reply to post by JoeBarna
It is not the maker of the stones, which have been estimated to be at least 6000 years old.
There was some bronze age habitation there but they didn't build anything, the stone work is Roman. I believe if you check your find that estimate
comes from a unevidenced fringe site.
It is the size of the largest. They are in the neighborhood of 2000 tons.
Hans: The trilithon (which are the ones I'm thinking you're thinking of) weigh around 800 tons, they were moved by the Romans and placed as part of
a lower slope retaining wall. The big suckers around 1,000 tons were not completed and not moved.
The largest trilithon stone is aproximately 3.4 meters by 4.5 meters by 19 meters. That comes to 290 cubic meters. If the measurements from sacred
sites are right and it is limestone then the stones should be about 696 tons. If it is high density limestone then the stones should be about 841
tons. So a guesestimate of 800 tons is about right - unless someone can get a really big bathroom scale in there....
I could deal with hundreds of slaves moving pyramid stones in Egypt weighing on the average of 20-30 tons, some as large as 70 tons.
Hans: No slaves, craftmen backed up by free men
But stones weighing almost 2000 tons? Can you explain that? I can't. That is what shattered my belief system.
Hans: Well not to worry they didn't move those stones. The Romans had windlass' and used relays of them to move heavy objects.
The heaviest object moved without mechanical help was by the Russians who moved a 1,600 ton piece of red granite several hundred miles for a statue
now called the Bronze horseman. The heaviest ancient stone moved was around 1-1,200 tons - the Egyptians did that but not in regards to the
pyramids.
[edit on 18/12/08 by Hanslune]