Black Genesis: The Prehistoric Origins of Ancient Egypt

also note that several megalithic alignments emanating from CSA mark both the rising of Sirius and the Big Dipper—and
the ancient Egyptians often identified the former with a cow and the latter with a bull’s thigh. Indeed the possibility of a
cultural link between the cow stone at Nabta Playa and the ancient Egyptians was suggested by Wendorf when he
proposed that this strange, sculpted megalith “may have been the origin of the ancient Egyptians’ fascination with
working large stones.” 20 Many questions regarding this cow stone remain unanswered. How was the top surface so finely
polished? How were the fine, sharp, and precise curvilinear edges made? What tools could have been used by ancient
people who lived before the age of metal? Unfortunately these questions may never be answered, for the cow stone was
removed from Nabta Playa by the Egyptian antiquities authorities and today lies broken in the backyard storage area of
the Nubian Museum in Aswan (see appendix 3). We can also recall that the cow stone itself was placed on top of another
sculpture that was cut into the living bedrock of the site. This bedrock sculpture has the shape of a large, smooth disk that
is about 3.5 meters (11.5 feet) across, with some of its parts and its edges carved by human hands. According to Wendorf
and Krolik,
The north and west sides had been carefully shaped by removing one or two large sections that left a curved outline,
following an arched bedding plane in the bedrock. The large sections removed during the shaping of the tablerock
were most probably reused as the two large slabs placed in the center of the surface architecture. The top of the
tablerock was flat and smoothed. It is possible this was natural smoothing . . . but this seems unlikely since none of
the other table-rocks visible at the sourthern end of the Nabta Basin display similar smoothed surfaces. . . .
Regardless of how the top was smoothed, the sides were clearly pecked and had a slightly re-curved outline. 21
Surrounding this bedrock sculpture is a great mystery that has not been adequately investigated. How and why was it
sculpted—and, more intriguingly, when was it fashioned? Wendorf initially proposed that it was created during the Late
Neolithic—that is, around 5100 BCE, after the playa sediments were formed. 22 Yet if so, we may wonder how the
ancient people of Nabta Playa could have known where this outcrop in the bedrock was located if they could not see it,
for it was totally covered by a thick layer of sediment. Wendorf and Krolik had no explanation. According to them,
however, the ancient people somehow knew where this outcrop was and thus dug through the sediment to expose it. They
then sculpted it, covered it with sediment, placed the cow stone above it, covered the cow stone with more sediment, and
finally arranged the megalithic architecture on the surface.
This seems quite implausible, and perhaps there is a simpler explanation: the bedrock sculpture long predates the
Late Neolithic given by Wendorf. 23 How old is the bedrock sculpture, who built it, and why was it built? What could
have been its true meaning? Clearly it was important enough to be made the centerpiece of the Nabta Playa ceremonial
complex when the Late Neolithic people placed the cow stone over it thousands of years later. Unfortunately we could
not investigate this matter further, for the sediment has been dumped back into the hole, and, as we have learned, some of
the surface megaliths have been removed and taken to the Nubian Museum in Aswan while others have been moved on
site, scattered randomly (see appendix 3). Whatever might be the solution to the unsolved mystery that lies behind the
multilayered and pangeneration construction of the CSA, it is sure to fit into a very elegant astronomical scheme. *29
We must also remember that Complex Structure A, although the largest at Nabta Playa, is but one of thirty complex
structures in the southwest part of the site. Only two of these structures, CSA and another, CSB, were fully excavated.
The bedrock under CSB was also sculpted, but into a different shape described as an inclined oval disc; there was no
embedded sculpture above it. A third complex structure was also partially excavated, and two more complex structures
had holes drilled into their sediment, confirming the presence of bedrock outcrops. This led Wendorf and his team to
conclude that all the complex structures seen on top of the sediments probably contain a sculpted bedrock outcrop
covered by 3 or 4 meters (10 or 13 feet) of sediment.
What could have driven the ancient people of Nabta Playa to sculpt all these outcrops of bedrock? Perhaps more
intriguingly, when these outcrops were completely covered by sediment carried and compacted by wind and rainfall
thousands of years later, how could they have been rediscovered by the people who built the megalith arrangements on
the surface? Or, were they not rediscovered by the Late Neolithic people? Perhaps, instead, they were maintained over
thousands of years by an even more ancient culture about which we know almost nothing.
Let us not forget, as well, the most provocative question that surrounds these mysterious complex structures. When
the CPE, led by Wendorf, started excavations at Nabta Playa in the 1970s, they very much hoped that the many complex
structures and tumuli were tombs that contained human remains of high-ranking individuals or even kings. Instead