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Look Mama, no diamond saw


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But the Wiki page about Puma Punka mentions 'mass production' of these Lego-like stones, so apparently they were able to make these stones rather fast.

number of workers, hard work, lot of material and good motivation.

Trust me hard work and motivation, makes wonders.

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Which is a speculation without verification by Jean-Pierre Protzen. From the evidence we have we can speculate on construction times from anywhere of 2 days to 300 years. And depending on how much Nibbler involvement you suppose the shorter the time.

I am not supposing anything weird like 'aliens' or Nibblers, but I guess this Protzen based his ideas on the Lego like stones that were found.

But the main suggestion in this thread is: we know how it could be done.

My suggestion is: show us.

Diorite should not be hard to find.

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I am not supposing anything weird like 'aliens' or Nibblers, but I guess this Protzen based his ideas on the Lego like stones that were found.

But the main suggestion in this thread is: we know how it could be done.

My suggestion is: show us.

Diorite should not be hard to find.

Maybe not where you are, but here all we got is sandstone, lime stone and slate accessible (there probably is some diorite a few hundred feet under ground...

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number of workers, hard work, lot of material and good motivation.

Trust me hard work and motivation, makes wonders.

If the precision of these andesite blocks and their interlocking nature is true then hard work and motivation are the least of the skills required. We are looking at a degree of standardisation that would be easier to grasp if the blocks were cast rather than shaped with primative tools.

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If the precision of these andesite blocks and their interlocking nature is true then hard work and motivation are the least of the skills required. We are looking at a degree of standardisation that would be easier to grasp if the blocks were cast rather than shaped with primative tools.

If it were the only case of standard blocks and tight fit we have in the world one might wonder. Problem is that it is not. It is the case where the hardest rock was used, but not the place with the biggest precision. That would be the artificial lakes of Angkor Wat where mortar and cement-less blocks were used to such precision that the result was a watertight containment:

angkor-wat-temple-angkor-cambodia.jpg?w=500&h=333

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Maybe not where you are, but here all we got is sandstone, lime stone and slate accessible (there probably is some diorite a few hundred feet under ground...

Certainly not here, lol. More than enough clay, though, and gravel and also marl (in the south east).

But I know they make sinks of diorite, so I guess those who make these sinks also have (rough blocks of?) diorite available.

Thinking of it, it would be a great thing for the 'Myth Busters'.

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He makes it look easy.

Yeah, that video (or a better quality of it) has been posted hundreds of times by now.

Here's a better quality one:

What I liked about this guy is that he not only had a nice theory, but also showed us all it wasn't just theory.

Just imagine someone saying, "All this crap about aliens and technologically very advanced civilizations. Just do this and that and so and so, and one man can move a block of stone weighing 10 tons."

All the Hancocks and Von Dänikens and their supporters would jump on him.

But he showed it, hands on.

One of the best videos connected to this topic.

And now we all want (well, I do) a video of someone carving a diorite block with the precision and accuracy the Puma Punku blocks were carved, and only using socalled 'primitive' tools (not made of steel, no use of electricity)

You can bet I will post it on my blog here.

.

Edited by Abramelin
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Well, who searches finds. While we have no tools from the Puma Punku temple the broader approach, that is checking the whole Tiwanaku culture, yield some interesting results.

Here we have a vitrine containing tools:

museotiwanaku14.jpg

Most interesting is the bone saw above the skull and the two drills on the bottom right. Getting warmer....

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Although I was far from suggesting 'aliens' did it, or that diamond cutters had been used, I'd like to see someone copy those Puma Punku stones using the tools like we see in the video and the pdf you posted.

Remember, there are also multiple other technologies potentially involved here including sawing and drilling and most of those demonstrated don't show the added step of finishing.

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I like that example because it shows clearly that you can use a softer rock/metal to form a harder one, most won't notice but up there they are using sandstone (Mohs ~0) to form granite (Mohs 2-7).

Small caveat here, sandstone ranges in hardness depending on the binder from soft enough to carve with a nail (seen it done on HGTV's "Extreme Homes")

to essentially solid quartz.

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Small caveat here, sandstone ranges in hardness depending on the binder from soft enough to carve with a nail (seen it done on HGTV's "Extreme Homes")

to essentially solid quartz.

Yes and no... The problem here is not the engrained granulation but the binder.

But the secret of using sandstone as a honing tool is precisely the quartz content in the binder, which with a Mohs value of 7 will easily grind down most metals and stones.... not so long ago it was used to sharpen steel:

stock-photo-an-old-fashion-sandstone-grinding-wheel-153811.jpg

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Was he able to get to the precision of the the blocks in the next video?

Hi Abe;

Did you notice the frieze on the sister gate at the end of the clip. At first I thought it looked like worm holes, but not in stone . Maybe aftercarving? because it doent gel with the plain austere look of the rest of the blocks. Or it could simply be an indication of how the frieze was carved, I imagine drawn 1st and then drilled before being carved or chiseled. I dont know what to make of the worm holes but they do appear to follow the lines in the design in places.

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Yes and no... The problem here is not the engrained granulation but the binder.

But the secret of using sandstone as a honing tool is precisely the quartz content in the binder, which with a Mohs value of 7 will easily grind down most metals and stones.... not so long ago it was used to sharpen steel:

Exactly, and a good grindstone has to have a hardness that's "just right."

http://books.google.com/books?id=Bo4NTbATXzgC&pg=PA375&lpg=PA375&dq=%22how+to+select+a+good+grindstone%22&source=bl&ots=woHmGnRvjR&sig=xaIKRKqkf3HyEWok53sSQPumUMc&hl=en&sa=X&ei=Ss6iT5ubBo346QHt9IHuCA&ved=0CCcQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=%22how%20to%20select%20a%20good%20grindstone%22&f=false

Just sayin', your point's correct, it's just probably not _that_ soft.

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And now we all want (well, I do) a video of someone carving a diorite block with the precision and accuracy the Puma Punku blocks were carved, and only using socalled 'primitive' tools (not made of steel, no use of electricity)

You can bet I will post it on my blog here.

.

Nail hit squarely on the head. :yes:

Sorry but I fail to see what point if anything has/being be proved here :no: , All that's been shown so far is basic knowledge and skills of a mason.

Now.........show me a perfect hand worked under cut in granite being crafted, show me a perfect inside square cut being crafted, show me perfect hand worked jar being crafted, show me your perfect balancing pot being crafted......then stick that on Youtube. Stuff like the videos on the first page may impress somebody who has no idea, sorry but it doesn't impress me.

http://www.theglobaleducationproject.org/egypt/articles/hrdfact3.php

All it's going to take is one, just one single person to replicate the level of accuracy and complexity and stick the end result on Youtube, using the tools and ONLY the tools that was available to the ancients....how hard a task is this for crying out loud.

Wally proved a point by not being a keyboard warrior and getting off his back side and showing what one man can do with the limited equipment and simple items available to the masons in ancient times. Sorry but nothing he's put on his Youtube video was new to me, masons have known these things for years, in fact many techniques in the video are still used today anyway. There's nothing new here, absolutely nothing. He's shown what a half decent mason already knows anyway, all he's done is stick it on Youtube and everybody has to go WOOOOOWWWW AMAZING........I despair I really do.

Please......... stop telling me how something was made and show me a video of it being made using the ancient tool box..

Sorry if I sound like I'm getting annoyed but talk just frustrates me.

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Nail hit squarely on the head. :yes:

Sorry but I fail to see what point if anything has/being be proved here :no: , All that's been shown so far is basic knowledge and skills of a mason.

Now.........show me a perfect hand worked under cut in granite being crafted, show me a perfect inside square cut being crafted, show me perfect hand worked jar being crafted, show me your perfect balancing pot being crafted......then stick that on Youtube. Stuff like the videos on the first page may impress somebody who has no idea, sorry but it doesn't impress me.

http://www.theglobal...es/hrdfact3.php

All it's going to take is one, just one single person to replicate the level of accuracy and complexity and stick the end result on Youtube, using the tools and ONLY the tools that was available to the ancients....how hard a task is this for crying out loud.

Wally proved a point by not being a keyboard warrior and getting off his back side and showing what one man can do with the limited equipment and simple items available to the masons in ancient times. Sorry but nothing he's put on his Youtube video was new to me, masons have known these things for years, in fact many techniques in the video are still used today anyway. There's nothing new here, absolutely nothing. He's shown what a half decent mason already knows anyway, all he's done is stick it on Youtube and everybody has to go WOOOOOWWWW AMAZING........I despair I really do.

Please......... stop telling me how something was made and show me a video of it being made using the ancient tool box..

Sorry if I sound like I'm getting annoyed but talk just frustrates me.

Here's a thought, Bansky Boy. I don't think most of us display chronic astonishment at ancient man's ability to work with all types of stone.

You're the one constantly demanding that someone get out there and prove it can be done. So, why not stop demanding this and do it yourself?

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Well, who searches finds. While we have no tools from the Puma Punku temple the broader approach, that is checking the whole Tiwanaku culture, yield some interesting results.

Here we have a vitrine containing tools:

museotiwanaku14.jpg

Most interesting is the bone saw above the skull and the two drills on the bottom right. Getting warmer...

But again, NO video proving your point.

This is nothing even remotely similar to the Puma Punku stones.

Try harder, please.

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The main point here is

You (whoever you are) claim you know how things were done.

Good.

Now show us (video) how you did it.

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While we're on subject and since Banksy Boy brought up this website link with Chris Dunn's photos, any idea on what specific tool or tools the Egyptians used to make deep straight line cuts in the basalt of this picture?

post-98694-0-30265200-1336087560_thumb.j

I've been looking for a specific tool/saw all over the academic websites as a possible candidate, can't find a reference for the exact tool. Also, in the picture below from the same website Bansky Boy posted, are pictures of stoneware like this one. My question is, how exactly did they get this specific piece so thin and what exact tool or tools did the Egyptians use to produce a quality of stoneware like this?

post-98694-0-59883300-1336087609_thumb.j

Probably get a better look at the pictures on the website, by the way. The attachments here are a little small compared to ones on the above website link that Banksy Boy posted.

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While we're on subject and since Banksy Boy brought up this website link with Chris Dunn's photos, any idea on what specific tool or tools the Egyptians used to make deep straight line cuts in the basalt of this picture?

post-98694-0-30265200-1336087560_thumb.j

I've been looking for a specific tool/saw all over the academic websites as a possible candidate, can't find a reference for the exact tool. Also, in the picture below from the same website Bansky Boy posted, are pictures of stoneware like this one. My question is, how exactly did they get this specific piece so thin and what exact tool or tools did the Egyptians use to produce a quality of stoneware like this?

post-98694-0-59883300-1336087609_thumb.j

Probably get a better look at the pictures on the website, by the way. The attachments here are a little small compared to ones on the above website link that Banksy Boy posted.

The question is: did the ancient Egyptians do it or was it part of a well intended but badly performed "improvement" scheme?

There are many archeological sites that have been "rebuilt" using modern tools/means, there are sites that have been vandalized with modern tools/means. If it is Egyptian it would be a combination of a rock saw and an abrasive (i.e. quartz sand)

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But again, NO video proving your point.

This is nothing even remotely similar to the Puma Punku stones.

Try harder, please.

Wait...musta been aliens...no Atlanteans..no come on now, you are a little older than that.

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Wait...musta been aliens...no Atlanteans..no come on now, you are a little older than that.

I'm not sure why people are so astonished by Puma Punku. I mean, the stonework is masterful, no doubting that, but I think the site has been wholly misrepresented by half-baked TV crap like Ancient Aliens and any other number of dubious sources. The vast majority of the construction and especially the largest stones are red sandstone, one of the easiest types of stones to work and shape.

Smaller, ornamental stones are andesite, a volcanic stone. I often hear that the stones at Puma Punku are diorite. The large stones are not, but are andesite and diorite the same thing? I'm not well versed in geology so I don't know. I imagine they were formed in similar ways, but that doesn't make them the same, nor does it imply the same degree of hardness.

All I know from what little reading I've done on Puma Punku from legitimate sources, it can be tricky to separate the facts from the spouting geysers of bullcrap.

Geysers! Ha!

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Good videos here...but I bet those guys beating on chisels would have a very different opinion about whether they could replicate the blocks at Puma Punku using those tools, if anyone bothered to ask them. Opinions on this appear somewhat divided depending upon where one wears their calluses; on their hands or on their rear-ends.

I don't think most of us display chronic astonishment at ancient man's ability to work with all types of stone.

Derision in lieu of substance?

Wait...musta been aliens...no Atlanteans..no come on now, you are a little older than that.

So are you...why run from the challenge?

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Good videos here...but I bet those guys beating on chisels would have a very different opinion about whether they could replicate the blocks at Puma Punku using those tools, if anyone bothered to ask them. Opinions on this appear somewhat divided depending upon where one wears their calluses; on their hands or on their rear-ends.

Derision in lieu of substance?

So are you...why run from the challenge?

I admit I myself get overly testy with these matters. Many, many times I've attempted sincerely to offer substance, only to have it turned on it's head and summarily dismissed. As I'm sure you'll admit, lilthor, you've been guilty of this, yourself. You're one of those who does not like the evidence we cite or charge that we "run from a challenge"...but at the same time, what have you to contribute? Where are your answers? Instead of just hammering us skeptics, what can you offer in the manner of realistic explanation?

In all fairness, and speaking for myself, I will never cave into the pie-eyed scenarios of the likes of Chris Dunn or other fringe theorists, who present the same sort of chronic astonishment and a refusal to consider extant evidence, while at the same time seeming to hint at some sort of super-advanced, lost technology. This is simply not realistic. And it's also why Chris Dunn and his sort are considered somewhat nutty and are not taken seriously.

The problem is, lilthor, we have in the archaeological record the tools actually used by the people of Puma Punku and Egypt and other ancient monument builders, but this does not mean we have all the answers. Are we able to explain in exacting detail how these peoples worked in stone, in all cases? Of course not. We are left to evaluate the material culture left to us, and how we've come to understand ancient building techniques through experiential archaeology and other procedures. We will never have all the answers, but at the same time this does not give one license to abandon proper inquiry in favor of unrealistic sci-fi scenarios like super-advanced, lost technologies.

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I'm not sure why people are so astonished by Puma Punku. I mean, the stonework is masterful, no doubting that, but I think the site has been wholly misrepresented by half-baked TV crap like Ancient Aliens and any other number of dubious sources. The vast majority of the construction and especially the largest stones are red sandstone, one of the easiest types of stones to work and shape.

Smaller, ornamental stones are andesite, a volcanic stone. I often hear that the stones at Puma Punku are diorite. The large stones are not, but are andesite and diorite the same thing? I'm not well versed in geology so I don't know. I imagine they were formed in similar ways, but that doesn't make them the same, nor does it imply the same degree of hardness.

All I know from what little reading I've done on Puma Punku from legitimate sources, it can be tricky to separate the facts from the spouting geysers of bullcrap.

Geysers! Ha!

They are the same in as far as they are of volcanic origin and look more or less the same. Andesite generally has more metallic content such as magnetite than diorite and diorite contains more sulfur compounds, in as far as the silicate oxide content they are equal, or within the same category. They contain less quartz than similar rock formations, i.e. granite, making them easier to work (so far for the diamond saw) by abrasion, a little more difficult by impact.

The problem we are facing here is that diorite is not equal diorite. As with all rocks there are softer and harder varieties. And by no means it is only worked in Puma Punku. Hammurabi code was hammered into a diorite block (probably because it was the longest lasting material known at the time). There is a predynastic Egyptian example of a diorite vase (about 3600 BC), but as it is the Idahet variety (very soft) it could be easily turned to form.

220px-Diorite_Vase_Neqada_II_Predynastic_Ancient_Egypt_Field_Museum.jpg

What we are faced with is the usual fringe problem: they have smelled a stinking river and now they want to make us believe all rivers stink...which is far from reality.

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Answers are precisely what some argue to be in short supply. Others contend we have all the answers we need. Obviously I tend toward the former and find it most intriguing that the people who are doing the most recent fieldwork do as well.

We simply do NOT have tools in the archaeological record that match the surface features found on many of these creations. It is as true today as it would have been back then that tool shape dictates work features and vice versa.

Also being completely ignored, if not outright rejected, are the obvious hallmarks of high degree process efficiency found at many of these sites. This means precision AND speed. As an earlier post suggested, it appears some of these works were done rather quickly and without error.

Someone pointed out in the other thread that stone can even be shaped over time by contact with human hands. It seems people would rather believe blocks like those found at Puma Punku were lovingly massaged and rubbed into shape than accept they used efficient means.

I know little about the "fringe theorists" mentioned, but I do know they are in the field collecting data. And hand calluses.

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