Table of Contents
Funny Olde World puts Luke’s second Egyptian trip beside Johanna. At the Serapeum the great boxes look stranger and more precise than later royal coffins, and both stall on granite. A softer stone could have made a box just as large with less labor, so hardness needs a reason. When his feed drops, Johanna argues that such shrines could not be a rushed hand polishing, and more hands would not speed the finish. Bare walls in the Bent Pyramid, and a valley temple Luke found stripped, sit awkwardly beside museum reliefs that seem cut from those early blocks. He thinks Greek rulers in Egypt measured the Great Pyramid and learned again how to raise huge granite, to show they could restore an older greatness. On burials he guesses, carefully rather than mystically, that early pyramid chambers held no body. Nearby officials’ tombs look like graves. The pyramids do not. Later the talk widens to water at ancient sites and to practices now filed as science. It stays a field conversation of open mechanical questions.
Key points
- Luke’s Serapeum visit frames the stone boxes as more precise than later royal coffins he compares.
- Granite’s hardness is the shared question, because a softer stone could have made an equally large box.
- Johanna argues the work could not be a rushed hand polishing job, even with more workers.
- Bare surfaces at the Bent Pyramid and its valley temple are used to question when relief carving began.
- Ptolemaic projects are read as a later attempt to recover earlier granite skill by measuring the Great Pyramid.
- Missing bodies in early pyramids are treated as a real gap, not as proof that burials were simply lost.
- The closing stretch ties ancient sites to water and treats part of old ritual practice as what is now called science.
Short quotes
Yeah, and well, and even as conservative as like my approach to ancient history is, I still find these things absolutely perplexing.
Luke, Funny Olde World on early Egyptian stonework
Luke says that even a cautious historical method still leaves the Serapeum boxes baffling. Watch at 4:11
Granite is so much harder than a sandstone or a limestone.
Luke, Funny Olde World on early Egyptian stonework
Hardness is the puzzle, since this stone costs far more labor than softer rock for the same bulk. Watch at 6:57
This is not something that you guys can bash together.
Johanna, Funny Olde World on early Egyptian stonework
Johanna’s point is that hand finished shrines of this kind could not be knocked out in a hurry. Watch at 11:09
A few months ago I went down to the Valley Temple of the Bent Pyramid and it was completely naked.
Luke, Funny Olde World on early Egyptian stonework
Luke reports that valley temple bare of carving, which struck him as odd. Watch at 17:58
I think it should be weird to insist that there was something there that there's no evidence for.
Luke, Funny Olde World on early Egyptian stonework
He would rather doubt a burial in an empty chamber than invent remains nobody has found. Watch at 48:16
Video by Funny Olde World. Watch on YouTube.