We are still in early days to know the full implications of our find. The most intriguing of the questions arising from this discovery is this: how did the pharaohs know of the location of Uwaynat and, more pertinently, how did they manage to get there with only donkey-power and no water spots for 700 kilometres? A brief calculation of the huge amount of water needed for this journey into the most arid region of the globe reveals that the cargo would have been far too voluminous and massive to be undertaken with donkeys only. Were chariots or carts used? This, according to the evidence, cannot be the case as the ‘wheel’ had not been yet introduced in Egypt, let alone chariots and carts. Were there water spots on the way that today have disappeared? Not likely say the climatologists, for the desert was then as arid as it is now. Did the pharaohs set up water-stations along the route, as we today would set up fuel-stations? Perhaps, but none have been found leading to Uwaynat, at least not yet. The mystery must remain unresolved until more research is done.
Robert and I are planning a second expedition in October 2008, and this time we hope to be able to stay at Uwaynat much longer to answer some of the many questions that the Yam Inscriptions have raised. The Egyptian Sahara still holds many secrets. But the evidence so far points very strongly that the origins of the pharaonic civilization, and perhaps civilization as a whole, were seeded in the Egyptian Sahara and, thousands of years later around 3200 BC, sprouted and bloomed in the Nile Valley to finally give us the giant pyramids of the Old Kingdom in the north and eventually the wonderful temples of the New Kingdom in Upper Egypt in the south.
*Mahmoud Marai is the discoverer, along with Mark Borda, of the ‘Yam Inscriptions’ in southern Uwaynat and the now-named Marai Cave in Northern Uwaynat. He is 34 years old, married, has two children, and lives in the suburb of Maadi in Cairo. Although a qualified chemistry teacher, Marai has chosen to devote his life to the exploration of the Egyptian Sahara and, especially, the Gebel Uwaynat which, to this day, remain largely unexplored. He has travelled to the heart of the Central Sahara, to Tassili N Ajjer, Tenere Desert, the Akakus Mountains and the Arabian Desert. Marai also conducts expeditions and educational tours in the Egyptian Sahara. He can be contacted at: [email protected]
Notes
Introduction
1 Produced by Pioneer Production Ltd. in UK.
2 Produced by the Dutch filmmaker Roel Oostra of Crescom Ltd.
3 Discussions in Egyptology, Vol. 30, books review section.
4 Anthony Aveni, Starways to the Stars: Skywatching in Three Great Ancient Cultures, Cassell, 1997, pp. 11-12.
Chapter One: The Star at the Head of the Sky
1 Robert Bauval and Adrian Gilbert, The Orion Mystery, Heinemann, 1994.
2 Stephen Quirke, The Cult of Ra, Thames & Hudson, 2001, p. 116.
3 Was the original seated statue inclined? The levelled floor of the serdab suggests that it was not. But did it have to be inclined? The head is positioned behind the two peepholes, which are themselves inclined towards the lower northern sky, much like a seated astronomer would be positioned behind a set of binoculars that was inclined towards the lower northern sky. At any rate, the inclination is only about 15 to 17° to the horizontal, which requires a very small tilt of the head backwards to gaze at the same spot in the sky.
4 Mark Lehner, The Complete Pyramids, Thames & Hudson, 1997, p. 84.
5 Ian Shaw and Paul Nicholson, The British Museum Dictionary of Ancient Egypt, The British Museum Press, 2003, p. 87.
6 Ibid., p. 153.
7 Ibid., p. 134.
8 Ibid.
9 The Ancient Gods Speak, ed. Donald B. Redford, Oxford University Press, 2002, p. 165.
10 Ibid.
11 See ‘Osiris’, in Shaw and Nicholson, op. cit., p. 213-14. Khentiamentiu was the ancient god of Abydos, a site sacred to Osiris and location of the Osireon at Abydos built by Seti I.
12 The Ancient Gods Speak, op. cit., p. 359.
13 The glyph kh, which is a sort of animal’s belly (maybe a cow). This glyph is part of the Horus name of Ntjr-y-(kh)-t which may give it the full meaning of ‘Most Divine of the Corporation’ or ‘the Corporation is Divine’.
14 A.M. Blackman, ‘The Ka-House and the Serdab’, Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, Vol. 3, 1916, pp. 250-4.
15 J.E. Manchip White, Ancient Egypt, its Culture and History, George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1979, 2nd Ed., pp. 40-1.
16 Ibid., p. 41.
17 The Orion Mystery, op. cit.
18 Pyramid Texts, 1,277-9.
19 Alexander Badawy, ‘The Periodic System of Building a Pyramid’, Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, Vol. 63, 1977, p. 58.
20 Edwards, The Pyramids of Egypt, Penguin, 1982, p. 295.
21 Quirke, op. cit., p. 117.
22 The term ‘Indestructibles’ was used by I.E.S. Edwards in the BBC 2 documentary The Great Pyramids: Gateway to the Stars, first shown in February 1994.
23 James H. Breasted, Development of Religion and Thought in Ancient Egypt, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1972, p. 101.
24 R.T. Rundle Clark, Myth and Symbol in Ancient Egypt, Thames and Hudson, 1978, p. 58.
25 E.C. Krupp, Echoes of the Ancient Skies, Oxford University Press, 1994, p. 212. Also, according to Mark Lehner ‘The “Imperishable Ones” are the circumpolar stars . . . Since these stars revolve around the celestial North Pole and neither rise or set, the long, narrow passages sloping up from the burial chamber in the northern sides of many pyramids were aimed like telescopes in their direction.’ The Complete Pyramids, op. cit., p. 28.
26 Shaw and Nicholson, op. cit. p. 166.
27 Ibid., p. 153
28 R. H. Wilkinson, The Complete Gods and Goddesses of Ancient Egypt, The American University in Cairo Press, 2003, p. 129.
29 Walter Scott (ed.), Hermetica, Shambhala, Boston, 1993, p. 485.
30 Blackman, op. cit., p. 254. This description and names given by Blackman would perfectly fit the Djoser Pyramid, with its so-called ‘King’s Apartments’ under the Pyramid which are aligned (i.e. lead upwards and towards) with the serdab outside.
31 The Orion Mystery, op. cit.
32 Wilkinson, op. cit., p. 161.
33 Edwards, op. cit., pp. 267-8. Interestingly, the inscription also mentions the constellation of Orion, an indication of the connection between these stars and the soul of pharaoh.
34 Lehner, op. cit., p. 34.
35 A. Piankoff, The Pyramid of Unas, Bollingen Series 5, Princeton, 1968.
36 Christine Ziegler, Les Pyramides D’Egypte, Paris, 1999, p. 52.
37 Lehner, op. cit., p. 28.
38 Lehner, p. 90.
39 Alexander Gurshtein, ‘The Evolution of the Zodiac in the Context of Ancient Oriental History’, Vista in Astronomy, Vol. 41, Part 4, 1997, p. 509.
40 Josef Dorner, Die Absteckung und astronomische Orientierung agyptischer Pyramiden, University of Innsbruck, 1981 (Thesis +C14169207).
41 Wainwright, ‘Seshat and the Pharaoh’, Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, Vol. 26, 1941, pp. 30-40.
42 Wilkinson, op. cit., p. 166.
43 In his study of Egyptian myths and symbols, R.T. Rundle Clark makes no mention of Seshat (see Rundle Clark, op. cit.)
44 Wainwright, op. cit.
45 Krupp, op. cit., p. 212.
46 Wainwright, op. cit.
47 Anne-Sophie Bomhard, The Egyptian Calendar: A Work for Eternity, Periplus, 1998, p. 4.
48 E.A. Wallis Budge, The Gods of the Egyptians, Vol. I, Dover Publications, New York, 1969, p. 425.
49 This tradition of the superwoman/goddess is witnessed throughout Egyptian civilisation and right to its end, with Queen Cleopatra IV, who is said to have been proficient in nine languages and had studied astronomy, mathematics, architecture and medicine at the Great Library of Alexandria.
50 George Hart, A Dictionary of Egyptian Gods and Goddesses, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1988, p. 193.
51 Edwards, op. cit., pp. 249-50.
52 R.W. Stoley ‘Primitive Methods of
Measuring Time with Special Reference to Egypt’, Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, Vol. 17, 1931, p. 170.
53 Z. Zaba, L’Orientation Astronomique Dans L’Ancienne Egypte et la Precession de l’Axe du Monde, Prague, 1953, pp. 58-9.
54 Ibid.
55 Ibid.
56 Kate Spence, ‘Ancient Egyptian Chronology and the Astronomical Orientation of Pyramids’, Nature, Vol. 408, 2000, pp. 320-4.
57 The Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Scientific American and New Scientist were among the many newspapers and journals which, on 15 and 16 November 1999, announced Kate Spence’s discovery.
58 Robert Bauval, ‘A Brief Evaluation of Kate Spence’s article in Nature, vol. 408, 16 November 2000, pp. 320-4’ Discussions in Egyptology, Vol. 48, 2000, pp. 115-26.
59 In an interview with the science editor of The Dallas Morning News Spence stated that ‘Khufu’s Great Pyramid is the most accurately aligned pyramid of the bunch because it happened to be built around the time when a line drawn between Kochab and Mizar crossed the pole dead-on . . .’
60 Shaw and Nicholson, op. cit., p. 42.
61 All this has been fully discussed in my book The Orion Mystery, op. cit.
62 Ibid., Plate 15a.
63 Lehner, op. cit., p. 29.
64 The Orion Mystery tells the whole story.
65 Lehner, op. cit., p. 90. Lehner’s angle of 13° for the serdab was recently quoted in a major television documentary featuring a plethora of eminent Egyptologists such as Dr Kate Spence (Cambridge University), Dr James Allen (Metropolitan Museum, New York), Dr Rosalie Davies (Manchester University) and Dr Zahi Hawass (Supreme Council of Antiquities in Egypt). The documentary was called The Great Sphinx, shown in the spring of 2002 and it was produced by the BBC for the Discovery Channel.
66 Jean-Phillippe Lauer, Histoire Monumentale des Pyramides D’Egypte, I, Le Caire, 1962.
67 Ibid. p. 3.
68 Edwards, The Pyramids of Egypt, 1993, Penguin ed., p. 41. Jacques Vandier, however, gives an angle of 17° to the vertical (see Jacques Vandier, Manuel D’Archaéologie Egyptienne, Tome I, Paris, 1952, pp. 936-7).
69 In July 2002 I had the opportunity to go to Egypt. I took with me a 15-inch Stanley spirit level as well as a Staedtler design protractor with a variomatic set-square that could be fixed on to the flat top of the spirit level. I also built another simple inclinometer using a large piece of cardboard on which were drawn angles ranging from 13° to 18°, and a plumb line attached to the focal point. I managed to get several readings from the west, east and north sides of the serdab. I also took readings from the slope of the lower course of the casing stones of the actual Step Pyramid that abuts against the back of the serdab. Judging from the readings we recorded, it was clear that the angle of inclination of the serdab was very close to 16°. This value is also quoted by Lauer and Edwards, I consider this value, therefore, conclusive.
70 For the year 2800 BC and an orientation of 4° 35′ east of north, StarryNight Pro. V. 4 gave 15° 37′ altitude; Skymap Pro7 gave 15° 33′. Both values are within the expected precision range to match the 16° incline of the serdab.
71 Edwards, op. cit., pp. 284, 286
Chapter Two: The Quest for Eternity
1 Anne-Sophie Bomhard, The Egyptian Calendar: A Work for Eternity, Periplus Publishing, London, 1998, p. 2.
2 I live about a mile from the Giza Necropolis. From my apartment I get a clear view of the Khufu and Khafra pyramids. The final draft of The Egypt Code was written here.
3 R.A. Schwaller de Lubicz, The Temple of Karnak, Inner Traditions, Rochester, Vermont, 2001, p. 1.
4 Jean Kerisel, The Nile and its Masters: Past, Present, Future Source of Hope and Anger, A.A. Balkema, Rotterdam, 2001, p. 37.
5 Allan Chapman, Gods in the Sky: Astronomy from the Ancients to the Renaissance, Channel 4 Books, London, 2002, pp. 32-3.
6 Henri Frankfort and John A. Wilson, Before Philosophy, Pelican Books, 1961, p. 51. Likewise, the British Egyptologist J.M. Plumley wrote that ‘contrary to modern usage the Ancient Egyptians orientated themselves to face southwards. At their back lay the Mediterranean and the rest of the ancient world. The west was for them the right, and the east the left.’ Ancient Cosmologies, edited by Carmen Blacker and Michael Loewe, with contributions by J.M. Plumley et al., George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1975, p. 19.
7 The Ancient Gods Speak, op. cit., p. 254.
8 Lehner, The Complete Pyramids, op. cit., p. 29.
9 Chapman, op. cit., pp. 32-3.
10 Lehner, op. cit., p. 28.
11 Lucie Lamy, Egyptian Mysteries, Thames & Hudson, 1981, p. 48. I had proposed the same idea in 1989 that ‘a major feature of the After-world often mentioned in the Pyramid Texts is the “Winding Waterway”, which was, in all probability, seen as a celestial counterpart of the Nile’ (Bauval, Discussions in Egyptology, Vol. 13, 1989).
12 Herodotus, The Histories, Book II 18-24, p. 136.
13 Richard H. Wilkinson, The Complete Gods and Goddess of Ancient Egypt, op. cit., p. 45.
14 Bomhard, op. cit., in Preface.
15 Pyramid Texts, 1, 704.
16 W. M. Flinders Petrie, Researches in Sinai, John Murray, London, 1906, pp. 163-4.
17 Leo Dupuydt, Civil Calendar and Lunar Calendar in Ancient Egypt, Uitgeverij Peeters en Department Oosterse Studies, Leuven, 1977, p. 9.
18 Juan Belmonte, ‘Some open questions on the Egyptian Calendar: an astronomer’s view’, Trabajos de Egyptologia, Issue 2, 2003, p. 10. Coincidence would have it that the vector of the proper motion of Sirius made it such that almost throughout the pharaonic era the star had a yearly cycle of exactly 365.25 days, thus requiring 1,460 years (365 ÷ 0.25 = 1460) for the civil calendar to return to the heliacal rising of Sirius.
19 Censorinus, Die Natali, Chapter 18. See also Dupuydt, op. cit., p. 9.
20 Recent research has suggested that the names of the months may have existed in earlier times, possibly even when the calendar was inaugurated, but no textual evidence has yet confirmed this. See Belmonte, op. cit., p. 7.
21 Pyramid Texts, 1, 520.
22 Pyramid Texts, line 1, 773.
23 Pyramid Texts, 1, 944.
24 Pyramid Texts, 1, 960-1.
25 Dows Dunham & William K. Simpson, The Mastaba of Queen Mersyankh III G7530-7540, Department of Egyptian and Ancient Near Eastern Art, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1974, p. 8.
26 Five days added to the computed value of 267 days.
27 They may have got this name from Satis, the Egyptian star-goddess of the flood at Elephantine who was identified to Sirius. It was also called ‘Sihor’ by the Hebrews and ‘Sirio’ by the Romans.
28 R. Burnham Jr., Burnham’s Celestial Handbook, Vol. I, Dover ed., 1978, p. 387. Sirius is the star that is brightest in the sky. The brightness of Sirius (which is a ‘sun’) in absolute terms is 23 times more so than our sun. It is also twice as massive as our sun, much hotter and its 9,400 Kelvin temperature making it look very white.
29 Burnham, op. cit., p. 387.
30 Stand in front of the Great Pyramid about an hour after sunset and look up towards the south.
31 The summer solstice may have originally marked the first day of the civil calendar. The idea was first proposed in 1894 by the astronomer Sir Norman Lockyer in Dawn of Astronomy. The German chronologist E. Meyer also proposed it in 1908. Recently the Spanish astronomer Juan Belmonte has revived this idea and further proposed that the summer solstice was the basis of the original calendar (Belmonte, op. cit.).
32 Otto Neugebauer & Richard Parker, Egyptian Astronomical Texts, Vol.1, 1964, pp. 38-43; pp. 70-3.
33 Scott, Heremetica, op. cit., Asclepius III
34 For a recent identification of Sah with Osiris and Orion see Kurt Locher (of the Berne Astronomical Institute) ‘New Arguments for the celestial location of the decanal belt and for the origins of the Sah-hieroglyph’, in VI International Congress of Egyptology, Torino, Vol. II, 1993, p. 279. See also S. Hetherington (ed.), Encyclopaedia of Cosmology,
Garland Publishing Inc., New York 10993, p. 193.
35 Shaw & Nicholson, op. cit., p. 275.
36 Krupp, Echoes of the Ancient Skies, Oxford University Press, 1997, p. 22.
37 R.O. Faulkner, The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts, Oxford University Press, 1970, p. 120.
38 Nathalie Beaux, ‘Sirius Étoile et Jeune Horus’, Hommages à Jean Leclant, Intitute Français D’Archéologie Orientale, Bibliotheque D’Etude 106/1, 1993, p. 64, n,14.
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