Page 276 - Fingerprints of the Gods by Graham Hancock

Graham Hancock – FINGERPRINTS OF THE GODS

Chapter 34

Mansion of Eternity

Have you ever climbed a pyramid, at night, fearful of arrest, with your
nerves in shreds?
It’s a surprisingly difficult thing to do, especially where the Great
Pyramid is concerned. Even though its top 31 feet are no longer intact, its
presently exposed summit platform still stands more than 450 feet above
ground level. It consists, moreover, of 203 separate courses of masonry,
1
with the average course height being about two and a quarter feet.
2
Averages do not tell you everything, as I discovered soon after we
began the climb. The courses turned out to be of unequal depth, some
barely reaching knee level while others came up almost to my chest and
created formidable obstacles. At the same time the horizontal ledges
between each of the steps were very narrow, often only a little wider than
my foot, and many of the big limestone blocks, which had looked so solid
from below, proved to be crumbling and broken.
Somewhere around 30 courses up Santha and I began to appreciate
what we had let ourselves in for. Our muscles were aching and our knees
and fingers stiff and bruised—yet we were barely one-seventh of the way
to the summit and there were still more than 170 courses to climb.
Another worry was the vertiginous drop steadily opening beneath us.
Looking down along the ruptured contours that marked the line of the
southwestern corner, I was taken aback to see how far we had already
climbed and experienced a momentary, giddying presentiment of how
easy it would be for us to fall, head over heels like Jack and Jill, bouncing
and jolting over the huge layers of stone, breaking our crowns at the
bottom.
Ali had permitted a pause of a few moments for us to catch our
breaths, but now he signalled that we should press on and began to
climb again. Still using the corner as a guideline, he rapidly disappeared
into the darkness above.
Somewhat less confidently, Santha and I followed.

Time and motion

The 35th course of masonry was a hard one to clamber over, being made
of particularly massive blocks, much larger than any of the others we had

The Pyramids of Egypt, p. 8.
1
2 Peter Lemesurier, The Great Pyramid: Your Personal Guide, Element Books,
Shaftesbury, 1987, p. 225.

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