Graham Hancock Answering Ancient Mysteries

I have seen his site before but have not done much poking around on it.
Following the links to the diagrams that Perrin and Vyse drew up I do not see anything that tells me that they could not have faked the specific cartouches containing "Khufu". Again I am not saying thats what happened I am saying I dont see anything definative. The cartouche that they show running under a floor joint could have been painted on the wall and allowed to run down into the joint or its exposed marking could have been modified.
The clear cartouche that does clearly show "Khufu" could have been painted on by them. I am having trouble locating any photo of the cartouche that runs behind the joint that shows a crack large enough to see down into. I am curious how you could see a painted surface behind a joint that could not be reached by someone with a brush but could be seen? I would think if you could see it they could have painted it. Did the exposed joints only become visable after the 1839 expedition? Its hard to judge these things unless there is clear photos of the writing as it is. Also do we know that the drawings were not later altered by additional forgery?
There is a cartouche that is horizontal and could not have "ran" down the wall if it was forged. I cant really tell what it looks like form the drawing on the site so I will have to dig around for it. I take it that it shows one of the other names that have been attributed to "Khufu". Again however we cant tell if it indeed actually runs behind the joint or simply ends there.
Interesting...

Originally posted by Dragoon01
I have seen his site before but have not done much poking around on it.
Following the links to the diagrams that Perrin and Vyse drew up I do not see anything that tells me that they could not have faked the specific cartouches containing "Khufu". Again I am not saying thats what happened I am saying I dont see anything definative.

You mean, other than the fact that the spelling of Khufu that Vyse found was completely unknown to Egyptology at the time, right?

How could he fake a spelling that nobody knew about and later have it found to be legitimate?

Harte

already seen the vid, you must subscribe to some of the same peeps as me on youtube ...i'm a massive Hancock fan, so i chucked you an S&F as it's a very interesting vid, as is all of Hancock's work!

reply to post by Harte


Was it not thought that it matched a spelling recently published in a contempary publication originally thought to be incorrect?
That publication later proving to be accurate? Maybe I am conflating something here its been along weekend, but it seems there were other mentions of this spelling already known to Egyptologists of his day.
Also ran across another story about Vyse concerning the Menkarae pyramid. Supposedly he identified a coffin as belonging to Menkarea and thus sitting the ownership of another pyramid. This coffin and its occupant were carbon dated to a much later time and the British museum pulled the supposed Menkarea coffin from display.
Have not had time to further investigate this stroy but if it is indeed true that puts a second Vyse artifact into question and further cast doubt upon his honesty. Maybe one of you knows more about that story and can comment?

Originally posted by Ittabena
reply to post by Glargod

 

As someone who has studied ancient mysteries for a long time now - I remember when Chariots of the Gods by Von Daniken was first released - I have to say that I do not trust Graham Hancock.

So you base your expertise on reading stuff like Von Daniken, who doesn't have such a hot rep for accuracy himself?
,

Why? Well one reason is a book I read a while back by the name of The Stargate Conspiracy, by Picknet and Prince in which the two authors level some pretty odd charges towards Graham, one of which was his contradicting himself from time to time. I cannot remember all the other charges exactly - it has been a while since I was separated from that book unfortunately - but it didn't look good for Graham and it left an impression on me.

So you once read a book that criticized Hancock about "pretty odd" charges or something maybe that he contradicted himself, but you don't quite remember, and that's why you don't like Hancock.

Another reason is that I have never been able to finish a Graham Hancock book. Now I have read some of the most dry technical manuals there are (Try to get through the Sonet book on Fiber Optics, a real sleeping pill) but somehow I can't get through one of Graham's. Read most of Sitchin's books too, and do not completely trust him either, but that has to do with his being the only expert on dead languages who had published at the time that I read his stuff.

So you don't like Hancock because you've never been able to finish one of his books---which means you really haven't read Hancock.

And Graham has so many books out on so many different facets of ancient mysteries, somehow I just do not see him having enough time in life to do all this research and all this writing. To my mind Graham is a historical hack who has stood upon the research of others to publish more prolifically than almost anyone else.

And the last reason you don't like Hancock is because he's written "too many" books. Actually he's published ten books since about 1990, so 22 years for 10 books. Most of them are related, btw. So let's review: You don't like Hancock because:

1. You've read a lot on this stuff starting with von Daniken.
2. You once read a book that criticized him about something "pretty odd" you don't remember.
3. You've never actually read a book by Hancock clear through.
4. Hancock has written "too many" books.

Tell me, do you have anything to say about what Hancock claims that you feel is untrue and that you have some evidence to make your case? Or do the above reasons summarize pretty well the quality of your criticism of Hancock?

Originally posted by Dragoon01
reply to post by Harte

 

Was it not thought that it matched a spelling recently published in a contempary publication originally thought to be incorrect?
That publication later proving to be accurate? Maybe I am conflating something here its been along weekend, but it seems there were other mentions of this spelling already known to Egyptologists of his day.
Also ran across another story about Vyse concerning the Menkarae pyramid. Supposedly he identified a coffin as belonging to Menkarea and thus sitting the ownership of another pyramid. This coffin and its occupant were carbon dated to a much later time and the British museum pulled the supposed Menkarea coffin from display.
Have not had time to further investigate this stroy but if it is indeed true that puts a second Vyse artifact into question and further cast doubt upon his honesty. Maybe one of you knows more about that story and can comment?

You have to keep in mind that during Vyse's time, very little was actually known about Ancient Egypt. It certainly wouldn't have been unusual in the least for any Egyptologist of that era to misidentify anything.

If you look back at some of their writings, their timelines were off by as much as a thousand years, compared to what we know for certain today.

Regarding the claim about the spelling of Khufu, I'd like to see some sort of evidence for what you claim. In Vyse's time, some Egyptologists criticized him because of the spelling he reported on, they concluded he was in error.

That is, until they went there themselves and saw it.

Harte

reply to post by Harte


And what of the other evidence supplied by Walter M. Allen of Pittsburgh, Pa., who supplied documentary evidence from his grandfather Humphries W. Brewer "in which Brewer said he witnessed Hill, a man working for Vyse, go into the pyramid with red paint and a brush. He said that Brewer objected to such forgeries, but was then fired and banned from the site"

Source

Vyse is not totally credible, but then again neither is Stichin, but some obscure graffiti painted in some hidden spot, that Vyse just happened to find as his failure of an expedition was about to end is not credible evidence for me, Vsye went with the specific aim of proving that Khufu built the pyramids, he had failed to do so, right up until the last minute, when he was alone and stumbled on this graffiti, that no one else had found over 100's of years exploration, a monument that is devoid of any markings, yet some slave felt "compelled" to go against the orders of their Pharaoh and mark it up, just seems a little odd, and a little convenient to me

Originally posted by PrinceDreamer
reply to post by Harte

 

And what of the other evidence supplied by Walter M. Allen of Pittsburgh, Pa., who supplied documentary evidence from his grandfather Humphries W. Brewer "in which Brewer said he witnessed Hill, a man working for Vyse, go into the pyramid with red paint and a brush. He said that Brewer objected to such forgeries, but was then fired and banned from the site"

Source

From your link:

But the best evidence, Sitchin argued, was that the name of Khufu was misspelled – and conform to a notorious misspelling in a book to which Vyse had access. It is particularly the latter allegation of misspelling the Pharaoh’s name that has been hotly contested by experts in the field; so when they argue Sitchin was wrong, they conveniently wipe the other doubts under the carpet too.

The above is completely incorrect, as the source I already linked you to fully explains.

Sitchin claimed Vyse was in possession of a book of glyphs that would allow him to copy the name - incorrectly.

In fact, as Vyse's own journal shows, and a page of his journal is shown on the site I linked, Vyse himself was stumped by the spelling of Khufu he had found.

Your link (Phillip Coppens) states:

That year, an academic book about hieroglyphics had been published, “Materia Hieroglyphica”, in which the name of Khufu was erroneously entered: the lines of the sieve were so close together, that they appeared in the print like a massive disc, which is in fact another way of writing “Ra”. It is known that Vyse had this book with him.

That describes the glyph as Vyse expected to see it. Sitchin claims here that Vyse forged the glyph and copied the drawing from the book he had.

Unfortunately for Sitchin, Vyse's journal clearly shows he was expecting the disc with the dot, or just a disc (with no dot.) What Vyse reported, shows in his journal, and was disputed at the time, was the sieve glyph that Coppens mentions above - a disk with 3 slashes in it. That glyph was not known at the time to be used in Khufu's name (the pharoahs had five names.) The truth is, only later were other examples of that form of Khufu's name found.

While Vyse may not be totally credible, Sitchin is absolutely not credible in the least. Vyse has his reasons for not being credible. As I stated, not a lot was known at the time. Sitchin, on the other hand, not only ignores known facts, he simply fabricated a viscious lie about Vyse because he needed the GP to be older than Egypt to fit it into his lie about the Anunnaki.

Harte

reply to post by Harte


Be consistant here. I dont think you are stating things clearly.

The spelling was known to Egyptologists, not widely know but known. Sitchin claimed that Vyse reported and copied the name incorrectly from a misprint in the "Heiroglyphica" book. If it was a "misprint" then the correct spelling had to have been known. The misprint was not because the name was unknown it was a type setting error. Sitchin has stated that this is the basis for his belief in forgery. Thats fine I think he is wrong on this matter. I dont see that Vyse reported or copied the name incorrectly. I do not however see anything that tells me that Vyse could not have 100% without a doubt, forgerd the cartouches containing the "Khufu" name. Sitchin had a motive to cast3e doubt on Vyse thats no question but we have no reason to imediately accept that Vyse did not engage in some form of unethical action. Vyse did indeed find the cofin in the Menkare pyramid and profess it to be that of the Pharaoh and thus dated the third Pyramid to him. As I stated further evidence shows this to not be the case. Although I do not accept carbon dating to be 100% accurate as the method can give wide spanning dates, the results give Egyptologists the need to invent stories of their own to expalin them away. they want to have things both ways. When carbon dating gives results they expect they are happy with it, when its not they invent rather wild reasons to explain why it would not. The story is that the coffin found by Vyse was a replacement for the original? The bones he found were a burial from a much later date. Although why anyone in 300BC would have been buried in the third Pyramid is not really explained.
Because we cannot prove one way or the other in regards to the "khufu" quarry marks we should not use them to assign ownership of the GP. Since the evidence that the Third Pyramid belonged to Menkare is also rather questionable we cant assign ownership to him either.


It may be that the pyramids were indeed built sometime near the reign of Khufu but that does not mean they were intended to be tombs or that they belonged to the Pharaoh that the scholars have assigned. None of that depends on Sitchins aliens either.

i have read a number of Graham Hancock books . yes they are usually very long and drawn out and he never really solves the mystery but i still find them interesting and thought provoking

Originally posted by Dragoon01
reply to post by Harte

 

Be consistant here. I dont think you are stating things clearly.

The spelling was known to Egyptologists, not widely know but known. Sitchin claimed that Vyse reported and copied the name incorrectly from a misprint in the "Heiroglyphica" book. If it was a "misprint" then the correct spelling had to have been known. The misprint was not because the name was unknown it was a type setting error. Sitchin has stated that this is the basis for his belief in forgery.

I think you may be misremembering.
Look, like you, I'm no Egyptologist.

But here's what Sitchin said (this is from Sitchin's "The Stairway to Heaven"):

To begin with, Mr. Birch was uneasy about the orthography and script of the many markings.
(EDIT: "Mr. Birch" is Samuel Birch, the British Museum in London's hieroglyphics expert at the time.)
"The symbols or hieroglpyhs traced in red by the sculptor, or mason, upon the stones in the chambers of the Great Pyramid are apparently quarry marks," he observed in his opening paragraph; the qualification at once followed: "Although not very legible, owing to their having been written in semi-hieratic or linear-hieroglyphic characters, they possess points of considerable interest... . "

What puzzled Mr. Birch was that markings presumably from the beginning of the Fourth Dynasty were made in a script that started to appear only centuries later. Originating as pictographs—"written pictures"—the writing of hieroglyphic symbols required great skill and long training; so, in time, in commercial transactions, a more quickly written and simpler, more linear script referred to as hieratic came into use. The hieroglyphic symbols discovered by Vyse thus belonged to another period.

The bolded portion above is purely a lie, and Sitchin knew it (or should have.)

Sure, in Vyse's time they hadn't found any heiratic script from that early, but they have found many examples of it since then.

To continue:

They were also very indistinct and Mr. Birch had great difficulty in reading them:

"The meaning of the hieroglyphics following the prenomen in the same linear hand as the cartouche, is not very obvious... . The symbols following the name are very indistinct."

Many of them looked to him "written in characters very nearly hieratic"—from an even much later period than the semi-hieratic characters. Some of the symbols were very unusual, never seen in any other inscription in Egypt:

"The cartouche of Suphis" (Cheops), he wrote, "is followed by a hieroglyphic to which it would be difficult to find a parallel."

In other words, the hieroglyphic expert from the British Museum had no idea about the glyph, so it was on that fact that I based the claim that nobody was aware of that spelling in those days. After all, Birch was the world's leading hieroglyphic expert of the time, and he questioned the glyph.

There follows after the above quoted portion of Sitchin's book another skein of lies. But I won't address them because if I do, then where do I stop?

Sitchin claims that Vyse painted the wrong glyph on the stone in the GP. He claims that Vyse painted the "erroneous" sun disk glyph at the end of Khufu's name. Yet, when you look at Vyse's journal, and at pictures of the actual painted-on glyph in the actual GP, you see the seive glyph, and clearly not the disk.

Sitchin should have put his glasses on before he made this one up!

Harte

reply to post by Harte


Matters are not quite as simple as you appear to be making out. There is a reproduction of a drawing in one of Zahi Hawass's books of an inscription in Lady Arbuthnot's Chamber (the chamber below Campbell's Chamber where Vyse found the Khufu inscription). The orthography of this inscription seems to depict a circle with a dot. It would be interesting to see a photograph of this inscription to determine its orthography more clearly.





The plot thickens.....

Best wishes,

Scott Creighton

Both cartouches are names for Khufu, so the plot thins.

Harte

Originally posted by Harte
Both cartouches are names for Khufu, so the plot thins.

Harte

SC: The drawing of the inscription in Lady Arbuthnot Chamber looks very much like a solar disc with centre dot i.e. the AE god "Ra". As I said in my previous post, this is only an epigrapher's rendering of the inscription found in that chamber so if you have an actual photograph of this inscription that proves, beyond question, that the glyph in question is indeed a "Kh" disc glyph (i.e. circle with clear hatched lines) then I'd much appreciate seeing it.

Thanks in advance.

Best wishes,

Scott Creighton

Load this page at Google books.

A little more than halfway down - using the scroll bar on the right, you'll find a pic of the cartouche, which really can't be read in the photo.

But a drawing accompanies it, and in that drawing, the seive glyph is shown.

Harte

Originally posted by Harte
Load this page at Google books.

A little more than halfway down - using the scroll bar on the right, you'll find a pic of the cartouche, which really can't be read in the photo.

But a drawing accompanies it, and in that drawing, the seive glyph is shown.

Harte

Had a look at the page you linked to - scrolled down but could not find the image or drawing you refer to. If you could copy and paste it into a post that would be great.

From what you say above, there is an obvious discrepency between the two epigraphers' drawings - one appears to be a circle with a centre dot (RA) whilst you say the other shows a disc with hatched lines (KH). Which one is right?

I think only a clear photograph of the actual inscription will resolve this. Until such time that this is presented and the inscription made absolutely clear (one way or the other), the question remains open.....

Regards,

Scott Creighton

reply to post by Harte


Birch was referring to the marking after the cartouche. He had not seen that style of markings prior. He was well familiar with the markings within the cartouche. The specific item that sitchin claims was faked by Vyse is the very first mark that SC shows in his post with Hawass pictures. The lone cartouche with the Seive glyph first (they are read right to left) Sitchin shows that glyph as being a circle with a dot as printed in the "Heiroglyphica" book not the correct circle with three lines (it is not incorrectly shown by Vyse or actually on the wall contrary to Sitchin). Circle with a dot =Ra or =Re, circle with lines = Kh. That specific cartouche is writen alone on the wall higher up and not running behind a floor joint. It very well could have been faked. The second cartouche that Hawass shows is said to be a different name for Khufu. That may be the case but I have also seen this questioned as actually being a refernece to the god of the nile and this being a blessing and not a name of a Pharaoh. There is a cartouche that runs behind a joint shown on Vyse's drawings it could be another instance of the first one but it could also hav ebene faked or altered as its running verticle and not horizontal.

Originally posted by Scott Creighton
Had a look at the page you linked to - scrolled down but could not find the image or drawing you refer to. If you could copy and paste it into a post that would be great.

I'm using an older version of IE, and Google books looks weird on it.

Because of this, the page number was covered up by some little explanatory window, which is why I didn't just give you the page nimber.

I did a "print screen" for that page and pasted it onto a word doc. I'm at work right now, but I could upload it at home.

But, at home, my version of IE would have shown me the page number anyway!

Originally posted by Scott Creighton
From what you say above, there is an obvious discrepency between the two epigraphers' drawings - one appears to be a circle with a centre dot (RA) whilst you say the other shows a disc with hatched lines (KH). Which one is right?

I think only a clear photograph of the actual inscription will resolve this. Until such time that this is presented and the inscription made absolutely clear (one way or the other), the question remains open.....

Even a clear photo might not show it. It depends on how many people have tromped through that chamber. From the photo, it appears that the writing is easily accessible so it might have been touched, leaned on, breathed on, etc. for a hundred years, messing up or flaking off the paint.

So, we might never know.

On the other hand, Sitchin provided some graphics in his book that were simply fabrications, as you know. In "Stairway to Heaven," he showed the Ra disk in place of the seive glyph. Obviously, in the cartouche Sitchin was supposedly displaying, the seive glyph is used. I say "as you know" and "obviously" because you provided a pic of this very cartouche in your thread "Who was Khufu?" Your pic plainly shows the seive glyph, where Sitchin's drawing of the exact same cartouche (he pretends to have taken the drawing from Vyse's journal) shows the Ra disk.

What I'm getting at here is that the fringe has proven their readiness to fabricate evidence. Hence the source must be considered, assuming the cartouche itself can't be made out anymore in any new or old photo.

Harte

reply to post by Hanslune

Thanks for this, Hans.

Certainly the epigrapher's rendering of the cartouche seems to indicate more than one line. This photograph of the cartouche in question, however, is far from conclusive as it is very unclear (as Harte indicated). We still have to ask why two different epigraphers seem to have rendered two different epigraphs from the same original. Perhaps a colour photo of the inscription in Lady Arbuthnot's Chamber might help?

Regards,

Scott Creighton