The ancient Egyptians were an incredibly advanced culture in terms of art, architecture, and science. They were light years ahead of most other cultures, and even modern day historians struggle to understand where their knowledge came from. This video showcases some of the incredible ancient Egyptian discoveries that historians and scientists are still trying to rationalize.
The Temple of Amenhotep III on the West Bank of Luxor is an enormous sight spanning almost four million square feet, and it was there that 27 ancient regal statues of Sekhmet, the lion-faced ancient Egyptian goddess of war, were discovered.
Each statue is crafted from black granite, a difficult material to work with, and yet they have survived for thousands of years. Most of the sculptures are over six feet tall, and some show the goddess sitting on a throne holding the Egyptian symbol of life in her left hand. The temple was mostly destroyed by an earthquake about 3,200 years ago, and there is still much excavation work to be done, so more statues and artifacts may yet be unearthed.
The Great Pyramid of Giza is one of the most famous ancient Egyptian structures, but we still don’t know how it was built or what’s inside it. In 2017, a team of scientists identified an enormous hidden chamber inside the pyramid that is large enough to stash an entire Boeing 747. This is the first significant discovery about the pyramid’s interior since the 19th century.
The chamber is directly above the grand gallery and positioned at the same angle, but it doesn’t appear to be connected to any tunnels or other points of entry.
There may be something inside the void that was deliberately walled up when the structure was built some 4,500 years ago, but it’s impossible to find out without breaking into it. The Egyptian government has thus far refused to allow it to happen.
The Dendera Relief, located below the Temple of Hathor in Dendera, is one of the most intriguing ancient Egyptian discoveries. The enormous objects held aloft by the human figures in these carvings really do look like giant light poles, and some believe this is evidence that the Egyptians had access to higher forms of technology.
However, to Egyptologists, the carvings represent serpents being carried on lotus leaves. One of the most remarkable ancient Egyptian discoveries outside of Egypt is that of a 10-foot-long mummified crocodile in the National Museum of Antiquities in Leiden, Netherlands. Within the crocodile, the ancient Egyptians stuffed the equally mummified remains of 47 baby crocodiles. The workers at the museum were not aware of the presence of the baby crocodiles until 2016, when the crocodile was scanned with modern 3D imaging technology as part of an ongoing project.
Finally, the site of Nabta Playa in Egypt contains an incredible and mysterious stone circle that is even older and more complex than Stonehenge in England. When the stones were fixed into place 7,500 years ago, the area contained a lake and grasslands providing tribes somewhere to feed their cows and settle for a while. It was likely these early settlers who put the stone circle together, and it remains one of the oldest known archaeoastronomical sites in the world.
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