They’ve been crawled all over, like picnic food by ants, but non-invasive techniques (as were used by Luis Alvarez in the Khafre pyramid about fifty years ago) have seldom been tried. And foreign scholars and scientists insufficiently obsequious get the heave-ho. Frankly, I’d prefer the whole place were suddenly depopulated and studied unfettered and in depth. But I’m just a little crazy. ;’)
Well, they did find bits of green diorite in the construction till leftover from building it, and when that one nut many years ago drilled into the pyramid he found a rough sphere of black diorite.
But as far as I know they haven’t found green diorite inside the pyramid.
May just mean that it was picked clean, but it could also mean that the side rooms are still there, filled with dust and sealed.
And Zahi Hawass is about as likely to allow noninvasive scans [or any scans] as Zero is to allow his records to be released.
What’s the scuttlebutt on why non-invasive technologies weren’t approved for analysis? Do you suppose they weren’t adequately understood...or were those using them deemed untrustworthy (i.e. that they might surreptitiously use an invasive technique as part of the analysis)?
I’m with you. It’s frustrating that these things haven’t been exhaustively analyzed, just because the current civilization is about 14 centuries in the past.
I’m not a UN fan, but having the UN declare these to be somehow legally separate from the government of the country may head towards better access. Until something like that happens, scientists will be at the mercy of corrupt local folks.