The Secret of the Great Pyramid: How One Man's Obsession Led to the Solution of Ancient Egypt's Greatest Mystery [Hardcover]

Bob Brier (Author), Jean-Pierre Houdin (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 14, 2008

Nine years ago, French architect Jean-Pierre Houdin became obsessed by the centuries-old mystery of how the Great Pyramid was built. For ten hours a day, he labored at his computer to create exquisitely detailed 3-D models of the interior of the Great Pyramid. After five years of effort, the images rotating on his computer screen provided evidence of an astonishing secret. Corkscrewing up the inside of the Great Pyramid is a mile-long ramp, unseen for 4,500 years. The pyramid was built from the inside. This revelation casts a fresh light on the minds that conceived one of the wonders of the ancient world.

The Secret of the Great Pyramid moves between the ancient and the modern. The ancient story chronicles, step-by-step, how a nation of farmers only recently emerged from the Stone Age could construct one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. To execute something as complex and massive as the Great Pyramid, Egypt needed architects, mathematicians, boat builders, stone masons, and metallurgists. It took twenty years to build the Great Pyramid. By the time its capstone was laid in 2560 B.C., the innovations born of the building quest had transformed agrarian Egypt into the world's most modern, most powerful nation.

As we follow the progress of Hemienu, the innovative architect who planned, organized, and oversaw construction of the Great Pyramid, we also follow Houdin working to discover how and why the ancient architect designed the Pyramid as he did. Houdin works as a forensic architect, aiming to reconstruct the lessons Hemienu had learned from construction of three previous pyramids and to visualize his blueprint for the massive stone building. In the process, Houdin also discovers the answers to other questions that have bedeviled Egyptologists for centuries: such as what was the purpose of the mysterious Grand Gallery and when did the Pyramid crack? Along the way, Houdin receives the support of a pathbreaking French software company, which helps him validate his theory virtually—a first in archaeology!

The story of genius and obsession in the ancient and modern world, this archaeological mystery will appeal to anyone who has ever been captivated by this magnificent edifice.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Since its construction 4,500 years ago for Pharaoh Khufu, the Great Pyramid of Giza has remained an engineering mystery. According to Egyptologist Brier (The Murder of Tutankhamen) and architect Houdin, the monument was designed by Khufu's brother Hemienu, an architectural genius, and built in two decades by 25,000 paid Egyptian construction workers. Having studied the structure minutely and using computer graphics to visualize every aspect of the pyramid and its construction, Houdin offers a radical proposal of how the huge limestone and granite blocks were raised: the pyramid was built from the inside out around a mile-long ramp corkscrewed up to the top, which remains in the pyramid's walls. The authors' prose is lucid, aided by drawings and photos, and the theories are intriguing but inconclusive until permission can be obtained from Egyptian authorities to thermally photograph the pyramid and determine its internal structure. The highly technical nature of some of the architectural and engineering material makes this book more suitable for experts in archeology and architecture than for buffs. (Oct.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

A specialist on Egyptian mummies, Brier relates that he receives many a missive purporting to have solved the mystery of the Great Pyramid’s construction. In one day’s e-mail, a plausible idea caught his fancy. Unlike theories that aliens lent Egyptians a helping hand, this message dwelt on the central engineering problem concerning the type of ramp the tomb’s architect used. Brier’s communication came from coauthor Houdin, a French architect who devoted years to studying the problem. Rather than immediately bowl readers over with Houdin’s proposal, Brier cleverly entices them by alternating Houdin’s quest with the trial-and-error development of pharaonic pyramids. Photos and computer-generated graphics illustrate the authors’ explanation of designs and building processes, in the course of which they describe defects in the theories that the ramp was a mile-long straightaway or an external corkscrew. Houdin adopted an inspiration of his father’s, that the ramp was indeed a corkscrew, but one that rested inside the pyramid. His search for supporting evidence, culminating in a public presentation of his theory in 2007, fills out a book to fascinate pyramid fans. --Gilbert Taylor

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Smithsonian (October 14, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 006165552X
• ISBN-13: 978-0061655524
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #714,551 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

33 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars More than one mystery, October 18, 2008

By 

Friederike Knabe (Ottawa, Ontario Canada) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Secret of the Great Pyramid: How One Man's Obsession Led to the Solution of Ancient Egypt's Greatest Mystery (Hardcover)

Anybody visiting the Great Pyramid in Giza has been in awe at the architectural genius that its construction exhibits - four and a half thousand years ago. The mystery of its structure has been occupying Egyptologists, architects and engineers for a long time. How was it possible to build the pyramid as high as it was and as precise? Could an outer ramp have been used to move the huge stone blocks into position or was there a hidden inner ramp? And what was the real purpose of some of chambers, in particular the commonly named "Great Hall"? Despite many theories, expertly summarized by Bob Brier, nobody has been able to prove any of them. Brier, a renowned Egyptologist himself, follows Jean-Pierre Houdin, an architect, on his nine-year absorbing quest to establish proof of his father's ground-breaking theory of the building's construction and the indisputable brilliance of the pyramid's architect, Hemienu.

Brier takes the reader through the history of pyramid building, interleafing it with the story of the Houdins' intricate search to find the evidence that was needed to convince the expert community of the validity of their theory. The author applies a fluid and conversational tone to the narrative making it easy for the reader to follow his information-rich and well-sourced account, without overloading us with too many technicalities and details. The reader is literally taken by the hand and walked through the building process of the Great Pyramid, one layer at a time, from the planning, design, and quarrying the stones, to the administrative challenges the search for the right locality and positioning and finally the actual construction. The illustrations further facilitate understanding and appreciation. [Friederike Knabe]

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An interesting theory on the construction of the Great Pyramid, November 22, 2008

By 

Robert C. Ross (New Jersey) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Secret of the Great Pyramid: How One Man's Obsession Led to the Solution of Ancient Egypt's Greatest Mystery (Hardcover)

People have puzzled about how Kheops's Pyramid was built for centuries. The long ramp theory seems intuitively correct but no remains of the ramp have been found. Herodotus wrote that a complex series of wooden machines lifted blocks up the sides of the pyramid; archeologists doubt that there was enough wood in ancient Egypt to do so. The spiral ramp theory posited a ramp built along the outer faces of the pyramid; again, there is no evidence of such a ramp and it would have blocked lines of sight for the builders to insure accurate measurements.

But perhaps the pyramid was built "inside out"?

-- An outside ramp made from smaller blocks was used to build the first 43 meters of the pyramid.

-- An internal spiral ramp made from those blocks ran behind the faces of the pyramid to complete the construction; and

-- The Great Gallery contained an ingenious system of counterweights to lift the heavy granite ceiling rafters in the King's Funeral Chamber.

This fascinating book tells the story of how this "out of the box" theory was developed:

"On January 2, 1999, while I was once again away in New York, my father, a retired engineer, saw a television programme about the construction of the pyramids presented by François de Closets. With his civil engineer's eye he took a critical look at theories in vogue at that time. He thought they just didn't stand to logic. And then suddenly an idea dawned: what if the pyramids had been built from within - from the inside out as it were? This was a revolutionary concept that swept away all the other hypotheses that had been put forward until then. As an architect with experience in three-dimensional graphics, I was called in to assist him in his research."

I remember a TV special several years ago in which a robot climbed up a shaft within the pyramid, only to discover a door blocking the ramp. Archaeologists have been puzzled by the shafts since they were discovered in 1872. Some believed they were built as vents, others that they were passages for the dead king's soul to ascend to the afterlife. In this theory, they provided space to turn the small blocks around 90 degree corners on the edges of the pyramid.

This book spells out the various efforts to prove the thesis in informal and warm prose, but with excellent technical support. The photographs and drawings help the general reader understand how it may have been done. The first Comment describes some of the online sources which support and challenge the theory. Altogether, this book is a great introduction to ongoing research on this incredible structure.

Robert C. Ross 2008

PS: National Geographic is going to release a television show it carried recently on its channel on this subject; details of the DVD are at Unlocking the Great Pyramid. B.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Construction of the Great Pyramid: Puzzle Solved, August 2, 2009

By 

J. Briley "draco40" (Maui, Hawaii) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Secret of the Great Pyramid: How One Man's Obsession Led to the Solution of Ancient Egypt's Greatest Mystery (Hardcover)

As an amateur Egyptologist I highly recommend this volume. It is easy ready, as Bob Brier is not only a knowledgeable Egyptologist and excellent teacher but a writer who with an easy, almost conversational style. Jean-pierre Houdin, co-writer and the architect/engineer whose tenacity and great ability to "problem solve" all the data, past and current, provides at the very least the most probable explanation as to the construction of the Great Pyramid of Khufu. Other explanations for the construction of the pyramid are legion, from the reasonable supposition that ramps were used and lengthened as the pyramid rose (but would end up requiring ramps miles long), all the way to the ridiculous (space aliens, again.) Brier first gives the history of the pyramids (function, theories of construction, interesting anecdotes) and then leads us step by step down the path to understanding the logic behind Houdin's reasoning, using modern technology, of the use of "inner" ramps to move blocks as the pyramid got higher. The reader will love the explanation of "cornering". Photos, excellent diagrams, and pictures are presented in an orderly fashion that explains this "theory" (no longer a theory to this writer). Especially fascinating is Houdin's explanation of the function of the Grand Gallery leading to Khufu's burial chamber. Those interested in this subject are in for a treat.