A huge labyrinth is believed to be below the sand (Image: YOUTUBE)
Posted on 07/15/2020 3:01:04 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
The discovery was made in Dashur, an archaeological site 90km south of Cairo, where the tattered remains of Pharaoh Amenemhat III's Black Pyramid can be seen today. The huge mortuary temple that originally stood adjacent to this pyramid is believed to have formed the basis of the complex of buildings with galleries and courtyards called a "labyrinth" by famed ancient Greek historian Herodotus. With no visible remains, the story was thought to simply be a legend passed down by generations until Egyptologist Flinders Petrie uncovered its "foundations" in the 1800s, leading experts to theories the labyrinth was demolished under the reign of Ptolemy II, and used to build the nearby city of Shedyt to honour his wife Arsinoe.
(Excerpt) Read more at express.co.uk ...
A huge labyrinth is believed to be below the sand (Image: YOUTUBE)
in Book II, Herodotus refers to the large "labyrinth" in the Fayyum as surpassing the pyramids:
"...the Labyrinth which lies a little above Lake Moeris, in the neighbourhood of the place called the city of Crocodiles... if all the walls and other great works of the Greeks could be put together in one, they would not equal, either for labour or expense, this Labyrinth... The pyramids likewise surpass description, and are severally equal to a number of the greatest works of the Greeks, but the Labyrinth surpasses the pyramids. It has twelve courts, all of them roofed, with gates exactly opposite one another, six looking to the north, and six to the south. A single wall surrounds the entire building. There are two different sorts of chambers throughout- half under ground, half above ground, the latter built upon the former; the whole number of these chambers is three thousand, fifteen hundred of each kind.
"The upper chambers I myself passed through and saw, and what I say concerning them is from my own observation; of the underground chambers I can only speak from report: for the keepers of the building could not be got to show them, since they contained (as they said) the sepulchres of the kings who built the Labyrinth, and also those of the sacred crocodiles. Thus it is from hearsay only that I can speak of the lower chambers. The upper chambers, however, I saw with my own eyes, and found them to excel all other human productions; for the passages through the houses, and the varied windings of the paths across the courts excited in me infinite admiration as I passed from the courts into chambers, and from the chambers into colonnades, and from the colonnades into fresh houses, and again from these into courts unseen before. The roof was throughout of stone, like the walls; and the walls were carved all over with figures; every court was surrounded with a colonnade which was built of white stones exquisitely fitted together. At the corner of the Labyrinth stands a pyramid, forty fathoms high, with large figures engraved on it, which is entered by a subterranean passage.
"Wonderful as is the Labyrinth, the work called the Lake of Moeris, which is close by the Labyrinth, is yet more astonishing. The measure of its circumference is sixty schoenes, or three thousand six hundred furlongs, which is equal to the entire length of Egypt along the sea-coast. The lake stretches in its longest direction from north to south, and in its deepest parts is of the depth of fifty fathoms. It is manifestly an artificial excavation, for nearly in the centre there stand two pyramids, rising to the height of fifty fathoms above the surface of the water, and extending as far beneath, crowned each of them with a colossal statue sitting upon a throne. Thus these pyramids are one hundred fathoms high, which is exactly a furlong (stadium) of six hundred feet: the fathom being six feet in length, or four cubits, which is the same thing, since a cubit measures six, and a foot four, palms. The water of the lake does not come out of the ground, which is here excessively dry, but is introduced by a canal from the Nile. The current sets for six months into the lake from the river, and for the next six months into the river from the lake. it runs outward it returns a talent of silver daily to the royal treasury from the fish that are taken, but when the current is the other way the return sinks to one-third of that sum."The Histories: Book II Euterpe[may be a dead link]
Herodotus
tr by George Rawlinson
“Egyptologist Flinders Petrie”
Well, if old Flinders says so, than it must be.
Many’s the night old Flindie and I cracked open a bottle of Heinz 57 and reminisced about our days selling sand to the Arabs.
Flinders Kleepers
“I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: `Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear —
“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
Percy Bysshe Shelley
“In 2300 BC, the waterway from the Nile to the natural lake was widened and deepened to make a canal that now is known as the Bahr Yussef. This project was started by Amenemhat III or perhaps by his father Senusret III. This canal fed into the lake. This was meant to serve three purposes: control the flooding of the Nile, regulate the water level of the Nile during dry seasons, and serve the surrounding area with irrigation. There is evidence of ancient Egyptian pharaohs of the twelfth dynasty using the natural lake of Faiyum as a reservoir to store surpluses of water for use during the dry periods.”
...
“The immense waterworks undertaken by the ancient Egyptian pharaohs of the twelfth dynasty to transform the lake into a huge water reservoir gave the impression that the lake was an artificial excavation, as reported by geographers and travellers during classical times.[5] The lake was eventually abandoned due to the nearest branch of the Nile shrinking from 230 BC.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Moeris#History
“Roses are red
Violets are blue
If you wear a cat on your foot
Than it becomes a shoe”
blue bysshe unicorn
That poem always reminded me of Babylon. This once great city was prophesied to be destroyed and never rebuilt, which of course was foolish. It stood in the crossroads of two great trade routes and no way would it be destroyed . . . until it was. No way it would never be rebuilt . . . until it wasn’t. When I saw Saddam Hussein unveil his plans to rebuild Babylon (with drawings and a war chest to begin, I said that is a dead man walking . . and not much later he was.
Boy, could he sell sand.
Don’t I know it.
Before old Flindie gave him his sales pitch, Saudi Arabia was a lake.
If Percy Bysshe Shelley had flourished in the 1990s, his nickname might have been Percy V-Dot 42 Bysshe Shelley.
Okay, even I don't think that deserves a rimshot.
canal of joseph site:freerepublic.com
Ok,so the guy on the left is over stylized. But the character on the right IS likely based on the same historical person for which the canal remains named.
ancient origins egypts great lost labyrinth
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