# How were the pyramids in Egypt built?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559>\
**Category:** Great Debates\
**Created:** [December 7, 2014, 10:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559 "2014-12-07T10:40:36Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 20\
**Page:** 115

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\
**Post date:** [May 24, 2015, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2282 "2015-05-24T19:48:58Z")

</div>

For stones too heavy to move by adding wooden arcs, stone could be used - stone to bear the weight, framed with timber sides.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![rayxoxo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f05b48/32.png) [@rayxoxo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rayxoxo)\
**Post date:** [May 24, 2015, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2283 "2015-05-24T20:58:33Z")

</div>

How to built a pyramid using the method suggested -

You need long rope, logs, and two very large buckets (large enough to hold the tonnage of stone).

Both ends of the rope are attached to the two bucket or elevators - The rope goes over logs at the particular height of the pyramid and when one is lowered to the ground the other end is at the top of the particular level of the pyramid.

Stones are loaded onto the bucket/elevator on the ground and logs are used to roll the buckets by sitting under the rope - The high bucket is loaded with people and things to out-weigh the stone - As the upper elevator becomes heavier than the stone - the bucket with the stone rises and the upper bucket begins to lower til at the ground.

Just picture a rope over a clothe line with two buckets attached to their ends. Which ever is heavier pulls up the opposite bucket. The logs are the friction removers.

Similar to a see saw affect.

Please note that I know nil about building things.

As strange as this may seem, it came to me in a dream. ; ?)

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\
**Post date:** [May 24, 2015, 9:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2284 "2015-05-24T21:09:12Z")

</div>

Surely it would be easier just to squirt the stones into place or make them fly with pieces of paper.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\
**Post date:** [May 24, 2015, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2285 "2015-05-24T21:13:12Z")

</div>

> [@rayxoxo](#):
>
> Please note that I know nil about building things.
> 
> As strange as this may seem, it came to me in a dream. ; ?)

Then it must be true! Just ask **cladking**. 😉

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Latro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a87d85/32.png) [@Latro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Latro)\
**Post date:** [May 24, 2015, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2286 "2015-05-24T21:42:45Z")

</div>

> [@rayxoxo](#):
>
> Stones are loaded onto the bucket/elevator on the ground and logs are used to roll the buckets by sitting under the rope - The high bucket is loaded with people and things to out-weigh the stone - As the upper elevator becomes heavier than the stone - the bucket with the stone rises and the upper bucket begins to lower til at the ground.

But, that’s brilliant!  
The people just step out of the bucket, when they get down, and walk back up the ramp, where a refreshing soda awaits.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Section\_Maker\_Jupe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/section_maker_jupe/32/1424_2.png) [@Section\_Maker\_Jupe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Section_Maker_Jupe)\
**Post date:** [May 24, 2015, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2287 "2015-05-24T23:49:00Z")

</div>

What I am having trouble imagining, is getting the 81’3" CO2 geyser to cooperate, whether its lifting stones, or making sodas!!!

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\
**Post date:** [May 24, 2015, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2288 "2015-05-24T23:54:44Z")

</div>

That’s because your plumbing isn’t also a group of gods.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slow_moving_vehicle/32/291_2.png) [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slow_Moving_Vehicle)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2289 "2015-05-25T00:39:25Z")

</div>

> [@Section\_Maker\_Jupe](#):
>
> What I am having trouble imagining, is getting the 81’3" CO2 geyser to cooperate, whether its lifting stones, or making sodas!!!

You’re a victim of your confused modern language. If you could speak the ancient language, you’d know the ancient science and would be able to fix your geysers. Alas, there’s only been one person who understood two sciences…

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![cladking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4af34b/32.png) [@cladking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cladking)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2290 "2015-05-25T01:15:38Z")

</div>

> [@Section\_Maker\_Jupe](#):
>
> What I am having trouble imagining, is getting the 81’3" CO2 geyser to cooperate, whether its lifting stones, or making sodas!!!

They studied these geysers extensively and understood them in depth. They had studied them for nearly eight centuries before building G1 in 2750 BC and had experience with the natural geysers they had replaced. They learned very early that stopping the backflow of decarbonated water was the chief means of assuring there would be another eruption soon. To this end they invented the ability to fit stones together with “optical precision” so inert spent water would be whisked away by gravity rather than seeping through the bedrock or flowing back down the well and stopping eruptions. There’s nothing to stop a CO2 geyser from being essentially continuous so long as there’s a steady flow of carbonated water into the chamber where it is degassed.

459a. Men bury themselves (in their grave (?); the gods fly up.

Not only were these drilled but they did plumbing on them. Even the drillgets a mention;

1969a (N. 758). so that the two followers of the gods, with sharp teeth and long claws, may bring the god forth by his hands.

The gods must be brought forth by their means to manipulate at a distance.

This next one gave me great consternation for a long time. How could a sieve protect anything at all especially when that sieve is the sky which allows all objects to pass;

1608a. she has protected thee against all evil things, in her name of “Great Sieve” (protectress).

1629a. Nut throws herself upon her son, who is in thee; she protects thee;

But the sky throws herself on the geyser and she empraces the earth and all things contained. The answer is quite simple; by her arms reacjhing into the earth the geyser is protected so long as her arms are complete. If you throw a stone in it breaks the arm of the sky and she no longer protects the geyser. Language always reflected the desired state rather than the actual state. Throwing a stone in the well was a crime against nature and the state as defined by ritual. It was breaking the arm of nut.

I already mentioned many of the other things concerning care and feeding of a geyser. Most of what they did were common sense but they were developed by a different science than we have. It was very much a common sense science; you observed what was there and then reasoned how it fit with everything else you already knew. If necessary you made repeated or similar observations and it became theory when others could replicate the observation. This science was so simple a caveman could do it. The first beaver to build a dam did it. We can’t see it because we don’t even take reality as being axiomatic. We don’t trust our own senses so look at the world only through the reality of experiment.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![cladking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4af34b/32.png) [@cladking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cladking)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 1:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2291 "2015-05-25T01:18:21Z")

</div>

> [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](#):
>
> You’re a victim of your confused modern language. If you could speak the ancient language, you’d know the ancient science and would be able to fix your geysers. Alas, there’s only been one person who understood two sciences…

Understands… 😉

Unfortunately my understanding of both sciences is woefully incomplete. I do get their respective metaphysics however (at least the definitions and axioms).

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2292 "2015-05-25T01:24:39Z")

</div>

> [@Latro](#):
>
> But, that’s brilliant!  
> The people just step out of the bucket, when they get down, and walk back up the ramp, where a refreshing soda awaits.

It’s like a perpetual bucket and soda machine! I wonder where they got platforms big enough to life multi-ton stones…??

And, does anyone know if the ancient Egyptians had ice cream? Because ice cream sodas would have been killer after walking up the ramp.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2293 "2015-05-25T01:28:13Z")

</div>

> [@cladking](#):
>
> They studied these geysers extensively and understood them in depth. They had studied them for nearly eight centuries before building G1 in 2750 BC and had experience with the natural geysers they had replaced. They learned very early that stopping the backflow of decarbonated water was the chief means of assuring there would be another eruption soon. To this end they invented the ability to fit stones together with “optical precision” so inert spent water would be whisked away by gravity rather than seeping through the bedrock or flowing back down the well and stopping eruptions. There’s nothing to stop a CO2 geyser from being essentially continuous so long as there’s a steady flow of carbonated water into the chamber where it is degassed

Actually you have nothing to explain how the water with natron was injected in the earth. And now that you have added that it was supposed to be continuous you have made the effort even more complicated. This means that besides a drilled hole (that we have no evidence of) There is the need to have another to inject the natron water in so as to get a constant geyser on the other drilled hole.

Your ideas are getting even more hopeless, and it was hard to think how that could be, but you managed.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2294 "2015-05-25T01:36:45Z")

</div>

> [@XT](#):
>
> It’s like a perpetual bucket and soda machine! I wonder where they got platforms big enough to life multi-ton stones…??
> 
> And, does anyone know if the ancient Egyptians had ice cream? Because ice cream sodas would have been killer after walking up the ramp.

“I’ll take 2 Root Beer Float Shooters” said the goddess Tenenet.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![cladking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4af34b/32.png) [@cladking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cladking)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2295 "2015-05-25T01:50:17Z")

</div>

> [@tomndebb](#):
>
> All of the major language families are far older than the Giza pyramids and your refusal to actually pay attention to that point does not render it invalid; it merely demonstrates that your opinions fall into the category of crank beliefs.

I understand this applies to vocabulary. I’ve seen no evidence it applies to grammar.

> [@](#):
>
> Madame Blavatsky would be so proud.

I had to look up Blavatsky even though I’d heard the name before. She actually had one thing right and that is there is an intimate connection between religion, science, and philosophy. Some people think I believe that ancient language was “magical” or supernatural but nothing could be further from the truth. The same cerebral wiring that produced ancient language also produced the theory of relativity and the observation that there’s a natural connection between science and religion. People haven’t lost the ability to tap into their own brains but merely lost the playbook that kept us on the same page. Modern thought isn’t inferior but it is based on extrapolation from experiment.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![cladking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4af34b/32.png) [@cladking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cladking)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2296 "2015-05-25T01:53:57Z")

</div>

> [@GIGObuster](#):
>
> Actually you have nothing to explain how the water with natron was injected in the earth. And now that you have added that it was supposed to be continuous you have made the effort even more complicated. This means that besides a drilled hole (that we have no evidence of) There is the need to have another to inject the natron water in so as to get a constant geyser on the other drilled hole.
> 
> Your ideas are getting even more hopeless, and it was hard to think how that could be, but you managed.

No.

The carbonated water existed naturally and humans had nothing whatsoever to do with it being there. It existed before humans came to “Rosteau”.

There was no need to “inject” natron. When there was an eruption in progress there was neither a need nor a means to add natron. When the eruption stopped the means and the need were born; they merely dumped it down the well.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2297 "2015-05-25T01:55:42Z")

</div>

> [@cladking](#):
>
> No.
> 
> The carbonated water existed naturally and humans had nothing whatsoever to do with it being there. It existed before humans came to “Rosteau”.
> 
> There was no need to “inject” natron. When there was an eruption in progress there was neither a need nor a means to add natron. When the eruption stopped the means and the need were born; they merely dumped it down the well.

Make up your mind, was the geyser constant or not? Such a geyser capable of doing such portents would not had escaped the notice of Egyptians that saw it, so where are the traditions, engravings and painting for all that? And what king ruled for 400 years again?

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2298 "2015-05-25T01:55:59Z")

</div>

> [@cladking](#):
>
> They studied these geysers extensively and understood them in depth. They had studied them for nearly eight centuries before building G1 in 2750 BC and had experience with the natural geysers they had replaced. They learned very early that stopping the backflow of decarbonated water was the chief means of assuring there would be another eruption soon. To this end they invented the ability to fit stones together with “optical precision” so inert spent water would be whisked away by gravity rather than seeping through the bedrock or flowing back down the well and stopping eruptions. There’s nothing to stop a CO2 geyser from being essentially continuous so long as there’s a steady flow of carbonated water into the chamber where it is degassed.
> 
> 459a. Men bury themselves (in their grave (?); the gods fly up.
> 
> Not only were these drilled but they did plumbing on them. Even the drillgets a mention;
> 
> 1969a (N. 758). so that the two followers of the gods, with sharp teeth and long claws, may bring the god forth by his hands.
> 
> The gods must be brought forth by their means to manipulate at a distance.
> 
> This next one gave me great consternation for a long time. How could a sieve protect anything at all especially when that sieve is the sky which allows all objects to pass;
> 
> 1608a. she has protected thee against all evil things, in her name of “Great Sieve” (protectress).
> 
> 1629a. Nut throws herself upon her son, who is in thee; she protects thee;
> 
> But the sky throws herself on the geyser and she empraces the earth and all things contained. The answer is quite simple; by her arms reacjhing into the earth the geyser is protected so long as her arms are complete. If you throw a stone in it breaks the arm of the sky and she no longer protects the geyser. Language always reflected the desired state rather than the actual state. Throwing a stone in the well was a crime against nature and the state as defined by ritual. It was breaking the arm of nut.
> 
> I already mentioned many of the other things concerning care and feeding of a geyser. Most of what they did were common sense but they were developed by a different science than we have. It was very much a common sense science; you observed what was there and then reasoned how it fit with everything else you already knew. If necessary you made repeated or similar observations and it became theory when others could replicate the observation. This science was so simple a caveman could do it. The first beaver to build a dam did it. We can’t see it because we don’t even take reality as being axiomatic. We don’t trust our own senses so look at the world only through the reality of experiment.

Total WOO. Incredible that this is still going on.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![cladking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4af34b/32.png) [@cladking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cladking)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2299 "2015-05-25T01:56:55Z")

</div>

> [@XT](#):
>
> I wonder where they got platforms big enough to life multi-ton stones…??

The Palermo Stone suggests they got the wood for the dndndr-boat from Byblos which is most likely modern day Lebanon.

These would have been simple sleds built of large timbers.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2300 "2015-05-25T02:03:34Z")

</div>

> [@cladking](#):
>
> The Palermo Stone suggests they got the wood for the dndndr-boat from Byblos which is most likely modern day Lebanon.
> 
> These would have been simple sleds built of large timbers.

He asked for huge platforms not boats.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\
**Post date:** [May 25, 2015, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/2301 "2015-05-25T04:45:24Z")

</div>

> [@Musicat](#):
>
> Regarding arc-shaped wooden add-ons:
> 
> The excuse for not having the leftover parts – just repeating what others have said – is that wood was precious and recycled soon after use. Why keep your obsolete tools around if they can be beaten into plowshares? There are no external ramps in existence now, either, but that doesn’t mean they weren’t used.
> 
> A reasonable explanation, but I would feel much more confident if there were wall drawings of such a method in use, and AFAIK, these don’t exist.

If you read again I’m confident you’ll see that nothing you’ve said here connects whatsoever with the objections I made to the “turn a block into a wheel” theory.

[Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559.md?page=114)

[Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559.md?page=116)