I’m really curious about your source for this, MC, because it sounds very implausible.
I saw “This Old Pyramid”, and six men had no trouble sliding a block of stone on a sled, moving over a log road that was kept wet. The log road wasn’t a road of rollers, but of logs laid in the ground, perpendicular to the direction of the road.
Never attribute to an -ism anything more easily explained by common, human stupidity.
Yes, a source-- you sound very confident on this, so I’m wondering where you learned this.
(How old are you? What’s Imhotep like, anyway?)
Anyway, even in the good ol’ days, I think a bunch of 3 foot diameter logs would be hard to come by in the Nile river valley-- more trouble than they’re worth, at least.
The Greeks did use that sort of thing, though-- built wooden wheel-things to stick around the lintels (Coulton, 1977, citing Metagenes via Paconius 
). The fact is that we have SEEN guys use these wooden rollers (although they gave it us in favor of sledges-- faster).
So, Hansel, was it Hemmingway that coined the phrase: “Built in crap detector” hum?
I’ve given up on the yo-yos but I am having limited success with the sling shot (anybody know where I can get a quantity discount on pichincko balls?).
Does anybody know how many pichincko balls could be carried from Japan to Easter Island on a Kon-Tiki type craft? Thor Hyerdahl has stoped returning my calls.
My next project is to replicate the Nazca Lines with nothing but a jump rope and an Etch-a-Sketch.
Elmer J. Fudd,
Millionaire.
I own a mansion and a yacht.
My idea is that the pyramids were done simply by cutting away the soil around them rather than adding bricks.
I know for a definite fact that pyramids were not built with kites.
They were built with great big rocks.
Kites just blow away; & anyway, rocks last ever so much longer.
Next Week: We learn that tollhouse cookies don’t taste very good, if you make them from ols tollbooths. Use new ones.
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Here’s the link to the Time magazine short article that prompted the original question.
[http://www.pathfinder.com/time/magazine/articles/0,3266,35072,00.html]How Do You Build a Pyramid? Go Fly a Kite
I made a mistake in the previous post, here is a clickable link.
I can just imagine the overseer holding a wet finger up, saying “we’d better not try it right now: it’s too gusty.”
Never attribute to an -ism anything more easily explained by common, human stupidity.
The kite theory seems pretty screwed up based upon the little bit I have heard about it here. A couple questions:
Did she theorize that a single large kite was used to do the lifting, or was it a cluster of individual kites? Using one large kite would be improbable because the kite itself would most-likely collapse under its own weight–fuggedabout supporting the weight of a large stone object as well. Using a large number of kites would also be impractical, especially if you consider the number of support and tether lines it would take to do the job.
Does Egypt have a fairly windy climate? I don’t think I would want to be under that limestone block if the wind died down suddenly. Of course, if the guys holding the lines ran really fast they could keep it in the air, but they would end up moving the block out of position.
Not to be a killjoy, but is this really that big of a mystery that scientists need to expend so much time and energy on it? I mean, come on, the Egyptians were capable of quarrying the limestone rather well, and we know that most heavy work was done by draft animals and manual labor. If they used rollers, ramps, or frames and pulleys doesn’t make too much of a difference.
Even Alexander Graham Bell had very limited success with his tetrahedral kites. He built a 1600 cell kite and was only able to lift a 160 lb. man about 10 ft.
I think he also tried a much larger (3000+ cell) one and tried towing it behind a boat. I don’t recall the results of that but I do know it was destroyed after falling in the water.
“Some people are worried about the difference between right and wrong. I’m worried about the difference between wrong and fun.”
~P.J. O’Rourke~