# How were the pyramids in Egypt built? **URL:** \ **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:** 59
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2015, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1162 "2015-05-02T22:43:31Z")
> [@74westy](#): > > That article is vague but seems to be saying that prairie dog language is a collection of nouns. Cynonyms, too. ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2015, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1163 "2015-05-02T22:51:16Z")
> [@74westy](#): > > That article is vague but seems to be saying that prairie dog language is a collection of nouns. Yup, nouns such as tall, thin, blue, walking and slowly. ---
**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 2, 2015, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1164 "2015-05-02T23:13:02Z")
Plus, since they are basically rats, what language skills they _seem_ to have _appears_ pretty awesome, but I’d like to see more research and studies by other researchers. **cladking** , THIS is what your “theory” lacks and why we have no respect for it. You state things absolutely, with no support from outside researchers, and you expect people to accept it at face value. That ain’t gonna happen here. ---
**Author:** ![cladking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4af34b/32.png) [@cladking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cladking)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2015, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1165 "2015-05-02T23:54:24Z")
> [@Channing\_Idaho\_Banks](#): > > This doesn’t explain anything. Why can’t the workers on the ramp just sit down and have a drink of water? And what if the guy pulling multi-ton stones up the side just sits down for his water and his stone crashes to the ground, killing everyone below? That’s not a problem for you? When men are working at a single location it is easy to have everything they might need right at hand. They had many acres of step tops upon which to work allowing plenty of supplies and anything needed including extra men to relieve any who got tired. They could usually work in the shade and installing canopies would be easy. Walking on level ground and not needing to lift their own weight allowed all the work to go into actually lifting stones. They needed fewer men just to overcome friction and could pull from very high friction surfaces since stones didn’t travel on it. Even the workers could be pulled up to work allowing them to arrive on the job fresh instread of already exhausted from a mile walk up an 8% grade. This simply makes the job “comfortable” and cuts the job of lifting stones by nearly 50%. But it also cuts out the need to build ramps and then to rebuild ramps to clad the pyramid. Depending on the configuration and specifics this could cut work as much as 99%. Of course this is a meaningless computation since they never used ramps. Men who work around suspended loads are taught not to walk underneath them. There was nothing but a loading platform directly under the stones anyway and no men were working there during lifts. There’s no reason anyone would be injured but stones dropped off spiral ramps would probably kill men below and could satart a cascade event if a ramp collapsed. Ramps would have been exceedingly dangerous. They couldn’t have all the needed supplies along a mile long ramp. One of the points in the debunkment is the extreme constriction of the work area imposed by ramps. Storing supplies all along it with two way traffic would have resulted in larger ramps which are already overly large and already hiding the pyramid so it couldn’t be built straight. A man in a spacious work area can just sit down and get relieved. He only has to pull a stone 100’ at a time. But you can’t drag a stone 100’ up a ramp and stop or the stone will stop and every stone behind it will stop. Ramps don’t work. They were an illogical and unevidenced assertion the first trime someone said “they mustta used ramps” and they still are. In light of evidence they pulled all the stones on all the great pyramids up one step at a time it no longer makes sense to speculate on ramps. They used an easier, more logical, and far better evidenced system and that’s just the bottom lines. ---
**Author:** ![cladking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4af34b/32.png) [@cladking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cladking)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2015, 12:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1166 "2015-05-03T00:03:15Z")
> [@dropzone](#): > > **cladking** , THIS is what your “theory” lacks and why we have no respect for it. You state things absolutely, with no support from outside researchers, and you expect people to accept it at face value. That ain’t gonna happen here. I believe most of my assertions are just logic and usually based on well known and well established fact. Some of these facts are stated in unusual ways but this makes them no less factual. For instance Egyptologists say they were blessed to have the flood in the summer which provided ample manpower to drag stones. I say they they were forced to expend extreme effort in peak growing season with no crop in the ground endangering their lives and family. It’s the same thing from a different perspective. Egyptological perspective is trying to justify ramps but the way I say it is the way any Egyptian would have responded to any nut case who wanted him to drag a 6 1/2 million ton tomb up a ramp. Ramps are highly illogical. And the thinking and emotions ascribed to the great pyramid builders are highly insulting. They are insulting to our ancestors and they are insulting to us. Egyptologists don’t see this because they look at the world and ancient Egypt through a kaleidoscope that distorts the facts, logic, and language. It can be a beautiful picture they see but it just ain’t right. ---
**Author:** ![cladking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4af34b/32.png) [@cladking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cladking)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2015, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1167 "2015-05-03T00:12:48Z")
> [@](#): > > You’ve fallen so in love playing Ancient Egyptian wordd games, you think it trumps testing physically. They were building a real object - show us that your idea is real world possible I can get going sometimes. I thought a lot like an Egyptian before I started this and now it takes conscious effort not to do it. I let a few through though. 😉 > [@CarnalK](#): > > I would be happy if you moved, as suggested, into the more physical proofs you need. Make models. Study the geology that a geyser requires. I think just about all the physical evidence has been pursued and there’s nowhere left to go. It all supports geysers but very few things are really ruled out. Everything is at dead ends because the data just aren’t available. Petrie collected huge amounts of measuremernts and it’s like Egyptologists think he got enough no more will ever be needed. Science has come a long way in the last century but little is being applied to Giza so the data don’t exist. More than anything I need chemical analyses but this is the biggest void of all in the testing. They test mummies but little else. They’ll use very high tech on a few things and completely ignore broad swathes of the physical evidence with lower tech testing. They’ve done muon detection in G2 but can’t be bothered to run a $200 chemical analysis of the water or the ben ben. ---
**Author:** ![cladking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4af34b/32.png) [@cladking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cladking)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2015, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1168 "2015-05-03T00:17:46Z")
> [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](#): > > Still wriggling. The point remains, modern science has a better understanding of how gravity works than the pyramid builders did. Your “cite” of your interpretation a language you admit you cannot read is not evidence. Even if I thought that you had interpreted the word “shu” correctly - and according to you, it means ‘inertia’, not ‘gravity’ - that still betrays no knowledge of how gravity works. There’s really little we know about the nature of gravity beyond “weight and inertia”. I’m merely trying to show that the Egyptians knew weight and inertia as well. They used vector equations to compute load movements. These were called the “seven arrows of sekhmet (power)”, I believe. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2015, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1169 "2015-05-03T01:23:26Z")
> [@cladking](#): > > . . . Ramps don’t work. They were an illogical and unevidenced assertion the first trime someone said “they mustta used ramps” and they still are. . . . You keep saying this, but you’ve never shown why. Why not ramps? They’re the easiest way to get a load to a height. We use them today, in such things as open-pit mining. Ramps may…or may not…have been used in the construction of the Pyramids. But there is no reason that they could not have been used. ---
**Author:** ![cladking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4af34b/32.png) [@cladking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cladking)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2015, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1170 "2015-05-03T03:27:36Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > Ramps may…or may not…have been used in the construction of the Pyramids. But there is no reason that they could not have been used. It’s not so much that ramps are impossible given their level of technology but that they are impossible in light of the physical and cultural evidence that exists. In all practical ways ramps are an impossility. Given ancient materials and technology they couldn’t have projected enough man power on ramps to lift 6 1/2 million tons an average 140’. This isn’t simply the lack of a sufficient economy to do so much work but the inability to place enough men on any ramping system at all to do the required quantity of work. Even using modern materials and modern techniques it is most improbable we could devise man operated (and constructed) ramps that would suffice. In the real world where pyramids exist it can’t be done and even if it could be done it would leave an entirely different set of evidence. Even if they could be used in the real world to lift the stones and the evidence was consistent with them having been used one would still need to be wary in figuring they actually were. This is because of the nature of the pyramids. It’s not just a simple stack of stones 481’ high. It is finely formed and THEN was finely cladded. Building and cladding it simultaneously would be exceedingly difficult and the nature of it would imply had ramps been used they’d have had to be constructed twice; once to build it and again to clad it. In light of the fact that there is no evidence of any sort for ramps and a lack of means to use ramps then it’s simply easiest to dismiss the concept of ramps altogether. The evidence suggests all the pyramids were stepped and logic impells us to believe that these steps were instrumental in the way they were built. In light of the fact that these steps are mentioned in the historical accounts and implied (weakly) by the PT and that they would constitute the easiest and simplest method to lift stones our hands are forced in the absense of more convincing evidence to conclude ramps really are debunked and the pyramids were apparently built by pulling stones up one step at a time. This is consistent with other megalithic sites as well. There are terraces and levels on all these sites and only most of the great pyramids have their steps hidden by exterior stonework. Consider what a simple concept this really is! Then ask yourself how the idea of ramps ever arose in the first place. This is the disconnect we’ve been discussing in this thread for days. How can such a simple method be overlooked in favor of a more complex, less well evidenced, and illogical hypothesis? They did not have to use ramps and everything agrees they did not. ---
**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 3, 2015, 3:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1171 "2015-05-03T03:45:46Z")
> [@cladking](#): > > I believe most of my assertions are just logic and usually based on well known and well established fact. Some of these facts are stated in unusual ways but this makes them no less factual. Actually, it does, since you are pulling your interpretations out of your ass. > [@](#): > > …wanted him to drag a 6 1/2 million ton tomb up a ramp. For instance, the largest stone is a mere 8800 tons. Gotta get your numbers right if you want to play in the big leagues. > [@](#): > > Ramps are highly illogical. Humor me and pretend that post 152 doesn’t exist, because it doesn’t explain what you claim it does. What is illogical about ramps? > [@](#): > > Egyptologists don’t see this because they look at the world and ancient Egypt through a kaleidoscope that distorts the facts, logic, and language. You seem to have confused Egyptologists with you, since you are the one with the kaleidoscope that distorts the facts, logic, and language. My friend, when absolutely nobody agrees with you, that’s a sign. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2015, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1172 "2015-05-03T03:48:51Z")
> [@cladking](#): > > It’s not so much that ramps are impossible given their level of technology but that they are impossible in light of the physical and cultural evidence that exists. > > In all practical ways ramps are an impossility. . . . You certainly appear to be contradicting yourself here. First you say that they might be possible, then you backtrack and say they aren’t. Obviously, the ramps don’t exist any longer; they would be removed. The scaffolding is gone from the Golden Gate Bridge for the same reason. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2015, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1173 "2015-05-03T03:52:54Z")
> [@cladking](#): > > . . . Building and cladding it simultaneously would be exceedingly difficult and the nature of it would imply had ramps been used they’d have had to be constructed twice; once to build it and again to clad it. . . . This is true no matter what technique was used to raise the building stones. The facing stones would have to be lifted up later. (But…why wouldn’t it be possible for the facing stones to be put into place very soon after the building stones? i.e., at the same time they’re building level 20, they’re facing level 19? So the same ramp could be used for both purposes.) ---
**Author:** ![cladking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4af34b/32.png) [@cladking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cladking)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2015, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1174 "2015-05-03T04:29:59Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > This is true no matter what technique was used to raise the building stones. The facing stones would have to be lifted up later. > > (But…why wouldn’t it be possible for the facing stones to be put into place very soon after the building stones? i.e., at the same time they’re building level 20, they’re facing level 19? So the same ramp could be used for both purposes.) It wouldn’t be impossible. Most ramp theories require the ramps to be anchored to the pyramid side and it would be exceedingly difficult to anchor them to the cladded pyramid. You can’t get around this problem in the real world. You can build massive spiral ramps that rest on the ground and lean against the pyramid but then you have to build a pyramid you can’t see. Building it straight would probably be impossible. The actual leveling of the Great Pyramid is actually extremely robust. Most of the courses are slightly wedge shaped and they are arranged to correct errors on lower courses. It would be almost impossible to do this under massive spiral ramps which are in vogue today. The only ramp theory that easily allows cladding is the internal ramp hypothesis. It’s not that the cladding proves ramps weren’t used as that it strongly suggests most oif the escheresque ramp proposals will never be straightened out. No one has ever devised a system that would even approach the top, far less finish it. This is why many ramp theorists now propose that they changed lifting methods as they neared the top but there’s no real evidence of any such change. Stones sizes consistently taper off slightly with altitude and show no sudden changes as might be expected if a less robust means were employed high up. Vertical and horizontal lines are visible at all altitudes and a step is shown (weakly) at 406’ which should be above where ramps could easily reach. Perhaps it could be done as you suggest with a long straight ramp or evenb switch-back ramps but the former are solidly debunked and the latter would leave one side of the pyramid distinct from the others. While no sides are distinct the NE corner is. Ramps here aren’t possible because the cliff face is beyond it. The easiest and best evidenced way to do what they actually did was to build it in steps and finish it from the top down. No, I don’t mean they installed level 20 cladding before level 19 because this is impossible. I mean they first cladded the top step from the bottom up and then the second to the top from the bottom up until they finished at 81’. It was a lot of work but it was far easier than dragging stones up ramps. If they had a motive force of any sort then that motive force would have done the actual lifting rather than men. There are several ways it might have been possible to harness wind and water. The PT even refers to capillary action but I believe this refers to something else. ---
**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 3, 2015, 8:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1175 "2015-05-03T08:01:02Z")
See? When you don’t bring up geysers or bizarre interpretations of language, you sound pretty darn rational! Keep it up! ---
**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 3, 2015, 8:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1176 "2015-05-03T08:18:05Z")
I have been trying to follow this thread, but I missed the bit where cladking explained in detail how the geysers hypothesis actually is supposed to have worked, in mechanical detail (diagrams would be good too). Which post was it? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2015, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1177 "2015-05-03T14:28:37Z")
I just rewatched the _Engineering an Empire_ episode I mentioned earlier. While the exact configuration of the ramps is a matter of debate, it’s ramps nonetheless. Cool. ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2015, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1178 "2015-05-03T16:34:06Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > I have been trying to follow this thread, but I missed the bit where cladking explained in detail how the geysers hypothesis actually is supposed to have worked, in mechanical detail (diagrams would be good too). Which post was it? No diagrams, but as best I can gather they took a great big pulley, ran a great big rope through it, attached a stone to one end of the rope and a giant bucket to the other, then filled the bucket with geyser water until it was heavy enough to hoist the stone. Maybe down a shaft in the middle, next to the geyser? Maybe down the other side? Anyhoo, I’ve taken the liberty of an [artists’ rendering](http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a211/andros_sd/pyramid_zpsbadr7jlq.png). Enjoy! ---
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2015, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1179 "2015-05-03T16:45:26Z")
> [@andros](#): > > Anyhoo, I’ve taken the liberty of an [artists’ rendering](http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a211/andros_sd/pyramid_zpsbadr7jlq.png). Enjoy! You forgot, it goes vertically up steps. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2015, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1180 "2015-05-03T16:58:19Z")
> [@andros](#): > > Anyhoo, I’ve taken the liberty of an [artists’ rendering](http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a211/andros_sd/pyramid_zpsbadr7jlq.png). Enjoy! Are they limited editions, and/or signed by the artist? ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [May 3, 2015, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559/1181 "2015-05-03T17:13:17Z")
While the drawings are excellent, containing much important detail and annotation, and very importantly they are done in color, I still have to point out some missing details. There’s a cricket at the top of the pyramid that the rope goes over. Also the stones go up 6 at time, very fast, so the bucket is really big, and even **cladking** doesn’t know how the bucket stops at the bottom. I hate to nitpick like that with such a cool drawing, quite suitable for a holiday card actually, but **cladking** will likely complain about any inaccuracy and blame it on Egyptologists. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559.md?page=58) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-the-pyramids-in-egypt-built/706559.md?page=60)