The mystery of the Great pyramid : traditions concerning it and its connection with the Egyptian Book of the dead : with numerous illustrations

NOTES

appear at an altitude of 30°, the pyramid should stand in 29° 58’ 22”. Its actual position is thus between the two limits assignable, and but twenty seconds from their precise mean.

Note V1: THe ASTRONOMICAL PURPOSE OF THE GREAT PyRAMID (page 81)

M. B. Cotsworth in his Rational Almanac (published about 1904) has gone into this aspect of the Great Pyramid very fully, and carried out sun-shadow experiments to test his conclusions, and which proved clearly that a Pyramid was by far the best for such a purpose, ordinary stakes or poles being far too short to attain practical results.

1. It is most easily built to the requisite height.

2. Its flat slope is best adjusted to the difficult Equinoxial noon slope required.

3- Its peculiar ‘‘arris-edges”” best indicated the characteristic shadows defining the different seasons of the year (re Nos. 2 and 3, refer pp. 79-80 above).

4. Its square base-plan accurately defined the four cardinal points of the compass.

“ Cumulated evidence,” writes Mr. Cotsworth, ‘‘ based purely upon these shadow experiments . . . so strongly emphasized this as the great object for which the Pyramids were built,’ that I became fully convinced that such was the original purpose of the Pyramid builders.”

We have drawn attention elsewhere to the widespread nature of such astronomical recording devices as pyramids, circles, and mounds. In our Introduction we have also noted the similarity of ideas between the Egyptian Book of the Dead and the Mexican Popol Vuh, a fact which Suggests a common origin.

Now the similarity of the Mexican teocalli to the Egyptian pyramids is noted by all writers on the

* ‘This applies only to the first three Pyramids on the Gizeh Plateauthose of Khufu, Khafra, and Menkaura. Later ones, which are too small for such a purpose—apart from other considerations—were constructed solely as tombs .

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