Anthony Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> RLH Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > >They didn't actually "dig" a tunnel...
> >
> >
> > lol ! you are funny! I’m not confused maybe
> you
> > are? You can dig through stone precut or
> not.
> >
> >
>
> If you had actually been inside Mamun's tunnel,
> you'd know that the blocks of stone that make up
> the walls are whole core blocks. This means they
> were only removing the blocks in between. There
> are stories, if I recall, of them building fires
> next to the blocks and then pouring vinegar on
> them when they were hot. This caused them to
> crack into smaller pieces and they could just
> remove them from the ongoing hole they created in
> the core.
>
> It wasn't tunneling, like what they had to do to
> create the descending passage down to the
> subterranean chamber. That required core drills
> and chisels. Mamun's job was less like digging
> and more like a game of Jenga than anything else.
> It probably took his crew only a few days to get
> in to the plug stones.

Hello Anthony,

In all fairness to RLH, you did write: "‘No, it didn't happen that way at all. He carved in a tunnel to go around the granite plug stones without disturbing them.

"carved" - cut by chipping away at a surface

Dug, carved, chipped, tunnelled, burrowed, excavated - does it really matter that much which word is used here?

As a matter of interest, how do you tell whether the surface of a core block is the handiwork of its original quarrymen or the handiwork of Al Mamun's crew?

MJ