Chapter 832: Underground Mastaba
The sun sets, but the world does not fall into darkness.
Next to the campfire, Bifang was cutting a tree stick, shaving off the surface wood chips layer by layer, and then pouring them into a cylindrical bark container.
After compacting the sawdust layer, Bifang picked out several pieces of intact charcoal from the campfire, waited for them to cool down, crushed them, and poured them into the charcoal.
After multiple layers of production, a simple disinfection mask is completed.
The fat in the ostrich meat was cooked into oil. Bifang tied a piece of hemp rope firmly to half a wooden stick and then soaked it in it. After the rope absorbed enough oil, he inserted it into the campfire.
The fire snake coiled up, and in a moment, a torch head was completed, and the blazing flames illuminated the surroundings.
After pouring water on the bonfire and extinguishing it, Bifang came to the dark entrance of the cave.
The firelight illuminated the surroundings of the cave entrance, but made the cave itself even darker, like a black hole that was ready to devour anyone, which was a bit scary.
Bifang, wearing a gas mask, was still not in a hurry to enter. He first placed the torch in front of the cave entrance and waited for about a quarter of an hour, during which time he went deeper and deeper until the entire torch was inserted into the cave.
"If it can burn, it means there is oxygen inside. If it doesn't burn violently, it means there is no flammable gas inside. It is safe to go in with a torch."
Bifang gave a brief explanation.
[Another small detail]
[Thin, really too thin]
[I doubt your swearing, and I have sufficient evidence (dog head)]
After making sufficient preparations, Bifang looked at the cave illuminated by the torches, lay down, and crawled in little by little.
The cave itself is not big, and the diameter exposed on the surface is less than half a meter. It is difficult to enter without lying down.
The orange light illuminated the passage, and the entire space was filled with thick sand and gravel, which were the remnants of the original backflow.
[A bit scared]
[After watching too many horror movies, I always feel like something will jump out in front of me]
[It would be the most troublesome if a rattlesnake suddenly appeared at this time]
【Fang Shen: Thank you】
Inside the deep cave, Bifang felt the inclination of the corridor and made a mark every three meters.
"The inclination angle is about thirty degrees. We can tell how many meters we have advanced by making marks, and then calculate our depth."
"We have now sunk about five meters, which means that this site is much larger than we thought, and it is most likely not an undiscovered pyramid."
Bifang lowered his voice. It was quite hot and stuffy in there, and with the gas mask on, it was difficult for him to breathe, causing him to be a little breathless.
The surroundings of the corridor also began to change. It was no longer entirely gravel, but was mixed with a lot of flint and even intact huge stones.
The size of the passage was also changing. Bifang could now change from lying down to squatting to explore, but squatting was too tiring, so he chose to crawl.
Why can't it be a pyramid?
[This drone signal is really good]
【High quality Tango nb】
"Because the shapes of all pyramids are fixed, the length of the square at the base of the pyramid multiplied by two, when divided by the height of the pyramid, is approximately equal to 3.14, which is π. They are all proportional."
"From the size and depth we have discovered, if it is really a pyramid, then the height of the ruins must be at least more than ten meters. However, after I entered through the passage, the total height I descended was less than five meters."
"This means that more than half of the pyramid has been cut off. The probability of this happening is extremely small. We can hardly imagine what it has gone through to be destroyed like this."
The pyramids are very sacred in the eyes of the Egyptians. They are not only a symbol of royal power, but also linked to religion and theocracy. In various wars in the West, invaders may destroy the capital left over from the previous dynasty, but rarely destroy churches, unless they are pagans.
Even though Bifang had mentioned before that in the 14th century AD, Sultan Badr al-Din Hassan of the Bahri dynasty removed the surface limestone of the pyramid to build a temple, he did not think of moving the entire pyramid.
The pyramid has been eroded by wind and sand for thousands of years. This erosion is all-round. It is impossible to completely erode more than half of it and leave only an intact base. Besides, the wind and sand are not so strong.
Keep climbing along the passage until you descend about six meters. The slope of the corridor ahead suddenly increases. In just a few meters, the slope changes from a small slope of 30 degrees to a super steep slope of over 60 degrees.
The slope was over sixty, and without stairs people could not stand at all. Bifang supported himself against the wall and began to slide down faster.
The depth of this slide was beyond everyone's expectations. The slope became steeper and steeper, and finally became an almost 90-degree vertical drop. If the passage had not been narrow enough for Bifang to support himself with his legs, he would have almost fallen.
“Crash!”
A dull sound echoed in the ruins, and a large amount of fine sand fell along with a figure, dripping and bouncing non-stop.
In the darkness, Bifang holding a torch fell to the ground, and a large amount of dust was raised, obscuring the vision for a moment.
【Here it comes】
【High Energy Ahead】
[Finally got in, this is too narrow, if it wasn't slippery, it would definitely be uncomfortable to get in. ]
【The King of Dirty Talk】
[It’s so dark]
"Finally got in."
Bifang, wearing a gas mask, slowly stood up from the ground. He was not choked by the smoke and dust. He patted the sand off his shoulders, then took off his shoes and poured out all the sand.
"I was really shocked just now. I didn't expect the ruins to be so deep."
Bifang raised the torch above his head and could still see the dark corridor. After a short descent, he went more than 20 meters underground.
"The Sahara Desert is mainly composed of rocky dunes and sandy land. Many dunes are over 180 meters high. The average height is about 150 meters, and the highest is even over 300 meters. Although it is not as deep as the sea, this depth is enough to submerge a city."
Holding a torch, walking in the deep ruins.
More than 20 meters underground, there is no light source except for the torches in hand. It is pitch black all around, enough to make any normal person fall into claustrophobia.
[Oh my god, I can’t handle this environment]
[Every time I see someone holding a torch in the darkness, I would rather not have the torch. It becomes the only light in the darkness, which is particularly eye-catching and makes me feel even more terrified]
[Plus one, just like moths to a flame, creatures in the shadows love light the most (dog head)]
“Tick-tock.”
The sound of falling water drops was magnified countless times in the silent environment.
Bifang walked forward following the sound, touched the wall beside him, and felt the wetness on his fingertips.
There is a thick vapor in this ruins.
Rubbing the wet gravel on his fingertips, Bifang explained.
"It is very difficult to get water in the Sahara. If you don't find the right location, you won't find water even if you dig for dozens of meters."
"But we are now quite close to the Nile."
"Geologists had studied wind-blown sediments, deposits from flowing water, and then with the help of aircraft radar they were able to see images of the bedrock near the Nile."
"Using data from the Shuttle Topographic Survey and ground samples, geologists estimate that the Nile once flooded Egypt's Kisaba Depression, forming a 42,000 square kilometer giant lake that later became an ancient river channel buried underground."
"These ancient channels were regularly activated as river systems during warming cycles, and recent algorithmic analysis shows that they ended about 6,500 years ago and are still going underground today."
"The research team at the time also conducted further investigations and estimated that the river extends more than 520 kilometers under the desert."
"So it may be related to a larger ancient river system called the Tamanrasset Valley."
"But it's not certain. It may not be an underground water system, but the Nile River has infiltrated here."
After falling from the ground, the corridor became much wider, completely wide enough for people to walk upright, and the top could be touched with just a hand.
The width is about one meter, which makes it difficult for two people to pass through at the same time, but for Bifang alone, this size is more than enough.
After walking about twenty meters, a corner appeared in front of us.
“There is no fork in the road.”
Bifang seemed to be thinking about something.
“This should be a ‘mastaba’”
【Master Eight? 】
【What is this? 】
[Tell me quickly, has Master Fang discovered anything? ]
Bifang held the torch close to the wall of the corridor, which was made of mud and stones and covered with strange and bizarre patterns.
In the dark environment, it looks particularly strange.
"'Mastaba' is a transliteration of Arabic, meaning a stone bench, which was originally used as a form of residential housing in ancient Egypt and later as a burial form for nobles before the Old Kingdom of Egypt."
"When the pyramids appeared later, this form of tomb became the burial place of common people. Of course, when we say common people, those who can afford to build this kind of tomb must be at least rich people."
[Before the Pyramids?]
[I thought the pyramids had existed since ancient times]
"Do you think the pyramids were born? They are just an evolution. The original foundation is the mastaba, which is like a pyramid without the top, only the base."
The earliest Egyptian tombs were mostly built with mud and stone, in the shape of a trapezoidal hexahedron, divided into two parts: an underground tomb and an above-ground sacrificial hall.
There are usually many burial chambers in a tomb, which are used not only to place the body of the deceased, but also the bodies of the companions.
In addition, there are tombs for storing food, utensils and clothes. After entering the Old Kingdom, the king began to use pyramids to replace mastaba as a form of burial, and the earliest pyramids evolved from mastaba.
"Archaeological excavations have revealed a well-preserved mastaba built during the First Dynasty. The core part is a rectangular pit located under the surface. The pit is divided into five small rooms, and the large room in the middle is used to store the dead."
"The four adjacent small rooms are used to store the deceased's belongings. Above the pit, nine rows of three vertical small compartments were built with mud bricks, and then covered with sand on the outermost layer."
"Look, we just turned two corners and surrounded a small house."
Bifang continued walking forward and came to the third intersection. He continued walking forward and happened to see a handful of arrow-shaped gravel that had been left on the ground.
Fearing the destruction of the ruins, Bifang did not carve anything on the wall as a mark. Instead, he put a handful of sand in a bag and sprinkled an arrow at the necessary key locations.
When the audience saw the arrow on the ground, they suddenly understood.
It seems that Bifang had indeed made a circle just now, and this should be the small room.
"If it were a pyramid, there wouldn't be . Instead, there would only be a few tombs followed by straight passages. It would be impossible to build small rooms inside."
"However, a room is this big. The person buried here must be an important person."
Now that he knew where this place was, Bifang was no longer so nervous and began to carefully observe the paintings on the wall.
“Anyone who knows a little about ancient Egypt must know what the ancient Egyptians believed in.”
"They believe that after a person dies, if the body of the soul is preserved and does not decay, it will be resurrected and live forever in another world three thousand years later."
"So starting in the Predynastic Period and continuing into the later dynasties, the Egyptians worked to develop better and more sophisticated methods of burying the body, with the primary purpose of burying the dead being to protect the body from outside harm."
"The earliest method of burying the body by the ancient Egyptians was to dig a simple pit in the sand and place the body in the tomb along with personal belongings or items that would be useful in the afterlife."
"The bodies were naturally preserved due to contact with the dry desert, but were still potentially endangered by several factors."
“Hence, the mastaba came into being to protect the human body from wild animals and would-be robbers.”
"But the mastaba did not naturally preserve the body as well as the sand did, which led the Egyptians to develop the mummification ."
The early pharaohs of Upper Egypt were buried in the Abydos King's Tombs, which were originally underground chambers made of mud bricks, with roofs made of closely packed tree trunks and floors and walls covered with wooden boards.
Later, it developed into using stone as finishing and paving, and a small room for storing tributes was added next to the east side of the tomb structure.
The tomb mound is a sand dune surrounded by a wall. The tombs of family members and dignitaries are arranged on the outer layer of the surrounding low walls, forming an early mastaba tomb.
Bifang walked in the corridor, looking at the scale of this mastaba.
"With such a large scale, it must not be early, and it should be quite close to the era when pyramids were used as tombs."
"This twilight snow structure may have come from Mesopotamian ideas, as this civilization was constructing similar buildings and structures at the same time."
[Awesome, Master Fang really has a comprehensive knowledge of both ancient and modern times!!]
[Write a book, Fang Shen, I think you can do it]
【Want to see】
【Want to see plus one】
[Wait, since it’s a tomb, then there must be a lot of burial objects (dog heads)]
[Fuck, doesn't that mean I'm getting rich? ]
[God Fang also dug out a golden mask! ]
Hearing that there might be treasure, many viewers immediately became excited and urged Bifang to go and look for it.
Bifang was speechless.
"Even if I find it, it won't belong to me. I'm not a robber."
