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What are the interesting facts about the Pyramids of Giza?

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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How the name ‘Eskimo’ originated?

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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Why the Polynesians build their huts?

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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Do you know how the Pygmies set their traps?

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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How the first human communities were formed?

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 did man learned to cook his food?

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.

 

Picture Credit : Google