Table of Contents
The Land of Chem spends this episode on a gas idea for the Step Pyramid at Saqqara. The host’s hypothesis, marked as his own, is that the monument began as a low platform over a bedrock cap and a methane pocket, then grew into a works for drawing off that fire air and for chemical manufacture. He says a recent paper on water and the building of the pyramid accidentally backs an older suggestion of his, that the enclosure called Gisr el-Mudir worked as a check dam and fed shafts below. Gas reaching the surface, he argues, was revered across the ancient world, from the oracle at Delphi to flames that never went out, and lightning is how he pictures those fires being lit. He puts early knowledge of such flames near 6000 BCE and treats much later Chinese wells as a younger cousin of the same craft. An altar and so called boundary stones at Saqqara are, in his reading, leftovers of a flame temple. On this account the Step Pyramid is a chemical plant.
Key points
- The host proposes a methane pocket under the Step Pyramid and a monument built to draw the gas off.
- He reads a published water study as support for Gisr el-Mudir functioning as a check dam.
- Surface seeps of gas are, in his account, the root of ancient flame worship, including Delphi.
- He dates early knowledge of those flames to about 6000 BCE, long before Chinese gas wells.
- Altar stones at Saqqara are reinterpreted as parts of a temple built around a burning seep.
- The Step Pyramid, on this hypothesis, ends as a plant for processing and storing the gas.
Short quotes
125 I explained how the step pyramid which was originally a single level platform was constructed above a Bedrock
The Land of Chem, Methane and the Step Pyramid
He recalls his earlier claim that the pyramid began as one level over bedrock. Watch at 1:54
deposits so I am proposing that deep below the step pyramid is a natural gas
The Land of Chem, Methane and the Step Pyramid
The new proposal is a natural gas pocket deep under the monument. Watch at 7:49
veneration it is thought that naturally produced Flames contributed to the rise of several fire worshipping traditions
The Land of Chem, Methane and the Step Pyramid
He cites the view that natural flames fed several fire cults. Watch at 10:16
natural gas Flames were first discovered around 6,000 BCE conventionally dated with the first evidence of petroleum
The Land of Chem, Methane and the Step Pyramid
He places the first known gas flames near 6000 BCE on the conventional clock. Watch at 14:05
Video by The Land of Chem. Watch on YouTube.