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

MYSTERY OF THE GREAT PYRAMID

distance about equivalent to a point in line with the centre of the ante-chamber wall behind which it passes. It then takes a number of short bends, each succeeding bend tending more upwards, but with a westward tendency, before finally being carried northwards direct to the outside face. These shafts, therefore, could not have been intended as observation tubes. Mr. Edgar (Pyramid Passages, vol. ii) suggests these bends were introduced to clear the masonry of the Grand Gallery (see his plates vi and xx). He reasonably asks, however, “‘ Why did not the builders place the inner mouth of the channel further to the west in the wall of the King’s Chamber, and thus avoid the necessity of these bends ? ”

One answer that suggests itself is that these air channels were constructed afterwards by boring through the masonry. Their cross-section, however, only about nine inches square (Edgar), shows that this could not have been the reason, since no one could use a hammer and chisel in such a restricted space, but they must have been constructed during building, like all the other passages, with the probable exception, as explained elsewhere, of the lower part of the well-shaft.

Note P: ‘THE GREAT PYRAMID AS A TEMPLE OF INITIATION (page 56)

Though we have stated in our Introduction that, for constructional reasons (see p. 3), it seems very doubtful if the Great Pyramid could have been used for purposes of initiation into the mysteries—but, as pointed out elsewhere, not absolutely impossible—in view of the tradition to this effect cited by Maspero, the following from Chapman’s Great Pyramid of Gizeh, from which we have already had occasion to quote, is of interest as an expression of modern views on this point :—

“Tt is chiefly contended that the (Great) Pyramid was built as a mausoleum to preserve the body of . . . Cheops, and, it is thought, of his wife, customs recognized as duties amounting to necessities in the case of a divine arch-ruler

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