Clive wrote

>When you do explain, can you also provide a valid engineering point of view why the builders would not interlock the casing stone to prevent it from falling apart. They did with the Bent, Red, G1 and G2...why omit G1?<

You seem to be a little confused as your question itself shows you've misunderstood the situation as well as what appears to be a typing error at the end (G1 and the G1 again). You also don't define what you mean by "interlocking".

But the following might help.

There are up to seven layers of casing stones in-situ on the East Side of the Red Pyramid that were uncovered by Stadelmann in the 1980/90s. They are laid in horizontal parallel courses no different to the Great Pyramid. Stadelmann writes in MIDAK 39 p.234 "At Dahshur North it is the first time that the individual layers of the core as well as of the casing have been placed horizontally..." he also discusses the backing stones. The technique is no different than that employed at the Great Pyramid so you are wrong on that one.

The Bent Pyramid was built in an entirely different way so you're not comparing "like with like". The casing stones were angled down unlike the Great Pyramid where the stones are horizontal. This system was tried again at Abu Roash and on one of the Satellite pyramids at Giza but then abandoned again.

For information on the evidence for how the casing stones on the Great Pyramid were put in place including the evidence from the top surfaces of the remaining stones that show how the next layer was placed see:

"Manoeuvring Casing Blocks of Pyramids" by Dieter Arnold in "Pyramid Studies and other Essays - Presented to I.E.S. Edwards 1988. Arnold discusses the marks caused by "Shift Cutting" which show the position of casing stones joints on the next layer above the first course at Giza. The evidence is sufficiently clear for Arnold to say that the second layer was manoeuvred from the South on the East side, from the East on the North side and from the North on the West side.

There are backing stones cut to receive casing stones still in place on the Great Pyramid and I've inspected and photographed examples up to three courses up from the base. For more on backing stones on the Great Pyramid see: "Ancient Egyptian Masonry" by Clarke and Engelbach. Particularly pages 99 and 105 where they have photographs and diagrams of the backing blocks on the second course cut to receive the casing stones. Indeed one photograph is actual captioned "...behind are the 'backing blocks' of the second course'. I shouldn't have to point out again that packing blocks make no sense if casing blocks weren't placed in position as they are cut to accommodate them.

Maragioglio & Rinaldi also have a lot of material on the casing stones and backing stones in their volume on the Great Pyramid along with separate drawings. They also comment on the evidence for "Shift cutting" when they write "on the upper face of some of the remaining blocks along the North side there are some slight incisions parallel to the joints between the blocks. They are in line with joints of the backing stones in the second course and evidently determined the position of its casing blocks" (M&R Volume IV p.20)

Hopefully that lot will help you understand the facts. If you have any more "simple" questions I suggest you try reading all the available material before making claims based on what is obviously a very partial knowledge of the real situation. Until you've done that I don't see much point in continuing this discussion as you make such an outlandish claim but I've never seen a single piece of fact based evidence from you that even begins to substantiate it.

There's comes a point when a silly idea just isn't worth flogging anymore and I've reached that point with yours. (It might be worthwhile adding in case anybody else is following this thread, and has lost track, that Clive claims that the Great Pyramid had only one row of casing stones at the bottom and never had anymore). If anyone else wants to continue they're welcome but I see no point.

PS. While you're reading the above source material I also hope you've taken up Petrie's suggested reading list to which I could add some Arab and later authors. Even without the evidence sited above they completely demolish your arguments.

Jon

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