Quote

Re: Pyramid Schemes
Posted by: Chris Tedder (IP Logged)
Date: October 6, 2005 05:33AM

AS: "Sah is not evidenced in the Fourth Dynasty."

The mention of Sah at the end of the 5th dynasty is in the so called 'Cannibal' hymn, which is considered to be a part of an older corpus of texts that made their way into the PT's. Sah was called 'the father of the gods' so he was obviously important.


Out of all the star patterns in the sky, two star patterns are specifically mentioned in connection with the royal and non-royal funerary beliefs already in the OK: Sah (Orion, a large distinctive constellation) in the southern sky, and Mesekhtiu (The Plough / Big Dipper, a large, distinctive, circumpolar, 7- star asterism in Ursa Major), in the northern sky. They appear in the Pyramid texts, on MK coffin lids and on the 'astronomical' ceilings. These two star patterns are two of the most distinctive easily recognizable star patterns in our sky, and the AE recognized them, and incorporated them into the hopes for the after-life.


AS: "Osiris is not evidenced in the Fourth Dynasty."


Why are you reverting back to your old trick of arguing against your preconceived notions of what you thought I wrote - I did not mention Osiris so why do you bring him up?


AS: "Any star patterns whatsoever are not evidenced in the Fourth Dynasty."


You should know by now that only fragmentary inscriptions have survived in the archeological record from the 4th dyn royal funerary complexes, so we have very little knowledge of the royal funerary ideology, compared to the extensive information found in the texts that have survived inside the 5th dyn pyramid of Unas where the stellar content is significant.



AS: "The angles of the shafts change several times, and only by selecting one of those multiple angles from each shaft can you "target" anything in particular."


The changes of angles are only in the lowest sections. If the 'soul' of the king rose up the shaft to access the sky, its the final top section that is parallel to the N/S centre axis that is important if the the aim was to target celestial objects.


AS: "The only gods found at Giza at the time the pyramids were built are Re, Horus and Hathor. None of these deities are stellar... they're solar, at best. You have to ignore this exclusive evidence in order to make your case."


Wrong, Re, Horus and Hathor are not the only deities found at Giza

How can you assert that Horus has no stellar associations when Netjerikhet's funerary complex was named 'Horus is the Star at the head of the sky' and similar texts are found in the PT's.



AS: "You are speculating the reverence of stars in the Fourth Dynasty. That is fine... "


I am not speculating a reverence for stars in the 4th dyn - that is again your own preconceived notion of what you thought I wrote.


I wrote that two of the 4th dyn pyramids had names that are explicitly stellar - that is not speculation. There is plenty of evidence that 4th dyn complexes were 'decorated' with the traditional 5-pointed stars, again that is not speculation - I gave the examples. Can you for comparison give all the examples of where a sun motif is used in the same context?


What do explicit stellar names for the king's pyramids, and the 5-pointed star 'decoration' in the royal funerary complexes suggest to you - they were interested in trees? Why did all the 5th / 6th dyn 'Son of Ra' kings have such a strong stellar content in their funerary texts?