Hoysaleswara Temple, India

originally posted by: Triton1128
I get the pillars. I'm aware that there is, or could be, alternative methods that would yield those same results. (the banding which looks like it was lathed) But the statues? With the flashlight, shining through 3mm wide gaps? Along with hollowed out crowns and skulls? I do not understand how that could be done. This day in age, we have 3D printers that print layer by layer at tolerances of 1mm or less. Or laser etching / engraving. Sure. But a thousand years ago?

That. is. amazing.

Again, look at the cathedrals of the time and remember they're using iron (and possibly low grade steel) tools.

We get so used to the beautiful things that our own technology makes possible that we forget what a highly skilled craftsman could do before the Steam Age and before electricity and motors were invented.

a reply to: Triton1128

I was about to post a thread about this exact topic because I came across the video a few days and find it pretty mind blowing and the narrator of the video is pretty intelligent and has some great insights.

Your thread title though, leaves much to be desired.

You need something eye-grabbing and shocking to draw everyone in, I was going to name it something like this:

"Evidence of Modern Machine Tools Revealed in Ancient Temple!" or something like that.
That's at least the initial idea, it could be edited a little bit, like "Shocking Evidence of..." or "Mind Blowing Evidence of...".

Naming your thread is a really critical part of getting the information out and disseminating it as widely as possible. This thread has 22 flags and 2 pages - it should have 100+ flags and 10+ pages by now.

You did a good summary and presented the video properly, you just made a thread title that probably gets glossed over by 90% of the people who would have otherwise looked into it had you played upon their psychology.

I know it sucks that we live in a world where sensationalism and tabloid style approaches are the best - but something like this REALLY deserves attention! And the guy who made that video really deserves way more views and likes for covering this and giving such a well thought-out and developed analysis (it seems he even visitied the temple personally as well).

This temple (and many others like it) is simply astounding and utterly baffling.
Thanks for sharing it though, S+F.

a reply to: Byrd

Do you know of any particular books that actually list tools used for creating these types of structures during this time period (or other time periods)?

I would be really interested to see what modern research has produced in terms of detailing the actual methodology behind all this fascinating architecture.

I fully believe that humans were capable of doing this without electric or gas operated motors, but I would like to know what types of tools "we" commonly believe were used specifically, and how long it took them to create it or what the margin of error was (for example did it require highly skilled craftsmen or could just about anyone accomplish it with a little practice?).

I doubt such a book exists, but I'd really like one with pictures of these items along with structures they are associated with and a very organized and easy to navigate format.

Maybe wikipedia is a good place in the absence of any actual handheld book, but if you have any suggestions I'd really like to review those texts. Thanks!

a reply to: Triton1128

These were made in China, the ball's are often of one piece so not opened then put back together which means the spheres have been carved inside one another and yet they are so perfect they put these statues to shame.
gbtimes.com...
They were carved by hand by master artisan's.
What they show along with Indian sculptures is a high level of social evolution, a society long lived enough and stable enough give rise to the art's of the highest degree of refinement.
The idea of them being made by hand to me make's them even more precious than if they were machined.

Here's what I want to know though, and obviously I'm no expert so anyone who is please inform me:

In the video the guy shows "marks" on the pillars that he refers to as machining marks or evidence of some type of modern construction method for carving such ornate shapes.

If he is wrong, what exactly are those cut marks and what type of tool made them and how were they made by using that tool?

Thanks! To me it's a mystery, that's why I ask!

a reply to: muzzleflash

The thing I found most interesting was the carving's of the geared mechanism.

a reply to: LABTECH767

Well it could be representing something more traditional and non-mechanical as conventional wisdom would say, but....

It could be representing actual gears.

That's what makes this so fascinating: the ambiguity.

a reply to: muzzleflash

We know so little of what they were capable of, what if the Antikythera mechanism had it's origin in India? or a culture that sat somewhere between, even Persia, as ancient goes this is only a little over a third the age of the Antikythere mechanism and that was a cogged and geared device.
We lost a lot during the dark ages in Europe, before them the bath's of Roma had triple glazed glass, ok it was rolled glass not like our molten tin (I typed mercury for some reason and live just around the corner form pilkingtons so that was a face palm moment) float method and not as good but still triple glazed and they had a great many other invention's that were simply lost or forgotten when the empire crumbled, but of course Byzantium clung on for a long time and they had hand pumped ship to ship flame throwers they could use in naval battles to incinerate enemy ship's back when Byzantium marines ruled the Mediterranean.

So what they were actually capable of in India and what ideas passed between these cultures via there trade and commerce we will probably never really know though I am certain they were more advanced than they are given credit for today especially prior to the Islamic invasion, the Islamic expansion wiped entire cultures, city's and even people's from the map of the world much as the later Mongolian expansion did, only the dense population and the entrenched ancient Indian culture and belief's prevented them from being wiped out too, they were however suppressed under moghul rule for many century's until the British came, then the British had a temporary and perhaps catalytic role replacing the much longer lasting Moghul dynasty's before India eventually returned to it's own people.

Still during all of that conflict how many time's were great library as great as the library of Alexandria burned and lost, how much was suppressed, forgotten or simply lost.

a reply to: LABTECH767

It has to have happened many times.

Like when the Mongols sacked Baghdad in 1258 they destroyed the vast libraries there.

So I agree that most knowledge from the ancient world has been lost, like you mentioned the Antikythera machine or Greek fire.

By the way we get our modern word napalm from naphtha + palm. I'm not saying Greek fire was naphtha but I do think it was similar and may have been a near analogue of something like napalm.

There's tons of good proposals for that.

But yeah I am very open to the suggestion that they had mechanical devices (at least clocks) for far longer than generally believed.

I also am open to suggestions about advanced stoneworking technologies and techniques that we currently have overlooked.

There have been a lot of good concepts proposed in the last 20 years of rudimentary but effective mechanical methods to both carve and place large stones with great accuracy.

Nothing we have done is quite as accurate as some ancient sites though. Which should be a red flag we are missing something critical here.