WORLD'S MOST IMPRESSIVE ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITES

                                                    GREAT PYRAMID OF GIZA






THE GREAT PYRAMID OF GIZA IS THE OLDEST AND LARGEST OF THE THREE PYRAMIDS IN THE GIZA PYRAMID COMPLEX BORDERING WHICH IS NOW EI GIZA,EGYPT.

EGYPTOLOGISTS BELIEVE THE PYRAMID WAS BUILT AS A TOMB FOR THE FOURTH DYNASTY EGYPTIAN PAHARAOH KHUFU.THEY TOOK ALMOST 20 YEARS FOR THE CONSTRUCTION.
IT WAS ORIGINALLY 146.5 METERS TALL BUT WITH EROSION IT'S PRESENT HEIGHT IS 138.8 METERS.EACH BASE SIDE WAS 230.4 METERS LONG.
THE ESTIMATED MASS OF THE PYRAMID IS 5.9 MILLION TONES.THE VOLUME,INCLUDING AN INTERNAL HILLOCK IS ROUGHLY 2500000 CUBIC METERS.
BASED ON THESE ESTIMATES,BUILDING THE PYRAMID  IN 20 YEARS WOULD INVOLVE  INSTALLING APPROXIMATELY  800 TONES OF STONES EVERYDAY.
ADDITIONALLY,SINCE IT CONSISTS OF AN ESTIMATED 2.3 MILLION BLOCKS,COMPLETING THE BUILDING IN 20 YEARS WOULD INVOLVE MOVING AN AVERAGE OF MORE THAN 12 OF THE BLOCKS  INTO PLACE EACH HOUR,DAY AND NIGHT.
THE PYRAMID REMAINED THE TALLEST MAN MADE STRUCTURE IN THE WORLD FOR OVER 3800 YEARS.
THE ACCURACY OF THE PYRAMIDS WORKMANSHIP IS SUCH  THAT THE FOUR SIDES OF THE BASE HAVE AN AVERAGE ERROR OF ONLY 58 MM IN LENGTH.






                                                                TEOTIHUACAN

Located in the Valley of Mexico, Teotihuacán was the capital of the Toltec civilization, which flourished from 300 B.C.E. to about A.D. 1000. Teotihuacán was the largest pre-Columbian city in the Americas and could have housed as many as a quarter million inhabitants. The major monuments of this area are the Pyramid of the Sun and the Pyramid of the Moon. According to ancient Mexican legend, the Pyramid of the Sun marks the place where time began. Bisecting the site, the Avenue of the Dead, labeled as such by Spanish conquerors who thought the buildings were tombs, is flanked with flat-topped temples, perhaps the most prominent of which is the Temple of the Feathered Serpent, where in recent years numerous human bones have been discovered. Some scientists think these bones represent of a mass human sacrifice, whose purpose was to consecrate the temple. One popular theory likens this ancient metropolis to a kind of model of the solar system. (For more information regarding this theory check out Graham Hancock’s book Fingerprints of the Gods.)
In 2009, a team of scientists placed a muon detector in a tunnel beneath the Pyramid of the Sun, hoping to discover hidden chambers in the monument. Muons, essentially cosmic ray remnants from deep space, can penetrate solid mass, though the denser the mass the more particles are blocked, providing images of rarefactions for investigators. (For more information about this high-tech investigative tool, see the September/October 2008 issue of Archaeology magazine.)

                                                                 STONEHENGE

Stonehenge is as old as the Pyramids of Egypt and perhaps just as enigmatic. Nobody knows for sure how or why it was built. One of many so-called “henges” found throughout the United Kingdom, current theory posits that Stonehenge could have been a ceremonial center linked to others in the region, particularly the nearby Woodhenge. (See the June 2008 issue of National Geographic.) For many years scientists have theorized that Stonehenge was an astronomical observatory or calendar, because of stone alignments with the winter and summer solstices. It also could have been a burial ground, as human bones have been found in the area. Some experts think these could be the remains of sacrificial victims.

PETRA

Petra, the so-called rose-red city was built by the Nabataeans about the time of the birth of Christ. Carved from the native red sandstone, the city is a marvel of the ancient world, particularly when one realizes that it was built in the inhospitable Jordanian desert. In fact, without the construction of numerous cisterns, the city would have been impossible to maintain. Perhaps the most arresting portion of the site is the so-called Treasury of Pharaoh at the main entrance to Petra. (This entrance was used in a scene for the movie Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.) The portal to this entrance seems to beckon one into a mysterious, perhaps dangerous world, into which one should think twice before entering!

Another amazing area of Petra is the royal tombs, also carved into a cliff face, the architecture of which is an equivalent of seventeenth-century baroque. Interestingly, the Romans were the last “civilized” people to occupy Petra. Once the spice trade, which traveled through the area, became diverted by maritime routes, Petra was slowly abandoned to the shepherds and, of course, eventually, the tourists. If you’re planning on being one of those tourists, you better hurry. An article in the July/August 2009 issue of Archaeology says that water is destroying the monuments by carrying salt to them (salt is very destructive to monuments) and also leeching minerals from the rock used in their construction. Also, local developers, hoping to make profits from the site, have damaged many of the buildings during the construction of septic tanks, roads and hotels.