fmetrol Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> I'm biased to a certain degree I suppose because I
> believe I have come up with a new metrology which
> doesn't necessarily work with sekeds. However
> having said that I think the use of sekeds is real
> but reserved for those mundine tasks where the
> masons, workmen, had to rely on a simple method of
> solving everyday problems of construction .
> However it was not the preferred arithmetic of 4th
> dynasty architects who had a much wider and far
> reaching bag of tricks.

Can you provide a single piece of evidence from any time in Egyptian history to show that mathematics was ever anything but a practical tool used to solve administrative and architectural challenges?

One single piece of evidence that suggests mathematics (and not specific "lucky" or "unlucky" numbers) is all we need to establish this cultural element of the ancient Egytpians. I am unaware of any such evidence... especially from the Fourth Dynasty, where you claim it must have flourished.

Now, I know you aren't saying it was "numerology" per se, but you are talking about a DIFFERENT math for the lay people, compared to the royalty. This IS "occult math", or a higher math, if you will. Why? Secret cubits? There's no evidence of it ever... just a pattern you may have discovered of random elements, overlapping and intermingling. Occasional patterns in the measurements alone will never suffice to supplant the known metrology of the Dynastic Egyptians.



> I doubt very much that by
> the 18th dynasty the 4th dynasty architect's
> methods were still understood. It appears not
> anyway.

That's special pleading.

Rarely do literate cultures LOSE their technologies. Dynasty 18 Egyptians could most certainly still read the copious amounts of Dynasty IV texts that survived to that time. Mathematical texts survive from that time, and if they are anything like almost every other text in Egyptian history, they were copies of older texts.

This idea that they 'got stupid" just doesn't fly. Khufu could never have built Karnak... not in his wildest dreams. They had neither the uniform metrology or the technology to comprehend the positioning of 40-ton lintels on top of 22-meter high columns.

I am far more likely to accept that the variations in measurements that people find in the Old Kingdom structures is a result of multiple factors that overlap and coincide to create what appear to be patterns, but are actually just systemic artifacts.

For example, two workers have measuring sticks that are slightly off from the others. Whenever these two workers get together, they create anomalous cubit measurements. When they do not work together, we get cubits within the error tolerance of the original cubit, and when neither of these workers are working together, we get really accurate cubits. Three different sets of readings... no "new metrology" required.

These are still lithic peoples, just using copper tools. They were using wooden measuring devices, not stone. Stone measurement tools would have been relatively impervious to temeprature and humidity. It does not appear that they were even aware that their measuring devices changed with the weather. This could also account for differences in measurements. Cubits laid out in the morning would be different from cubits laid out in the afternoon.

Yet, despite all these potential problems with their evidenced tools, people want to think they were able to actually measure 20 or 30 cubits accurately to within a millimeter. When it happened, it was probably pure luck. They couldn't tell they were right, any more than they would have knowingly created measurements that were wrong.

Anthony

You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him think.