How Ancient Egypt Moved 100-Ton Granite Blocks

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Did you know ancient Egyptians moved 100-ton granite crates, and scientists are still scratching their heads over how they did it? These massive stone boxes, found in places like the Serapeum of Saqqara, were carved with incredible precision. The crazy part? They were transported from quarries hundreds of miles away! Modern engineers are baffled by how this was even possible without cranes, trucks, or modern tools. Some think they used ingenious methods involving ramps, sledges, and even water to reduce friction. Whatever the method, it’s a mind-blowing example of ancient innovation that still amazes us today!  Animation is created by Bright Side. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Music from TheSoul Sound: https://thesoul-sound.com/   Check our Bright Side podcast on Spotify and leave a positive review! https://open.spotify.com/show/0hUkPxD34jRLrMrJux4VxV   Subscribe to Bright Side: https://goo.gl/rQTJZz ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Our Social Media: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/brightside Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brightside.official TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@brightside.official?lang=en Telegram: https://t.me/bright_side_official   Stock materials (photos, footages and other): https://www.depositphotos.com https://www.shutterstock.com https://www.eastnews.ru ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  For more videos and articles visit: http://www.brightside.me  ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This video is made for entertainment purposes. We do not make any warranties about the completeness, safety and reliability. Any action you take upon the information in this video is strictly at your own risk, and we will not be liable for any damages or losses. It is the viewer's responsibility to use judgement, care and precaution if you plan to replicate.

Transcript

00:00In 1850, French scientist Auguste Mariette went to Egypt looking for manuscripts, but

00:06accidentally found a head of a sphinx sticking out of the dunes.

00:11He cleared the sand and figured out the sphinx was guiding the entrance to some underground

00:15construction.

00:16Several months later, he finally entered the Serapium of Saqqara.

00:21Inside he found an enormous granite sarcophagi with remnants of 64 bulls.

00:26Scientists are still amazed by the tech that the ancient Egyptians used to transport those

00:31enormous boxes.

00:34The Serapium was built around the year 3000, before the Common Era.

00:38It was an underground tomb built to honor the sacred Apis bulls of ancient Egypt.

00:43It had a long hallway, almost 500 feet long, with giant stone rooms on both sides.

00:50Some of the sarcophagi weighed as much as 50 average cars, and all of them were made

00:55with super precision with exact 90 degree angles.

00:59These sarcophagi were beautifully decorated with hieroglyphs and carvings that told stories

01:04about the lives and importance of the Apis bulls.

01:08Now there are 24 sarcophagi left.

01:12In ancient Egypt, Apis bulls were very special animals connected to the deity Ptah.

01:17They thought the bulls carried Ptah's spirit and wisdom, helped the pharaoh, and protected

01:22the Egyptians.

01:24Scientists looked for special markings on young bulls to find Apis bulls.

01:28It could be a white triangle on its forehead, which symbolized divine light, a shape on

01:33its back like a vulture's wing, and a scarab shape under its tongue, which stood for rebirth.

01:39If a bull had these signs, they believed it was chosen by Ptah and treated it like royalty.

01:45The chosen bulls lived in a special temple in Memphis, the city where they worshipped

01:49Ptah.

01:51They received the best care and offerings from visitors who wanted their blessings.

01:55When an Apis bull passed away, it was treated with great honor and mummified.

02:01When Mariette entered the serapium, he noticed traces of rollers on the gallery's floor

02:06and found two wooden horizontal winches.

02:10Each had eight levers.

02:11Later, other explorers saw double rails.

02:15The burial chambers were lower than the hallway floor.

02:18To get the boxes into place, workers filled the chambers with sand so the sarcophagi could

02:22be rolled in straight.

02:24Then they slowly removed the sand to gently lower the boxes into perfectly cut spaces

02:29in the bedrock.

02:30A carved stone sign found in the serapium said it took 28 days to move just one sarcophagus

02:37and its lid into its spot during the time of Ptolemy II.

02:42The extreme precision of the sarcophagi with 90-degree angles also has an explanation.

02:49Ancient Egyptians wrote texts, or rather papyrus, on geometry a long time ago.

02:55It shows that they knew the approximate number, Pi, and could calculate the volume of a pyramid

03:01with its top cut off.

03:03If they could figure out complicated math like that back then, it makes sense that they

03:08could also carve perfectly flat surfaces 500 years later.

03:13All this sounds pretty legit, but some people think certain things don't add up here.

03:18The size of boxes is way larger than the size of bulls, yet they buried pharaohs in tiny

03:23coffins that barely fit their bodies.

03:26The sarcophagi are made out of granite with crazy precision, and they could have just

03:31used limestone, which would have made things way easier.

03:35The transportation of the boxes seems pretty simple, but only in theory.

03:41If one person could pull about 440 pounds, then at least 250 people would be needed to

03:47pull just one box.

03:49The tunnels in the serapium are really narrow, only about 2 feet wider than the boxes themselves.

03:54There's no way hundreds of people could have squeezed into those tight spaces to pull

03:59the boxes.

04:01And even if they did, how would they turn the box in the cramped corridor, lower it

04:05into its niche, and place it perfectly in the middle?

04:10Somehow they did this 24 times and every box is centered perfectly.

04:15Plus, the chambers were dusty and there were no signs of soot from lamps.

04:20This means they must have worked in almost complete darkness.

04:25The real use of the boxes could also be different.

04:28A long time ago, even before the Egyptian pharaohs ruled, the local people already

04:32knew how to use fermentation.

04:35It happens when tiny organisms called yeast eat certain ingredients like starch and turn

04:40them into gas and ethanol.

04:42So someone in ancient Egypt probably put food like barley, bread, and even meat inside a

04:48giant stone box, then closed it tight with a heavy lid.

04:53These stone boxes, carved from granite, were so precisely made that they were almost completely

04:58sealed, so nothing could escape from it.

05:01As the yeast inside the box started working, it created more and more CO2 gas.

05:06It built up pressure inside the box.

05:09The granite boxes were incredibly strong, they could handle more pressure than a car

05:13tire can hold.

05:15When granite was squeezed under such pressure, its crystals produced a tiny electric charge.

05:21This effect was possible because granite contains quartz, a material that reacts to pressure

05:26this way.

05:27The process also needed meat or animal parts, possibly to help the yeast grow better.

05:33Meat contains something called oleaic acid, which yeast needs to keep growing and to survive

05:38the bad effects of the ethanol it produces.

05:41As the pressure inside the box kept growing, the combination of gases and electricity made

05:46these boxes not just ancient fridges, but powerful energy systems.

05:52Over time, the pressure inside got so strong that it could push the lid open and the gas

05:57would escape with a pop.

05:59But when people rediscovered the Serapium in 1850, they found old drawings that showed

06:04piles of stones stacked on top of some of the box lids.

06:08So, someone long ago probably tried to make the lids even heavier by adding extra weight

06:13to make it harder for the gas pressure to push them open.

06:18This extra weight also meant the quartz crystals in the granite could keep creating more electricity

06:23under all that pressure.

06:25If someone opened one of these stone boxes thousands of years later, they would only

06:29find bones from bowls that were placed in the box.

06:33And that's exactly what Mariette discovered in the 1850s.

06:38They opened the Serapium for visitors soon after the first excavations in the second

06:42half of the 19th century.

06:44Prince of Wales even had a luncheon with his guests in one of the sarcophagi.

06:49Sands and earthquakes made the site inaccessible for a while, but now you can visit it again

06:54and try to solve the mystery yourself.

06:57With new tech, we could have answers to many other historical mysteries soon.

07:02A team of scientists at Chicago's Field Museum of Natural History recently used a special

07:07CT scanner to learn more about ancient Egyptian mummies without unwrapping them.

07:13They gently rolled 26 mummies on custom carts out to the parking lot, where the scanner

07:18was waiting.

07:20They took thousands of detailed X-ray pictures of each mummy and their coffins.

07:24When all the pictures were put together, they created 3D images that showed what was inside

07:30– the skeletons and some artifacts.

07:33The scientists hoped these images will help them understand ancient Egyptian burial practices

07:38from over 3,000 years ago.

07:41Even though the scanning process only took four days, it might take three years to study

07:46all the data.

07:47But scientists were able to learn some personal details about the mummies.

07:52One of the most popular mummified individuals at the museum, Lady Chinetta, was a woman

07:57who lived in ancient Egypt about 3,000 years ago.

08:01It looks like she passed away in her late 30s or early 40s.

08:05To make sure her body looked complete for the afterlife, embalmers put stuffing in her

08:09neck to keep it from collapsing.

08:12They also placed artificial eyes in her sockets so she would have eyes in the next world.

08:17She was wrapped in fancy linen and placed in a beautifully decorated coffin.

08:22The scans revealed that it had been carefully crafted with a slit at the back, which embalmers

08:27used to fit the body.

08:29There were also some artistic details on the surface, like markings for her knees.

08:34It looks like her burial was on the scale of a high-end luxury car.

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