There are lots of fine details and good

craftsmanship in other structures and pyramids as well. For many of us, it's not at all the in-

terior of the great pyramids that first attracted our attention but the vast enormity of the struc-

ture and effort required to lift and build it. Even if G1 didn't exist, G2 is still nearly as massive

and even the smaller great pyramids must have been significant undertakings.

The facts remain the same and the facts are that there is no direct evidence that the kings

from before the 5th dynasty were buried in tombs. That they might have been is a given, that

they were is an assumption based on interpretation of facts. The assumption flies in the face

of the words left by the builders who clearly stated many times that the king's grave was in the

sky. 616d. Thou art given over to thy mother Nut, in her name of "Grave"; 616e. she has em-

braced thee, in her name of "Grave";.

It will take science to settle the matter but no science is being done.

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