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Know_files/FINGERPRINTS OF THE GODS.pdf - D Ank Unlimited

Know_files/FINGERPRINTS OF THE GODS.pdf - D Ank Unlimited

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Graham Hancock – <strong>FINGERPRINTS</strong> <strong>OF</strong> <strong>THE</strong> <strong>GODS</strong><br />

because identical vessels had been found in pre-dynastic strata dated to<br />

4000 BC and earlier, 20 and because the practice of handing down<br />

treasured heirlooms from generation to generation had been deeply<br />

ingrained in Egypt since time immemorial.<br />

Whether they were made in 2500 BC or in 4000 BC or even earlier, the<br />

stone vessels from the Step Pyramid were remarkable for their<br />

workmanship, which once again seemed to have been accomplished by<br />

some as yet unimagined (and, indeed, almost unimaginable) tool.<br />

Why unimaginable? Because many of the vessels were tall vases with<br />

long, thin, elegant necks and widely flared interiors, often incorporating<br />

fully hollowed-out shoulders. No instrument yet invented was capable of<br />

carving vases into shapes like these, because such an instrument would<br />

have had to have been narrow enough to have passed through the necks<br />

and strong enough (and of the right shape) to have scoured out the<br />

shoulders and the rounded interiors. And how could sufficient upward<br />

and outward pressure have been generated and applied within the vases<br />

to achieve these effects?<br />

The tall vases were by no means the only enigmatic vessels unearthed<br />

from the Pyramid of Zoser, and from a number of other archaic sites.<br />

There were monolithic urns with delicate ornamental handles left<br />

attached to their exteriors by the carvers. There were bowls, again with<br />

extremely narrow necks like the vases, and with widely flared, pot-bellied<br />

interiors. There were also open bowls, and almost microscopic vials, and<br />

occasional strange wheel-shaped objects cut out of metamorphic schist<br />

with inwardly curled edges planed down so fine that they were almost<br />

translucent. 21 In all cases what was really perplexing was the precision<br />

with which the interiors and exteriors of these vessels had been made to<br />

correspond—curve matching curve—over absolutely smooth, polished<br />

surfaces with no tool marks visible.<br />

There was no technology known to have been available to the Ancient<br />

Egyptians capable of achieving such results. Nor, for that matter, would<br />

any stone-carver today be able to match them, even if he were working<br />

with the best tungsten-carbide tools. The implication, therefore, is that an<br />

unknown or secret technology had been put to use in Ancient Egypt.<br />

Ceremony of the sarcophagus<br />

Standing in the King’s Chamber, facing west—the direction of death<br />

amongst both the Ancient Egyptians and the Maya—I rested my hands<br />

lightly on the gnarled granite edge of the sarcophagus which<br />

Egyptologists insist had been built to house the body of Khufu. I gazed<br />

20<br />

For example, see Cyril Aldred, Egypt to the End of the Old Kingdom, Thames &<br />

Hudson, London, 1988, p. 25.<br />

21<br />

Ibid., p. 57. The relevant artefacts are in the Cairo Museum.<br />

322

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