I Just Painted That Barn!

[Kerry Skydancer]

Well, how did they move those stones that our modern equipment can't? They say they made the stones float on water with sound. For years they thought that was imposible untill NASA started floating quatters with sound.

Hmm? Who's they, and what stones are you talking about? I'm not aware of anything so super-sized in the old monuments that it would pose problems for a crane, or even for a work gang armed with pulleys, rollers, and ramps.

[Fusion]

I forget who and where, but I've seen pictures. One stone to that monument is out in the dessert though. I is larger than my HOUSE! Yes, some of todays crains can lift a house, but not one made out of solid high dencity matirial.

[The JAM]

[...unWARP!!!]

Good evening.


Some pyramidions (the topmost stone on a pyramid) weigh more than what ANY crane can lift.

Are archeologists still trying to figure out how the Incas built some houses in Machu Pichu, whose walls are built of carved stone, but each stone fits so close to another that the joint is practically airtight?

True, Kerry, intelligence is not an energy state, but human DNA, and the human brain, which intelligence needs, are, sadly, subject to entropy.

[Shyal_malkes]

I have heard one methode that the egyptians used to erect their giant obelisks was to gather together a lot of sand really high up and boxed in, then build the thing horizontal on top of it, then release the sand near the "bottom" of the obelisk, the thing then tips into place. do that enough times and you get a whole palace of obelisks to use.

entropy in the human systems, I think we are each subject to chaos in the system individually as time wears on, but as a human race as a whole the entropy doesn't seem to be effecting things from generation to generation very much (sorry, just a guess)

[UncleMonty]

People love to be amazed. They'll take a feat like the building of the Egyptian pyramids and turn it into an impossibility just so it will seem more astonishing that it was done.
A pyramid's stonework is very tight - but only the outermost layer. Beneath the sheathing of finely carved stone, it's pretty much a loose pile of blocks. As to lifting a huge weight to the top of the pyramid? I don't know how they did it, but they could have used a pulley system with a counterweight on the other side of the pyramid. Fill a big box with rocks until it's heavier than the block you want lifted...

[Shyal_malkes]

thinking more on possibilities and less on having sand on hte brain, but if they did move sand to build and raise obelisks, why not put together the bottom part of the outter layer of a pyramid, then build sand up to that level and start on the next level from there? effectively lowering the next highest level of the pyramid to ground level.

just a thought.

*finds a clean corner to go clean all the sand out of his ears*

[Fusion]

Next riddle. How did the move that stone over the sand in the first place?

[Shyal_malkes]

weren't most of the egyptian stones made out of brick, so all they had to do (for the bricks anyway) would be to move the raw materials up on top of the hill of sand and make the stones on top, right next to where the stones were going to be resting anyway.

water + sand + mud + straw + heat + time = brick (note, not necessarily in those proportions.)

I'm still workng out how they might have moved the 'time' up on top of the hill though.

[Tbolt]

Sorry Shyal but stone <> brick (Coundn't make the "equals not symbol ) The ancients could make brick of varying quality with the ingredients you mentioned. (Better quality bricks were kiln dried and could withstand rain better as opposed to sun-dried bricks which were easier to make, but deteriorated more in the event of a rainstorm)

The surviving monuments from antiquity were mostly made of quarried stone. Brick structures just didn't have what it took to stand the test of time and all that remains of them are the foundatins.

As to the movment of titanic boulders, it's hard to say, but when you have a labor force of 10,000 backs to draw upon, it's surpising what you can do with basic tools. (Ask the chinese)

If their instructions had survived to this day, it would be interesting to see how they accomplished their engineering tasks.

[Shyal_malkes]

well, so much for that theory. still I thought it sounded good. the question then becomes, how and where did they get that stone in the first place. knowing where the stone started may hold some clues as to how they ere able to move it.

just a thought = long and large stone pillar mined out of some mine somewhere. pulled on top of many wooden rollers by many 'volunteers'. mayhaps a pully and rope system is set up by a temporary frame along the way. the weight of the pillar makes it harder to start but easier to keep going (inertia). and by the time the pillar is done, the wooden rollers are reduced mostly to ruined shafts of wood, splinters and dust.

[Kerry Skydancer]

The Egyptians, at least, moved the stones from river-side quarries to the building sites by boat. Contrary to urban legend, we do have their work camps located and know what tools they used - Wood and stone ramps, with rollers, and cranes to haul them up once they got to the pyramid. The sand blew in later - remember that the big pyramids were put up over three thousand years ago, when the Sahara wasn't nearly so bad as today.

[Shyal_malkes]

the egyptians rollers turned to dust under their heavy stones, that's what made all the sand!

or not

[UncleMonty]

As I heard it, and this was a number of years ago on a National Geographic television special, so don't expect details... Each generation of Egyptian Pharaohs wished a grander, more astounding tomb than the one before. Since the Pharaoh was regarded as a god, what he wanted - he got. The earliest tombs were hardly more than really big piles of rock. The last tombs were truly remarkable works. It would be hard to say which finally did the most to destroy the Pharaohs rule: a change in weather, the wars with neighboring nations, or the cost of building the pyramids.

[Fusion]

Pride allways leads to a fall.

[Shyal_malkes]

and usually a lot of people gawking at it later muttering "how on earth did that happen!?"