Earlier in this series, I started by looking at Afrocentrist claims of the origins of Western culture and some examples of its acceptance of myth over fact.
Not surprisingly, many pseudo-archaeologists and fraudulent-historians have failed to get their minds around the idea that even a society as ancient as the Egyptians could have developed the knowledge seen in the material remains unearthed by archaeologists. These individuals imagine that the intelligence, technology, and knowledge possessed by the Egyptians was passed onto them from an earlier race of people, now lost to history and archaeology.
Today, the loudest voices behind this idea are Robert Bauval and Graham Hancock, who have proposed what they call the Orion Correlation Theory. They present the idea that the three great pyramids at Giza were built by the Egyptians in the 3rd Millennium BCE in an arrangement that mirrored the belt stars of the Orion constellation. Deeper than this, is the belief that the pyramids actually lined up dirrectly with the stars, and it was by this that the Egyptians positioned them.
However, the stars of the belt don’t actually line up with the pyramids, and they didn’t in the 3rd Millennium BCE either. Hancock and Bauval claim that the pyramids do in fact align with the stars as they would have been positioned around 10,500 BCE, thousands of years before archaeologists and historians date the pyramids. The dating of the pyramids is in fact quite solid, and even these authors, and other supporters of the Orion Correlation Theory, can’t find room to argue against it. Instead, they posit that the arrangement of the pyramids was based on knowledge passed down from some ancient and secret society which recorded the position of the stars and wanted to convey some message.
There are a number of problems with this theory. The first, is the absolute lack of evidence for any such ancient super culture. To main stream archaeologists and historians, this creates an obvious disproof, as the OCT appears to be little more than an intelligent design epic for the creation of the pyramids. This is not a problem for pseudo-archaeologists who wish to find support for the theory attempt to rearrange chronology of known events to find evidence for their secret culture.
An example of this is Hancock’s attempt to link the Sphinx to the constellation of Leo, and to posit a much earlier date for the monstrous carving. This dating is based on a hypothesis supported by a small number of geologists who say the erosion pattern on the Sphinx comes from a time when water was much more common in Egypt. However, many other scholars have pointed out that this is not necessarily true, and that current and past erosion could easily have caused the types of erosion seen on the Sphinx within the mainstream dating supported by archaeologists and Egyptologists.
On top of this historic missing culture, the OCT attempts to match the Giza Pyramids to stars which they actually do not fit. Astronomer Ed Krupp has pointed out two major differences between the pyramids and Orion’s Belt. First, the angle between the pyramids does not match the angle between the stars in the constellation. Second, the pyramids, as positioned on the ground are reversed compared to the stars in the constellation. If Hancock and Bauval are right about an ancient super culture, they were apparently quite poor in their ability to represent the stars.
Finally, the OCT looks at the Giza Pyramids as a one time event, built to fit a specific plan. However, the pyramids were actually built across a period of time. The three pharaohs buried in the Giza Pyramids were not a straight line of inheritance either, as there were disputes concerning the order. This makes it highly unlikely that some plan was made before pyramids were built.
Of course, the Giza Pyramids were not the only pyramids the Egyptians built. There are a number of pyramids throughout the region, which show a progression in technique. However, these pyramids were at all times tombs, with no apparent meaning in their arrangement. From this, the current model held by Egyptologists can be seen to be almost certainly correct.
Hancock’s claims don’t end with the creation of a mythical culture behind the Giza Pyramids. When faced with the many accurate problems people have raised, Hancock has attempted to explain them away by rewriting history. He has claimed that the ancient civilization that no one can find any evidence for existed in Antarctica, which shifted cataclysmiclly south sometime in the past, covering cities and all evidence of the culture in ice. Effectively, Hancock is looking for ancient Atlantis.
So how do we know Hancock and others are wrong? How do we know that there wasn’t a terrible event which hid a secret ancient civilization? First, ice probes of Antarctica actually tell us an accurate history dating back well before Hancock’s proposed chronology. Additionally, the historic record held in Egyptian writing and material remains is completely mute on this supposed culture or its impact.
Hancock and Bauval appear incapable of believing in chance, concerning the OCT, or the ability of the ancient Egyptians to create their culture through a process of gradual development and evolution. This is certainly representative of a broad range of theories concerning ancient super cultures that have plagued archaeology for a long time. As yet, they all lack even a modicum of evidence, instead relying on supposition, misunderstood science, fictional histories, and the gods of the gaps.
Pseudo-archaeologists don’t simply fall back on Atlantis as an origin of African culture, some have looked to known cultures as a potential base for African society. In the next installment of this series I will look the proposed spread of Israelite culture to Africa and the Americas posited by a number of pseudo-historians.
Brass, Mike An Analysis of the Quality of Graham Hancock’s Science; http://www.hallofmaat.com/modules.php?name=Articles&file=article&sid=8
Krupp, Ed Personal Communications
_______. “The Sphinx Blinks” Sky & Telescope, March 2001 http://www.hallofmaat.com/modules.php?name=Articles&file=article&sid=24
“Oldest Antarctic Ice Core Reveals Climate History” Science Daily http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/06/040611080100.htm
Fagan, Garrett G. Archaeological Fantasies: How Pseudoarchaeology Misrepresents the Past and Misleads the Public. London: Routledge, 2006.
Filed under: Archaeology, Archaeoporn, ID/Creationism, Pseudo-Science | Tagged: Ed Krupp, Graham Hancock, OCT, Orion Corellation Theory, Pyramids, Robert Bauval
Good stuff, keep it coming.
But, of course the Egyptians got it all from Atlantis. Here’s the ‘missing link’.
When we go back, as required, way earlier than the time of the first Pharaohs, we find this curious tradition preserved by Diodorus Siculus:
The Egyptians were foreigners, who, in remote times, settled on the banks of the Nile, bringing with them a civilisation of their mother country, the art of drawing and the polished language. They had come from the direction of the setting sun and were the most ancient of men.
Therefore, some ur-Egyptians had migrated from the west, coming over the Libyan sands (by which Diodorus meant most of the North African coast). Libya was included by Plato in the great and wonderful Atlantean empire: the men of Atlantis had subjected [to their rule] the parts of Libya within the columns of Heracles as far as Egypt….
Q.E.D.
(with tongue firmly in cheek)
Judith
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Visit Zenobia’s blog at Empress of the East
It seems that most of these folks invoke various forms of conspiracy theory, and spend a great deal of time and energy, but not research, trying to make facts fit their ideology.
Also, it’s rather insulting to the people of the continent of africa, and the african diaspora. Are they implying that if sub-saharan africans did *not* do these things, then they are not capable of greatness?
If Africans had their own unique histories and cultures that don’t include founding all other cultures, so what? Does that make Nelson Mandela any less great? Does that make the music of Senegal any less creative? Does that make the oil of Nigeria any less, er, oily?
“Are they implying that if sub-saharan africans did *not* do these things, then they are not capable of greatness?”
Ultimately, aren’t we all Africans?
And of course, there’s the rather obvious alternate explanation as to why the third piramid is slightly out of line with the other two.
The foundation isn’t there. While the first two piramids are build on solid rock, the rock simply doesn’t reach far enough to fit another piramid on it in a straight line, so they moved it back a bit.