My Science School

The Great Pyramid of Giza, located on the bank of River Nile in Egypt is one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Relics of Egypt's Old Kingdom era, they were constructed nearly 4,500 years ago. Egyptian pharaohs (kings) erected temples and giant tombs for themselves to sustain them in their afterlife. These tombs that we know as pyramids were filled with all the things the pharaohs would need in their afterlife, including gold, boats to carry them. and small tombs for the officials and relatives they would like to accompany them. Today, the Great Pyramid is the oldest and the only remaining ancient wonder of the world.

1. The three pyramids

The Giza pyramid complex has three pyramids. The first pyramid, known as the Great Pyramid of Khufu, was built by Pharaoh Khufu. It is the tallest among the three and was built around 2550 BC. It stands at 481 feet above the plateau.

The second pyramid was built by Khufu's son, Pharaoh Khafre in 2520 BC. Khafre also built the Sphinx, a mysterious limestone monument of a lion with a pharaoh's face.

The third pyramid, which is the smallest of the three, was built by Pharaoh Menkaure, son of Khafre, in 2490 BC.

2. The weight of the Great Pyramid

The Great Pyramid of Khufu took nearly 20 years to build. The massive structure required 2.5 million limestone and granite blocks to build. While some of the limestone blocks were quarried from near the site. the larger granite stones were fetched from Aswan, nearly 800 km away. Each stone block on average weighed 2.5 tonnes. The pyramid was built by skilled Egyptian workers who lived in a temporary city close by. When it was completed, the Great Pyramid was the tallest structure in the world. It retained the title for nearly 3,800 years, when it was finally overtaken by the Lincoln Cathedral in the 1300s. Experts estimate that the Great Pyramid would cost over 1 billion dollars if it were to be built today.

3. Aligned to the stars

The three pyramids of the Giza necropolis are built in such a way that they are perfectly aligned with the Orion constellation.

4. The monument of Glorious Light

In its initial years, the Great Pyramid was covered in highly polished limestone blocks known as casing stones. These stones reflected the Sun's light so well that the people of ancient Egypt used to call the Great Pyramid Ikhet, meaning GloriouS Light. The casing stones are now gone. It is suspected that massive earthquakes loosened the stones and they were taken away to build mosques in Cairo.

5. Depicting life in ancient Egypt

The interiors of the Pyramids of Giza are decorator with scenes from every aspect of life in ancient Egypt. The art includes depictions of carpentry, costumes, ancient farmers working in their fields, fishing, religious rituals and burial practices among others. The pyramids also contain inscriptions and texts that allow experts to research ancient Egyptian language and grammar.

 

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It is a misunderstanding that humans evolved from chimpanzees, we do share a common ancestor, though. And, sharing a common ancestor means sharing a lot of traits too. Come, let's find out more about these similarities and how they helped debunk a certain myth.

A common ancestor

Chimpanzees and humans are primates, and as mentioned earlier, share a common ancestor. One group of this ancestor evolved to become modern chimpanzees (a great ape) while another evolved to become early humans, finally leading to Homo sapiens modem humans. Which perhaps explains why chimpanzees are our closest relatives today. It is said that chimpanzees share about 99% of our DNA. For humans, this is a percentage much higher than what we share with other great apes or even other primates such as monkeys.

Many similarities

The most significant contributions towards establishing the similarities between chimps and humans, and debunking the myth that certain traits were uniquely human came from pioneering English primatologist and anthropologist Jane Goodall.

Having spent most part of her f adult life studying chimpanzees in the wild, she noticed a chimp using a twig to fish out termites from a nest. This was about six decades ago, when it was commonly accepted that only humans could create and use tools.

When the primatologist informed her boss back then about what she had seen, he's believed to have famously joked:

"Now we must redefine man redefine tools, or accept chimpanzees as humans." Trailblazing Jane Goodall made a few other "epic discoveries" too that highlight the similarities between chimps and humans. These are hunting: engaging in war against rival groups" and killing "members of their own species"; strong bonds between mothers and young ones, and among siblings and compassion - as first witnessed when one chimp comforted a mourning chimp, and through the adoption of an orphaned chimp.

 

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Alexander III of Macedonia was a mighty soldier whose ambition was to conquer the entire world and rule it. In the summer of 327 B.C. he led his army on a campaign towards Asia, entering lands that none had previously dared to visit. He crossed the river Indus, entering the vast territory of India.

Alexander and his soldiers conquered every army that tried to stop them. He finally reached the Thar desert, a huge, unexplored and mysterious place that lay along what is now the border between India and Pakistan. Alexander was only twenty-nine years old and he wanted to march on eastwards on his great road to conquest. But his soldiers were tired and refused to go further in the tropical rain. Alexander agreed to go back and returned to his homeland. Because of his magnificent exploits he became known as Alexander the Great.   

 

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In recent years archaeologists have found several fossilized skulls of man-like creatures known as hominids. These remains have been found in East Africa and indicate that this might have been the cradle of the human race.

We know that we may all have descended from an ape like hominid known as Australopithecus who walked in an almost erect position. Australopithecus was followed by Homo habilis who was able to make a few simple tools from stone. Next came Homo erectus, meaning ‘the man who stands up straight’, and from him there developed Homo sapiens, a more intelligent development of the human race.

The main difference between these categories was the size of the brain: a capacity of 500 cubic centimetres for Australopithecus and of 1, 500 for Homo sapiens.

But in 1972 the British anthropologist Richard Leakey found a skull in Kenya that belonged to a hominid with a brain capacity of 800 cubic centimetres. Leakey estimated the age of the skull as 2,600,000 years. This meant the owner of the skull lived about a million years before Homo habilis and had a bigger brain. Leakey’s discovery set off new studies into the origin of man.

 

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The broad band of dense forests that cover the equatorial zone of Africa are scattered here and there by clearings where small tribes of pygmies live. The pygmies are the smallest people in the world and are descended from an ancient race that once inhabited Africa. Today the pygmies live much as they have always done for thousands of years and still have very primitive conditions. They are afraid of the white man and try to remain isolated from the rest of the world. Occasionally they visit Bantu villages on the edge of the forests to the animals they have caught for tools and arrowheads.

Many scientists believe the pygmies are descended from an ancient human stock that was once widespread throughout Africa. Pygmies are now confined to the forests but there is proof that at one time they loved over a wider region. For example, Homer once described the terrifying battle between dwarf men and cranes, and Herodotus said the pygmies lived in the Libyan desert and were driven south by other invading peoples. Aristotle, too, referred to pygmies as inhabitants of the marshy regions round the source of the river Nile.

There were pygmies at the court of the pharaohs of Egypt where they proved to be skilful dancers and jugglers. Egyptian records show that 4,500 years ago pygmies were inhabiting some of the areas they still occupy today. Apart from these people who are now reduced to living in very difficult conditions in the forests.

 

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According to the latest students the first human beings appears to have come to America about 20,000 years ago. This was during one of the great Ice Ages that affected the Earth during the Quaternary Era of its history. At that time enormous glaciers joined Asia and North America, forming a natural bridge between the two continents across the Bering Strait. It was over this bridge that waves of Asiatic people of mongoloid stock passed, pushing on farther to the south as time went on.

Little by little these peoples grew accustomed to their new surroundings and their descendants completed the occupation of the entire American continent, reaching its southernmost tip at what is now Tierra del Fuego. The descendants of those ancient peoples still live in that region.

 

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The name ‘Eskimo’ comes from the language of the northern Red Indians and means ‘a person who eats raw meat’. It is an appropriate name because the Eskimos live mainly by hunting and fishing and in winter do not always cook the animals they catch.

This is because it is impossible to find any fuel for a fire in the icy waste that they inhabit. The only form of fire they have is produced by burning the oil of seals or whales in shallow, saucer-shaped lamps, made from pottery or stone. These lamps are used primarily to give light but the Eskimos can also boil their meat and fish over them. These foods are also frozen or dried.

There is another reason why the Eskimos sometimes eat raw meat: in this way they get the greatest possible nourishment. The Eskimos make up for the lack of vitamins from vegetables by eating the kidneys and liver of their prey raw. These organs have an abundant store of all the vitamins needed by the human body.

 

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In Polynesia the construction of a house is accompanied by a ceremony that combines politics with religion. The building contract has to be drawn up with the tafugas, a guild of skilled craftmen regarded as the guardians of the art of the god Tangaroa.

Once the Contract has been agreed the whole village celebrates the erection of the main pole. This part of the house symbolizes the link between the world of mankind and that of the gods. The rafters of the house are fixed to the main pole and to the poles that form the outer sections of the house. The dome-shaped roof is then placed on this framework.

Polynesians use no precision instruments and do all the building by eye. Their accuracy is amazing. Every house has an individual design reflecting the tafugas who   built it. When the house is finished the tafugas put his own special mark on the timber and the end of the job is celebrated by feasting.

 

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The Pygmies who live in the dense forests of equatorial Africa are the smallest people on earth. A fully grown Pygmy man never grows to more than about 1.35 metres. The forests provide their basic needs of food, water, firewood and clothing. Their huts are made by covering a beehive shaped frame with leaves. They live in a camp for about a month and then abandon it and move on.

Pygmies are a very tough people and they are more than a match for even large animals. They make the best jungle explorers, beaters and hunters of Africa and their profound knowledge of the ways of all the animals they hunt enables them to make very clever traps to catch them.

Around their villages and in the forest the Pygmies dig deep pits in the ground. They cover the pits with twigs and branches and then with a layer of green leaves. They next place some dead leaves, moss, trufs and even termite hills to make the spot look like solid ground.

Only the Pygmy can recognise these almost invisible traps: even a cunning animal like the leopard fails to see them. The big animals of the forest are often the victims of these traps. These include elephants, buffaloes and hippopotamuses which the Pygmies could not hope to catch by any other method. As soon as an animal falls into the trap the Pygmies rush up and kill it with their spears. The meat of the animal is shared out and eaten immediately.

 

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When the great ice sheets that covered much of the land began to retreat northwards and the climate became warmer, man was able to come out of his cave dwellings and build huts above the ground. As the ice melted it gave rise to streams and rivers. There were also new lakes to be explored. All these waters were teeming with animal life such as fish and fowl which provided a ready supply of food.

Once the ice had gone, dense forests of willow and birch sprang up. Thousands of different kinds of birds lived in the branches and they were an easy target for man to shoot down with his bow and arrow. There was a whole new world to explore.

Man becomes a woodsman, a fisherman and a wildfowler. This new life had a great influence on social relationships between people. To get the best results possible from hunting and other forms of human activity, people came together in groups and formed the first tribes. These communities then became larger as life grew more complex. It became evident that people had to live and work together as a group to carry out all the operations necessary for living.

The basic nucleus of this community was the family. There was never a lack of work for the various members of the tribe. There were trees to be felled, huts to be built or repaired, fishing nets to be made from cords obtained from dried plant fibres. The work of women was more concerned with the home. They made rugs out of tree-bark to make their homes more comfortable; they made clothes of skin, sewn with bone needles; they cleaned and gutted the fish the men caught in abundance and dried it in the Sun; they cooked meals, gathered the fruits of the earth and prepared food stores for the winter.

 

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When man discovered fire he acquired a mighty new weapon for he could defend himself better against animals which were terrified of this strange light that gave off heat. Man was also able to fight against the cold, light up the darkness and cook his food.

Man had always known that animals were afraid of fire, much more afraid than he was. He deducted from this that he could defend himself from even the fiercest beasts with fire. So he began to put burning torches at the entrance to his cave dwelling. These torches were kept burning throughout the night.

Until that time man had fed on raw meat. He probably first tasted cooked meat when a forest fire had trapped animals and burned them to death. He then learned that meat cooked by fire was more tender and manageable to eat as well as being tastier and easier to digest. In this way cooking by fire gradually spread from tribe to tribe.

 

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When primitive man came to know grain he valued it greatly because it could be kept even during winter, when food was usually scarce. But those little hard grains were no good to young children or to old people without teeth. Some mother, perhaps, thought she would try and mash them up into softer form to give to her baby. In this way she produced a rough sort of flour and discovered how to grind flour from grain.

The woman used barley or wheat flour to make small pancakes which they dried in the sun. They then learned how to place which they dried in the sun. They then learned how to place pancakes on top of hot stones or in the embers of a fire. They discovered that the dough was much nicer to eat when it had been toasted and this was how bread was born. The men who went hunting by now were taking along these rough pieces of bread with them.

The first good pictures of primitive baking come from the tombs of the ancient Egyptians. They show all stages of bread-making, from the removal of grain from the granary, the grinding on stones and subsequent sifting, to the mixing and kneading of the dough and the baking of the bread in large pots.

Man also learned to till the soil better: he sowed wheat and cultivated it carefully. Later man learned to prepare the soil with a plough pulled by animals instead of scratching it with a stick, and so the grain grew even better.

 

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In the social and political life of ancient Rome no important action was taken unless the gods were first consulted. War was not declared, a building was not opened nor a magistrate appointed unless certain sacrifices had first been offered to the gods and the gods had found these acceptable.

Rome had numerous temples, many of them near the Forum, and the link between ordinary life and religion was very close. Temples sometimes acted as government offices to keep money in: in the temple of Satum the public treasury was stored together with documents and war regalia.

Other famous Roman temples included that of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, of Vesta, Juno, Castor and Pollux, Venus, Janus and the Pantheon, the temple dedicated to all the gods.

 

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The people of Mesopotamia, that is the Sumerians, Babylonians and Assyrians, created a system of writing that was quite different from that used in Egypt. The difference was because the people of Mesopotamia used clay to write on instead of papyrus as in Egypt.

It is difficult to make curved lines on clay with a stylus so the Mesopotamians invented a handwriting based on straight lines that resembled nails or wedges. For this reason, their handwriting was known as ‘cuneiform’, a word meaning ‘wedge-shaped’. Cuneiform was later used on other materials, such as stone or metal. This writing was ideographic, as in Egypt and used pictures instead of words.

 

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We know exactly all the 282 laws in which King Hammurabi included the entire legal traditions of his day because they were found on a stele (stone slab) discovered at Susa in 1901 and now preserved in the Louvre Museum in Paris. The laws were written on the slab in a writing known as cuneiform. The slab also has a fine piece of sculpture depicting Samas, the god of justice, looking into the eyes of king Hammurabi as if to inspire him.

Babylonian society was divided into three distinct classes: the patricians, the plebeians, and the slaves. Justice depended on the class to which a person belonged. For example, an article in Hammurabi’s legal code said: ‘If a patrician, one of his eyes also shall be taken. If he breaks the bone of another patrician, one of his bones too shall be broken.’

If, however, the person hurt was a plebeian, matters were different. The law said: ‘If a patrician takes the eye or breaks a bone of a plebeian, he will pay a mine of silver.’ Of course, the penalty was smaller if a slave was involved. These laws seem very unfair to us today but the penalties inflicted are midway between the brutality of the Assyrian laws and the comparative lenience of the Hittites. We must remember that in the social conditions of Hammurabi’s day such laws were needed to curb the vices and passions of the Babylonians.

Hammurabi died but his dynasty, or family, continued to rule for another 150 years although it never reached the same peak of glory as it had in his day.

 

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