The Great Sphinx Dating Debate - page two

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Books about the Great
Sphinx & Pyramids

"Pyramid Quest: Secrets of the Great Pyramid and the Dawn of Civilization"
by
Dr Robert M. Schoch
&
Robert Aquinas Mcnally

EU English Edition

"How is it that the Great Pyramid exercises such a gripping hold on the human psyche adding cryptic grace and framing myriad claims of New Age "pyramid power"? In "Pyramid Quest", Robert M. Schoch and Robert Aquinas McNally use the rigorous intellectual analysis of scientific inquiry to investigate what we know about the Great Pyramid and develop a stunning hypothesis: this ancient monument is the strongest proof yet, that civilisation began thousands of years earlier than is generally thought, extending far back into a little-known time.

In tracing that story, we come to understand not only the Great Pyramid but also our own origins as civilised beings."

"Voices of the Rocks:
A Scientist Looks at
Catastrophes and
Ancient Civilizations"
by
Dr Robert M. Schoch

EU English Edition

"The great 19th-century battle between catastrophists and uniformitarians seemed to end with the notion of global cataclysms being dismissed as a back door to the supernatural.

But the catastrophist theory has gradually become more and more plausible, so that now, less than a hundred years later, it is widely believed that mass extinctions are linked to meteor strikes."

"The Complete Pyramids:
Solving the Ancient
Mysteries"
by
Mark Lehner
&
Richard H. Wilkinson

EU English Edition

"For centuries the pyramids have inspired passionate theories about their origins, purpose and method of construction. In this full work on the major pyramids of Ancient Egypt, the author surveys the history, building and use of the pyramids. He examines both the practicalities and logostics of their construction and their conceptual aspects - their cosmology and iconography and their intriguing texts."

"Lawton and Ogilvie-Herald (page 313) agree with me that the current arid climatic regime of the Giza Plateau began approximately in the middle of the third millennium B.C. (circa 2350 B.C. by one standard dating scheme) and there were various periods of relatively heavy rainfall from about 10,000 or 8,000 B.C. up until the onset of the predominant aridity that has existed in the area for the last 4500 years or so.

Lawton and Ogilvie-Herald also correctly point out that there were occasional rains, even heavy rains, during dynastic Egyptian times and up through the present day, resulting in periodic flash floods. Still, as will be discussed further below, such flash floods actually have little bearing on the weathering, erosion, and ultimately the determination of the age of the oldest portion of the Sphinx (here it is important to remember that the Great Sphinx was refurbished and partially recarved, including a recarving of the head, in dynastic times). Sporadic heavy rains and the resulting flash floods (due to the inability of the rain to penetrate and soak into the land's surface and thus it runs off and collects in valleys, wadis, and other depressions) commonly found in arid regions do have tremendous potential to move loose debris and even cause serious erosion.

Copyright © 1999, Dr. Robert M. Schoch

However, in my opinion as a geologist, the nature and especially degree of weathering seen in the Sphinx enclosure and on the body of the Sphinx itself, is incompatible with sporadic flash floods since dynastic times.

Even if occasional heavy rains occur on the Giza Plateau, the fact remains that currently on average only about an inch of rain each year occurs in the region (25 to 29 mm annually).

I do not believe that there has been enough rainfall in the area over the last 5000 years to account for the tremendous degradation of the actual limestone bedrock as seen on the western end of the Sphinx enclosure, much less to account for the extreme weathering and erosion seen on the core body of the Sphinx itself. The latter is an important point, because in the case of the body of the Sphinx only the back (top) of the Sphinx serves as a catchment area for any subsequent runoff.

From what we understand of the climate of the area, it strains credulity to suggest that this weathering and erosion is the result of rainfall during the last 4,500 years. This is even more so the case when we take into account the calculations of Lawton and Ogilvie-Herald (page 312) that the Sphinx enclosure and body of the Sphinx have been buried in sand, and thus effectively protected from this type of erosion, for 3,100 of the last 4,500 years.

Furthermore, based on the perceptive analysis of the geologist Colin Reader (discussed below), since at least the time of Khufu (circa 2550 B.C. according to one standard chronology), the Sphinx has not even been situated in a position where it could receive the brunt of such flash floods. Among ancient Egyptian structures, those that show clear signs of having been damaged or otherwise significantly affected by the occasional heavy rains and resulting flash floods are those situated in valleys, wadis, and other low areas that serve as channels for the collected water.

Lawton and Ogilvie-Herald cite the Valley of the Kings at Luxor as a case in point, and other authors have cited Reisner's suggestions of flood damage to the Menkaure valley temple on the Giza Plateau. Potential flood damage to Menkaura's valley temple is very different in kind and degree than the actual erosion and degradation of limestone bedrock as seen in the Sphinx enclosure.

According to Lehner (1997, "The Complete Pyramids", Thames and Hudson, London, p. 137), Menkaure's valley temple "lies at the mouth of the main wadi" (as is clear from maps of the site, as well as personal inspection of the area) which would situate it to receive the brunt of any ephemeral flash floods and hardly is relevant to the western end of the Sphinx enclosure or the body of the Sphinx itself."

Furthermore it was apparently finished in mudbrick by Shepseskaf, then rebuilt (after being 'flooded' at some point) during the 6th Dynasty. To use an argument from Menkaure's valley temple or the Valley of the Kings at Luxor in an attempt to keep some semblance of the traditional date for the Sphinx, or at least keep it dynastic, just doesn't work."

Dr Robert M. Schoch's response to criticisms by Ian Lawton & Chris Ogilvie-Herald in their book
"Giza: The Truth" continues on:

page three

"The Pyramids and Temples of Gizeh"
by
W. M. Flinders Petrie

EU English Edition

"Based on the author's work in Egypt in the 1880s, this unusual volume addresses one of history's greatest puzzles -- how were the pyramids of Gizeh built? Before Petrie undertook this study, the Great Pyramid was a byword for paradox - something that was generally familiar, yet not accurately known. No measurements or detailed examination had been performed. Petrie set out to apply mathematical methods to the study of the pyramids and surrounding temples, with the objective of understanding the methods and abilities of the ancient workers.

The result, presented in this volume, is a complete set of measurements of the pyramids, both inside and outside. These provide the foundation for the rest of the book, which deals with the architectural ideas of the pyramid builders, the mechanical methods they used, and a comparison of previous theories with the facts that Petrie had newly established."

Ancient Egyptian
Mysteries Bookshoppe