In the Cheops pyramid, experts discovered a previously unknown room, which may turn out to be a secret treasure storage or tomb. The room is located next to the tomb of the pharaoh and the main corridor of the pyramid.
When we saw this area of emptiness, we realized that we had come across something very interesting and big, we abandoned all other projects and concentrated on studying this area, located directly above the corridor to the tomb of Cheops, the archaeologists said.
Over the past 200 years, scientists have been able to discover only three rooms in the great pyramid, in one of which the pharaoh himself was supposedly buried, in the other his wife, and the third was considered a bait or trap for robbers.
But the mummies were never found, giving archaeologists hope that the remains might be hidden in hidden chambers of the pyramid. Scientists have been searching for these premises for a long time, and two years ago they were joined by physicists from the universities of Nagoya, Paris and Cairo.
© ScanPyramids mission
Experts studied the structure of the pyramid using non-standard methods, namely, space telescopes within the ScanPyramids project. Archaeologists have adapted telescopes to find voids and hidden rooms in ancient architectural monuments.
The operating principle of such a detector is very simple: it looks for flows of muons (charged particles) and determines the size of the space in which they are located. It is believed that in upper layers Millions of muons are formed every second in the Earth's atmosphere. They arise from the collision of cosmic rays with gas molecules in the air.
These collisions accelerate muons to near-light speeds, thanks to which they penetrate tens and hundreds of meters deep into the surface of the planet. As scientists' measurements show, every square meter The Earth's surface absorbs about 10 thousand of these particles.
Thus, the flux of muons decreases in empty space much more slowly than when passing through rock or earth. Using a telescope like this, you can determine where empty rooms are in an object.
Last October, a detector found several voids inside the Cheops pyramid that could be hidden rooms.
Our measurements absolutely rule out that this void area could have arisen due to differences in the properties of the stones or due to errors in construction, as Zahi Hawass claims. Voids of this size and configuration could not have accidentally appeared between the blocks, either from an engineering or any other point of view. The Egyptians were too good builders to make a mistake when building a pyramid, leaving a “hole” in it and creating a room or corridor somewhere else, said Hani Elal from Cairo University.
But this discovery caused a lot of suspicion and mistrust, so it was decided to continue the observations. Repeated research confirmed the scientists' guesses that above the main corridor of the pyramid there is a void zone 30 meters long, 8 meters high and approximately 2 meters wide.
© ScanPyramids mission
However, experts are not yet sure what kind of space this is, since it could be either a corridor or a series of rooms. A team of Egyptologists is now being formed to further study the Pyramid of Cheops and other structures of Giza.
A new way of studying buildings using a telescope has inspired scientists, as it can provide more information about the structure of ancient pyramids.
This year, the Cheops pyramid is revealing more and more mysteries. Thus, the secret of the construction of the Great Pyramid recently became known. Scientists learned about this thanks to the papyrus they found: its text was written by an Egyptian overseer of 40 slaves who were constructing the building.
Having deciphered the text, archaeologists learned that the Egyptians diverted water from the Nile and laid artificial canals across the Giza plateau, along which boats loaded with blocks moved.
A previously unknown region of emptiness was discovered during research by physicists from the HIP Institute in Paris. Supposedly, this could be a secret tomb or a passage into it.
In an article published in the journal Scientific Reports, scientists say that upon discovering this empty zone, they realized that there was something interesting and unusual in front of them. Therefore, they concentrated on studying this area, located directly above the corridor to the tomb of Cheops.
"We are now confident that it really exists, and it is the first find of its kind in the Cheops pyramid since the Middle Ages, when it was opened by Caliph Al-Mamun in the 9th century AD," said one of the researchers, Mehdi Tayoubi.
One of the seven wonders of the world - the Pyramid of Cheops, 145 meters high and 230 meters wide - was built in the middle of the third millennium BC by Pharaoh Khufu (Cheops), a representative of the fourth dynasty of the Old Kingdom, during which all the “great pyramids” were built. Ancient Egypt. This structure is considered the tallest and largest of all ever created by mankind.
Over the past two centuries, scientists have been intensively studying the pyramid. During this time, three rooms were discovered, in one of which the pharaoh himself was supposedly buried, in the other his wife, and the third was considered a bait or trap for robbers. In the walls of the corridors that lead to the tomb of Khufu, unusual channels and structures were found, which today scientists consider to be elements of the “security system” that protected the pharaoh from defilers.
Despite such a long study of the pyramid, many scientists are confident that the real tomb has not yet been opened, but is hidden somewhere in the thickness of the structure, because the mummies of the pharaoh and his wife have never been found
Two years ago, physicists from the University of Nagoya, Paris and Cairo began searching for these secret rooms, studying the pyramid using cosmic particle detectors and space telescopes as part of the ScanPyramids project.
French archaeologists and physicists, together with Japanese scientists, have adapted telescopes that can “see” muons - charged particles resulting from the collision of cosmic rays with gas molecules in the air - to search for voids and hidden rooms in ancient architectural monuments.
This technique works very simply: the flux of muons decreases in the air and in empty space much more slowly than when passing through the thickness of rocks or earth, which makes it possible to search secret rooms by bursts in the muon background.
Last year, participants in the ScanPyramids project announced a sensational discovery - they managed to find several previously unknown voids inside the pyramid, which could be the secret tombs of the “lord of two houses” and his wife.
Despite criticism from archaeologists and Egyptologists who accused physicists of incorrectly interpreting the data obtained, scientists are confident that their measurements are absolutely accurate, and the void area could not have arisen due to differences in the properties of the stones or due to errors in construction.
Voids of this size and configuration could not have accidentally appeared between the blocks, either from an engineering or any other point of view.
"The Egyptians were too good builders to screw up the pyramid, leave a 'hole' in it and create a room or corridor somewhere else," said Hani Elal from the University of Cairo, Egypt.
The physicists rechecked the obtained data again, and again found out that there are no other voids in the pyramid, except for the already known corridors and rooms. If their previous measurements had been erroneous, the pictures obtained by different muon telescopes would not have matched.
All these images showed that above the main corridor of the pyramid there is a void zone 30 meters long, 8 meters high and approximately 2 meters wide. This zone can be either a “solid” corridor running parallel to the ground or up or down, or a set of rooms. So far, physicists do not have enough data to rule out either the first or second option.
Scientists have not yet interpreted their discovery and do not declare that they managed to find a secret room - this task, according to them, should be dealt with by Egyptologists. However, physicists hope it will open a discussion about whether it is worth trying to penetrate this void zone and, if so, how to do it.
In the near future, as scientists noted, they plan to continue studying this void zone, as well as other regions of the Cheops pyramid, including the tomb of the pharaoh himself, and will begin to scan other pyramids that may hide secret rooms and voids unknown to us.
Scientists expect that new research will help to understand exactly how the pyramids were built and whether we can trust those descriptions of the process of their construction that have reached our time in the works of Herodotus.
However, the method used by physicists in the Cheops pyramid cannot be used everywhere. Muon scanners, for example, will not help to find the secret tomb of Nefertiti: it is unknown how the voids are distributed in the rocks located above them.
In addition, “scanning” by peers turns out to be long, and it is impossible to speed up the process with the help of man-made accelerators; parts cannot be delivered to Giza or the Valley of the Kings - it is too expensive, and these devices themselves are huge in size. It is impossible to create muons directly, because they arise from the decay of kaons and pions.
Internal structure of the pyramid
ScanPyramid, 2017
An international team of researchers has confirmed the presence of a hidden camera in the Cheops pyramid. It is located above the Great Gallery and reaches a length of about 30 meters. Article published in the magazine Nature.
The Pyramid of Cheops was created approximately 4.5 thousand years ago during the reign of the IV ancient Egyptian dynasty. It was erected by order of Pharaoh Khufu, better known as Cheops. For a long time, the pyramid remained the tallest building in the world - its height reaches 139 meters, and its width at the base is 250 meters. Despite the fact that it is one of the largest and oldest historical monuments on Earth, there is still no consensus on how it was built.
Today, three burial chambers are known inside the Cheops pyramid - an unfinished burial “pit”, the “King’s Chamber”, where an empty granite sarcophagus is located, and the “Queen’s Chamber”. The Great Gallery, a high inclined tunnel 46.6 meters long, leads to the Pharaoh's chamber. Last year, archaeologists also said they had discovered two voids - one located above the Great Gallery, and the other, called the Northern Corridor, located above the modern entrance to the pyramid. However, some scientists have expressed doubts about the reliability of the find, believing that some parts of the pyramid could be made of a different type of stone.
Participants in the ScanPyramids project who discovered the voids continued to study them to confirm the discovery. They reported the results in a new article. The researchers conducted three independent experiments based on the muon tomography method. Muons are unstable elementary particles that are born when cosmic rays collide with atomic nuclei and the subsequent decay of mesons. A stream of muons is capable of penetrating through the walls of buildings - however, the air retains fewer muons than, for example, concrete blocks. If we place a muon detector next to the building, which will register the number and trajectory of particles, then in fact we will get an “X-ray” of it internal device. You can read more about muon tomography, as well as its use, in our material “Fell from the sky”.
ScanPyramid, 2017
In the first experiment, the researchers used a nuclear photographic emulsion to capture muons. The detectors were installed back in 2015 in the southwest corner of the Queen's Chamber and the adjacent corridor. The results of muon scattering radiography showed that there is a 30-meter chamber above the Grand Gallery. The second experiment using scintillator hodoscopes (KEK), which was carried out already in 2016 and 2017, confirmed the results of the first group of researchers. The third team of scientists received a signal with a reliability of 5.8 sigma - that is, the probability that the physicists made a mistake is extremely small (less than a percent).
The center of the chamber is located at a height of 40-50 meters above the floor of the “Queen’s Chamber”; the length of the “great void,” as the authors of the article call it, is comparable to the Great Gallery. Unknown to researchers exact specifications chamber - it may turn out to be an inclined corridor or a room consisting of several rooms. Future research will help clarify this.
In Egypt, the pharaoh was considered a god-man. It depended on him whether the sun would rise, whether the Nile would overflow, whether the grain would ripen in the fields. And the god-man needs a tomb to match his divine greatness.
Around 2650 BC, a pyramid first rose above the earth - the pyramid of Djoser. This is the first known stone tomb in Egypt (mastabas had been built before, but they were built from raw bricks) and generally the first known stone structure of this size in the whole world. History has even preserved the name of its architect: Imhotep. His titles are carved into the stone of the pyramid next to the title of the pharaoh himself.
The Egyptian pyramids gave rise to many lies and misconceptions. Some, for example, suggest that they were built using ideal technology, which came from nowhere in finished form. In fact, one can trace how construction technologies improved from the early pyramid of Djoser to the brilliant pyramid of Cheops (Khufu), the last of the great pyramids. There is also a known pyramid that collapsed during construction. So ready-made knowledge did not fall on the Egyptians - it was obtained with the sweat and blood of thousands ordinary people who lost their health and even their lives for the sake of the greatness of the pharaohs.
It is also not true that the pyramids were built by slaves. During the Old Kingdom, the role of slave labor in the economy was generally quite modest. The construction of these magnificent tombs was carried out by another class of the forced population - the “meret”, or “hemmu”. They also worked for the owner under the supervision of overseers with sticks and, most likely, could not have their own land. And yet the Meret could not be bought or sold, they lived in families and had some property. This is their difference from slaves (“bak”).
The discovery of new pyramids that have not yet been studied by science, but quite a lot is already known about their construction. Builders' towns have been found, as well as quarries where the main material of these structures - limestone - was mined. Usually such a quarry was located not far from the construction site. True, granite and basalt were also required. They were brought from the south of Egypt along the Nile.
The Pyramid of Cheops (Khufu), also known as the Great Pyramid, became the culmination of great madness, the highest point of the desire of earthly kings to establish their divinity in stone. 140 meters in height (for comparison, the Pyramid of Djoser is only 60 meters). 2.3 million stone blocks, each edge polished. The completion of construction dates back to approximately 2560 BC. The era of the great pyramids lasted only a century.
The third dynasty of pharaohs, which built the most famous pyramids, paid dearly for their pride. Its last pharaoh was probably overthrown: his name was not preserved, and the pharaohs of the next - fourth - dynasty traced their pedigree not to their predecessors, but directly to the god Ra. From that time on, such majestic pyramids were no longer built.
And the Pyramid of Cheops, the last and greatest monument of bygone legendary times, still attracts the eyes of mankind. And although the burial chamber and sarcophagus were found long ago and the most large premises The pyramids have been explored, the ancient tomb has not yet revealed all its secrets.
On November 2, 2017, a publication was published in the journal Nature, which reported the discovery of a previously unknown cavity in the Great Pyramid. Space helped humanity in this new discovery.
