Turba Significationum De Pyramidibus Antiquis;

O r, t h e

S W A R M

O f

P O S S I B L E M E A N I N G S

S U R R O U N D I N G T H E

A N C I E N T

P Y R A M I D S

___________________________________

By J. B. D O O L I T T L E, M. A. , Senior Co-Curator, Royal Edenville Society For Egyptological Pursuits

_____________________________

Justified Ancients of Mummu (JAMS)

accounted by

Florence Tate, herself

_____________________________

O c c i d e n t a l D e v e l o p m e n t

F o u n d a t i o n I n t e r n a t i o n a l

Printed, and Sold, by A. F I R T H

MMVII.

I N T R O D U C T I O N

Do not be arrogant because of your knowledge, but confer with the ignorant man as with the learned, for the limit of skill has not been attained, and there is no craftsman who has fully acquired his mastery.

M a x i m s o f P t a h h o t p e1

In the new exhibit entitled “The Swarm of Possible Meanings Surrounding the Ancient Pyramids,” artist T I M O T H Y H U L L has chosen as his subject the long-standing tradition in Western civilization of representing Egypt as a repository of esoteric or mystical knowledge. In many ways, this tradition, which stretches from the present to the Age of Enlightenment, and in fact, even farther into remote antiquity, is summarily symbolized by the related forms of the P Y R A M I D and the O B E -L I S K, or more specifically, the P Y R A M I D - I O N at its peak; interestingly, these forms have been repeatedly appropriated by successive civilizations and employed either as symbols of authority or hidden truths, or sometimes both.2 Hull is particularly interested in the nineteenth century European reinterpretation of the Ancient Egyptian past through the lens of an assumed cultural superiority. The scholars and archaeologists of this period firmly and unquestionably incorporated the ancient Egyptian legacy into the Western experience.3 This particular revelation of Egyptian history still reverberates in many places today: the halls of Academia, the studios of Hollywood and of course, the ever famous collections of many European and American museums.

Hull’s work focuses on the contradictions inherent in the nineteenth and early twentieth century approach to Egypt. The first archaeologists in Egypt were certainly searching for scientific evidence, and without a doubt, their discoveries have had an impressive influence on our understanding of history today. But while they were looking for evidence, they were equally interested in proving specious theories for which no real evidence could ever be found.4 The search, then for the “right” type of evidence meant that a lot of valuable information was ignored, lost or outright destroyed in the process.5 Perhaps most importantly, however, the appropriation of the ancient Egyptian past as the remote “foundation” of Western civilization serves as a powerful tool of colonialism. In the story of the development of Egyptology, the Egyptians themselves are curiously absent, except as workers, guides or other subservient roles. Scholarly Egyptology was a European aristocratic endeavor, and it was assumed that ancient Egypt gave more to Western society than it did to contemporary Egyptian society.6

The same colonial trend is witnessed in the more recent occult appropriation of Egypt, but to an even

more dramatic, perhaps absurd, level. Occult scholars of the past century in particular have sought an extraterrestrial origin for much of Egypt’s antiquities.7 According to the various theses of the occultists, Ancient Egyptian ingenuity is outright denied, their mathematical achievements nullified, and all advancements made by ancient society were at the behest of a supreme alien intelligence. Thus, without instructions from above, the Egyptians themselves could never have built the pyramids, nor figured out the Nile inundation patterns, nor created a unitary state, nor invented writing, and so on.8 Under these assumptions, it is apparent that Egyptians, both ancient and modern, are effectively written out of their own history.

Hull analyzes these themes in his work. Rather than focusing exclusively on the ancient Egyptians, and the little we know about them, Hull takes a different approach. He looks first at the people who wrote the history of Egypt in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and attempts to understand their desires and motivations. Finally, Hull comments on the concept of mystical, esoteric knowledge itself and why we always seem to be seeking it. The Pyramid, seen through the ages as a font of mysticism, is a convenient symbol to analyze the evolution of the Western philosophical and material appropriation of Egypt.

To whom can I speak today?

The wrong which roams the earth,

There is no end to it.

. . .

Death is in my sight today,

As when a man desires to see home

When he has spent many years in captivity.

___________

From “The Man Who Was Tired of Life,”

Egyptian Middle Kingdom Text

Translated by R. O. Faulkner

The Literature of Ancient Egypt: An Anthology of Stories, Instructions and Poetry, ed. by William Kelly Simpson (New Haven, 1972)

P A R T O N E

You live again, you revive always, you have become young again, you are young again and forever.

B o o k o f t h e D e a d

We are always searching. The fragile and transitory nature of our corporeal selves has driven humanity to dizzying heights and nauseating lows in search of what Lou Tintarello once termed le risposte alle domande della vita.9 The search itself, the mad rush through life, however, dangerously assumes that somewhere there are answers to all of our questions. Our ancestors recorded a great deal, whether in text, material culture or architecture. Unfortunately, much has also been lost. Irrespective of the survival of the record, humanity’s common concern in the matter is simple: we record information because we wish to remember. As Bruno states, “In the act of recording, each individual hopes, overtly or not, that the answers he or she found are the answers that will lead us all to a better place.”10 The pyramids of Ancient Egypt, although they stand mute in the Sahara, have nevertheless spoken volumes to all who have gazed upon them; nowhere is there a more dramatic rendering of all the folly and splendor of human endeavor.11

From the earliest days of the Egyptian Old Kingdom, when King Djoser commanded his architect, Imhotep, to design and construct a massive

tomb to hold his body after death, the pyramid, in all of its forms, has been a source of fascination for generations. The pyramids themselves, polyhedrons made of four perfect triangles arranged to meet at a single point, are monumental to the point of an almost epic foolishness, yet at the same time, they are profoundly simple, powerful and worthy statements of human ingenuity. They have been found in many places around the world, both natural and constructed, but for many, “the pyramids” refer to those colossal polyhedrons found along the Nile River, principally in Egypt.12

The word “pyramid” itself has a very ancient pedigree. The English word comes from the French world pyramide, first noted in the twelfth century. The French word evolved from the earlier Latin form pyramis (genitive: pyramidis), which in turn came from an even earlier Greek term puramiV (pyramis). All terms are naturally cognate, and all refer explicitly to monumental triangular Egyptian tombs, or to objects of similar shape. There is a bit of disagreement as to the provenance of the Greek term, however. Most dictionaries present the Greek puramiV as an adapted form of the Ancient Egyptian word for pyramid, P-M-R, usually represented in Latin letters as pimar. The standard Egyptian term for pyramid was mer.¹³ The pyramidologist I.E.S. Edwards attempted to explain the etymology of mer by uniting m meaning “instrument/place” with ar meaning “ascension.” Thus, he reasoned, mer became “place or instrument of ascension.”14 While he questioned his own conclusions, the similarity of the sign for “steps,” rued, also meaning “resurrection” or “stair of the Underworld,” and the physical remains of the Step Pyramid of Djoser, is astounding.15 Another school of thought contends that the Greek word puramiV developed independently of the Egyptian and referred to a particular “wheaten cake” which was evidently triangular in shape.16

Tomb paintings and other sources reveal that the ancient Egyptians were indeed noted for a conical wheat confection, which they called ben-ben. This term is also used to describe the top of a pyramid, or the peak (pyramidion) of an obelisk. The term also figures into the Egyptian creation myth, as ben-ben is identified with the Sun God Atum. In the myth, Atum raised the primordial mound, or ben-ben up out of the water, in the same way that the good farmland emerged from the waters of the Nile every spring.17 Ben-ben had an additional meaning, as a sort of cosmic joke, because Atum created the primordial deities of Shu and his sister Tefnut through masturbation; the word bn also means “erection” or “ejaculate.”18

In addition to the pyramids themselves, other objects in ancient Egyptian tradition had the same shape. The Pyramidion, already introduced as the

peak of the obelisk, is one example, and the phoenix (benu in Egyptian), a creature known from Egyptian folklore, roosts in a pyramid-shaped nest.

With new texts being discovered and deciphered every year, archaeologists are now able to describe the pyramids in the context of the ancient Egyptian society that created them much more fully than any other period in the last two thousand years. That the pyramids were tombs for the pharaohs remains undisputed. The mythical identification with the sun was emphasized by the white casing stones with which the pyramids were girt. In the full Egyptian sun, the pyramids must have appeared brilliant, if not blinding. The pyramids physically mimicked the sun’s rays with their lines spreading downward to earth from a single point in the sky. They also represented a sense of national cohesion and unity unprecedented in the ancient world. Every year, during the floods, when the farmland of Egypt was under water, the people of the country congregated around the royal lands of Memphis and set to work on monumental projects. The sense of camaraderie and duty is witnessed in ancient graffiti inscriptions in stone found near the pyramids and other buildings, as well as the extensive archaeological remains found associated with the work camps, in reality more akin to cities, complete with vendors, caterers and entertainers.

There are over thirty surviving pyramids in Egypt today, with most pyramids built over the course of a few generations from the III Dynasty to the V Dynasty.19 While space constraints prevent a description of all of them, the Great Pyramid of Khufu, the largest of all, demands further attention. Located at Giza, together with the pyramids of Khafre and Menkaure, the three constitute one of the most famous skylines on earth. Khufu’s pyramid rises to a height of 146.59 meters and covers an area of 53052 square meters. The slope of the sides of the structure is 51˚50’40”.20 The pyramid faces are each aligned to the directions north, south, east and west. While he was in Egypt, Napoleon Bonaparte made some rough calculations relating to the amount of stone in the three pyramids of Giza. He deduced that if all the stones were taken and sent home to France, there would be enough material to build a modest ten-foot wall around the entire country! Napoleon, however, decided not to pursue those plans.21

Etymological and structural discussions aside, pyramids, symbols of antiquity, civilization, and of course the cradle of human society, Egypt, leave a powerful impression on all those who see them. By the time of the first Greek and Roman chroniclers (roughly 500 BCE to around 0 CE), the land of Egypt was already known to be particularly mystical and exceedingly ancient. The strange rites surrounding death and burial, the brightly painted tombs, the inscrutable hieroglyphic texts, the brooding, silent pyramids and even the climate all gave Egypt its special aura of uniqueness in the ancient world.22 During the Hellenistic and later Roman periods, the land of Egypt was described by outside observers; due to the eventual demise of the hieroglyphic writing system in Egypt itself around the year 400 CE, it was the words of foreigners, and not native scribes, that survived to describe ancient Egypt. For at least fourteen hundred years, the native voices of ancient Egypt lay silent, etched in the walls of forgotten tombs.

P A R T T W O

Toda la vida es sueño, y los sueños, sueños son.

PEDRO CALDERÓN DE LA BARCA

Despite the silencing of the scribes of ancient Egypt, the physical presence of the pyramids themselves provided a dramatic, if unfathomable backdrop to the Byzantine and later Islamic periods in the country. The monumentality, however, provoked considerable interest, and a great deal of medieval folklore from the Coptic and Arab traditions of Egypt survives. As with folklore found anywhere, some facets of the tales may indeed reflect ancient oral traditions, while others may simply be fanciful embellishments.

A medieval Coptic folk tale records the deeds of a king Surid, which may be analogous to Suphis, an archaic name for Khufu, builder of the Great Pyramid:

Surid, a king of Egypt before the flood, had two pyramids built. He ordered his priests to deposit inside them all the wisdom and knowledge of the sciences then available. In the great pyramid they placed information about the heavenly spheres and figures that represent the stars and planets, their positions and cycles, but also the foundations of mathematics and geometry. He did this so that they would be

preserved forever for those descendants who could read the signs.23

This passage neatly summarizes several main points regarding the Western “folklore” approach to ancient Egypt. The first point was that all knowledge in the world was first discovered, or at least in use, there; second, that all the knowledge was written or somehow stored within the confines of the pyramids themselves; and third, that someone who knew the appropriate rituals, or at the very least looked in the right places, would gain access to that knowledge. Until the decipherment of hieroglyphics in 1822 by Jean-Francois Champollion, this model was the dominant one in Egyptology. After 1822, and the gradual accretion of translated Egyptian texts, the model began to break down, albeit slowly. As Frenger points out, “Even today, ufologists and conspiracy theorists echo many of the points of the Coptic legends,” and the belief that extraterrestrial agents assisted the ancient Egyptians and provided them with technology and science “is nothing more than a modern folk tale.”24

Another interesting and durable folk motif is the presence of a special energy field in the vicinity of the pyramids. This energy field is something akin to a strong magnetic force, and is explained as a consequence of the pyramid’s north-south orientation, its shape, or energy provided by extraterrestrials. Medieval stories allude to self-sharpening blades left in the stones of a pyramid overnight; modern tales speak

of special regenerative properties seemingly granted by the pyramid.25 In some versions of this folk tale, raw meat is placed within the pyramid, and over the course of several days, weeks or years, the meat is found to remain in a relatively pristine, if desiccated, condition through that period. The point is made that the special, almost “holy” aura of the pyramid preserves flesh in a natural type of mummification. This interesting trope invites immediate parallels to medieval hagiography, such as Vita Niniani or Vita Columbani, which also equates holiness or otherworldliness with uncorrupt flesh. Numerous experiments have been undertaken by modern Egyptologists, and in each, the meat in the pyramid decayed just as quickly as meat left exposed anywhere else in Egypt.26

At this point in history, the lines have been drawn. There are those who feel that the pyramids are magical, and those who do not, and then the large percentage of humanity that simply does not care. There is very little common ground, however, between the two extreme groups, as each carries an emotional form of religious fanaticism into the argument. The believers argue that a corrupt “conspiracy” has attempted to destroy or otherwise hide the truth, and non-believers feel that the believers are obstacles to a more dignified understanding of the past.

C O N C L U S I O N

The history of our human civilization can be seen as a narrative of knowledge: the acquisition, loss, and collective evolution of knowledge in the myriad societies of the world. Knowledge is our currency, and the possession or lack of it has made or broken billions of lives before our own, and forms the starting point for Timothy Hull’s artwork. Triumphs have been witnessed at different times and different places, where humans have felt to be on the verge of understanding it all. But there have also been stunning defeats and setbacks, where the finite nature of our lives and our intellect slammed into the ever-expanding infinity of our observable universe.

The saga of the great pyramids of Egypt serves to illustrate the strength of knowledge, and the desire to possess and control it has driven the wheels of history. The pyramids themselves, of course, cannot talk to us, but their awesome physical presence alone invites contemplation. Anyone who looks upon them, from Herodotus to Jane Dorsey and her friends on yesterday’s TriBond Tours “Splendours of Egypt” cruise, is filled with the same curiousity: Who built them? How? Why? When were they constructed? A mixture of folklore and discrete shards of historical information immediately step in to fill the gaps in our knowledge.

Much like the pharaohs themselves, all who come to the waters of the Nile do so in search of some form of immortality. But in Hull’s corpus, the secrets we are looking for are always just out of reach, and it is not entirely clear if the secrets are in fact worth reaching for at all. We must not, as Ptahhotpe admonishes, “be arrogant because of our knowledge,” because there is no one alive “who has fully acquired his mastery.” We must, above all else, avoid presenting fallacious theories based on specious or even non-existent evidence as unquestionable truth.

A Series of Admonitions from a Sage to a Youth

Listen to what I say, young one, it is not a foolish tale I tell. What is righteousness if not a means to blot out the darkness of a ravenous jellyfish?

Do not force me to undertake the third path through the mountains.

Do not tempt me with the third padu-dessert.

Do not end the day by opening the third gate.

Do not make me flee to the forests of Anibanu.

Do not force me to scale the peaks of Mount Der-Peder(?) and toss keper-stones down from its summit.

Do not say to your mother “Float down the river.”

Do not say to a wife “Succeed at dusk.”

Do not say to a husband “Fly like an ear ornament.”

I do not write this down for my own health! Take heed of the words of an old man. One day you will walk down the road, and all the tests of life shall beset you. But you are not alone! For I will be there with you that day, though I may be dead many years.

* * * * * * * * * *

From a text scribbled on a piece of papyrus tucked into the ear of a late New Kingdom aristocrat. Tr. by Suzanne Barginton, 1964.

E N D N O T E S

As souls change into water

On their way through death,

So water changes into earth.

And as water springs from the earth,

So from water does the soul.

H E R A C L I T U S²⁷

[1] “The Maxims of Ptahhotpe,” tr. by R. O. Faulkner in The Literature of Ancient Egypt: An Anthology of Stories, Instructions, and Poetry, ed. by William Kelly Simpson (New Haven, 1972).

2 Compare the ancient Roman fascination with the obelisk as a symbol of authority with the modern identification of the pyramid with New Age and Occult thinking as a symbol of the esoteric. The Masonic pyramid on the US $1 evokes both themes.

3 Arthur Caravaggio, How Egypt Ruined My Life (London, 1908), 765.

4 Philip Traintree, De excidio Americae, (Berlin, 1880), 201.

5 Consider the figure of Charles Piazzi Smyth, the Italian-Scottish adventurer: His own abstruse calculations regarding the pyramids directed his first-hand observations. When he found that the pyramids did not meet his theoretical parameters, he attempted to rectify the situation by sawing large granite chunks off the structures. Hawass, Zahi Mountains of the Pharaohs: The Untold Story of the Pyramid Builders (2006, New York), 6-7.

6 Modern Egyptologists have attempted to rectify this trend. However, the unmistakable fact remains that thousands upon thousands of Egyptian artifacts lie in museums around the world, and many of them were inappropriately acquired, or outright stolen.

7 Cf. Allan and Sally Landsburg, In Search of Ancient Mysteries (New York, 1974) and Erich von Daniken, In Search of Ancient Gods (New York, 1973). Large portions of both books are reserved for discussions of Egypt.

8 Alan and Sally Landsburg, The Outer Space Connection (New York, 1975).

9 Lou “Toro” Tintarello, Searching for God in a Garbage Dump (Oxford, 1983), 39.

10 Algerid Bruno, “The Tainted Quill: Historians’ Ironic Obsession With Justice,” Sepulturum 20 (1998, Spring) 230.

11 Hilda Quarren, Twenty Minutes to a New You (Encore, 2005), 11.

12 Many other pyramids are found throughout the world, including south of Egypt in the ancient kingdoms of Nubia and Kush, as well as in Mesoamerica.

13 Mark Lehner, The Complete Pyramids: Solving the Ancient Mysteries (1997, London), 34.

14 Mark Lehner, The Complete Pyramids: Solving the Ancient Mysteries (1997, London), 34.

15 Richard H. Wilkinson, Reading Egyptian Art: A Hieroglyphic Guide to Ancient Egyptian Painting and Sculpture (New York, 1992),151.

16 Lehner, Pyramids, 34.

17 Pharactates the Elder, Natural History, XII, 43.22.

18 Lehner, 34.

19 Alan Gardiner, The Egyptians (London, 1961), 25.

20 Angela Barbery, Great Southern Cooking, (Atlanta, 1988),17.

21 Landsburg, In Search of Ancient Mysteries, 61.

22 Herodotus, writing on the Egyptian landscape and climate in the fifth century BCE, is most astounded by the fact that Egypt never experiences rain, but enjoys the richest fields in the world. The fields, of course, were watered by the annual inundation of the Nile.

23 Abu’l Hassan Ma’sudi, Akbar-Ezzeman MS, Bodleian Library, Oxford.

24 Thomas Frenger, Pyramids, Nazca Lines and the Bermuda Triangle: The E! TV Guide to the Paranormal. (Los Angeles, 2005), 76.

25 Peter Tompkins, The Secrets of the Great Pyramid (New York, 1971), 44.

²⁶ Zahi Hawass, Mountains of the Pharaohs: The Untold Story of the Pyramid Builders (New York, 2006), 20.

²⁷ Heraclitus, Fragments, tr. by Brooks Haxton (New York, 2001)

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