Were kites used to build pyramids?

By Dana Bartholomew Staff Writer

A kite soars, someone screams, and a 4-ton obelisk slides across the desert before tipping up and swinging free of planet Earth.

To Reseda businesswoman Maureen Clemmons and her Caltech team of engineers, the 45-second Mojave Desert "flight" last month represents a Kitty Hawk milestone in low-tech aeronautics.

But for Clemmons and her company of amateur Egyptologists, raising the megalith on a light desert breeze solves a far more compelling mystery: how the giant pyramids were built.

"We did this in a 15-mph wind, which is nothing," said the 44-year-old hair care entrepreneur and management consultant, whose Winnetka office is filled with mementos of ancient Egypt.

"Who says temples could not be built using kites? I think these people were masters of their own technology and resources."

Clemmons, who garnered international attention -- and derision -- for lifting a 400-pound concrete obelisk on two nylon kites in Northridge four years ago, means to repeat her 4-ton feat later this month in a public demonstration in Quartz Hill west of Lancaster.

And with the aid of Caltech engineers and bigger and better parafoil-and-pulley systems, the sky's the limit on the size of rocks that can be raised by wind alone, she and the researchers say.

While it once took 900 men and 74 horses to tip up a 340-ton Egyptian obelisk at St. Peter's Basilica in 16th century Rome, Caltech engineers calculate they can raise such a stone with four kites, a 30 mile-per-hour wind and a scaffold of 36 pulleys in all of seven minutes.

"Historically, I think it's very significant," said Mory Gharib, professor of aeronautical engineering at Caltech, who endorsed Clemmon's concept of how ancient stones were moved.

"Egyptologists like to think of extraterrestrials, or slaves only, but not in terms of clever techniques. This shows that ancient technology could have worked, that this kind of technology can be used to solve so-called impossible problems."

Others pooh-pooh Clemmons and her ilk as "pyramidiots."

Scholars generally agree that the Pharaoh's hulking temples, obelisks and more than 70 pyramids -- the largest holding 2.3 million stones of 2.5 tons apiece -- were built on the backs of slaves using ramps and levers.

"The kite project seems like a lot of fun, but it doesn't prove the pyramids were built that way," said Willeke Wendrich, associate professor of Egyptian archeology at UCLA.

"The evidence we have all points at other means," she said. "The trouble is a lot of (amateurs) who do this kind of research get carried away: They don't look at the evidence."

Clemmons, whose work has been featured in Time and by broadcasters around the world, remains undeterred. She even trademarked "pyramidiots" for a series of pocket protectors and T-shirts.

Ever since since the self-styled "backyard scientist" first noticed a picture of a failed attempt by modern Egyptians to heft a 40-ton obelisk by muscle alone, she has seen wind as the power beyond the seas.

"These guys are pulling these ropes trying to get this thing upright, it's swelteringly hot and I remembered my history clear back to the eighth grade that the Egyptians drank beer breakfast, lunch and dinner," said Clemmons, who laughs with raucous gusto.

"There's no way to move rocks when you're drinking that much beer," she said. "Then I heard about the '1,000 winds of Egypt,' and it hit me: They used the wind to move the blocks."

Clemmons, a mother of two who wrote her doctoral dissertation on innovators, now sees evidence for her theory in everything from hieroglyphs to wings etched in ancient tombs to kite-flying stances in classic Egyptian poses.

In addition to pyramid pursuits, the former vice president of Sebastion International juggles her shampoo company, her consulting business and a company founded to raise money for archeological research. She also tends to her husband and two children, ages 8 and 12.

To raise money, Clemmons not only launched a pyramid-shaped perfume called Ala (Latin for "wing,") with sales exceeding $10,000 last year, but dropped $20,000 out-of-pocket on materials including the kite and lines.

She also sees other possibilities for her Caltech team research.

"A lot of Third World countries without a lot of resources don't have bulldozers and heavy equipment," Clemmons said. "Maybe they can use kites for heavy construction."

Others are taking notice.

The Mexican University of del Sol has volunteered students, and a descendent of Inca monument-makers has offered to build bigger and bigger scaffolds and Washington Monument-shaped stones. Plans are in the works to duplicate the experiment using linen, hemp and other materials common to ancient Egypt.

"The beauty of this project is it isn't high tech; it's very down to earth, simple mechanics that appeal to a lot of people," said Emilio Castano Graff, 21, the Caltech student from Brazil who engineered the kite-and-pulley system.

"It's never been done before: Nobody has ever lifted heavy objects like this before. The power that we're getting out of a kite is tremendous."

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-- Anonymous, June 08, 2001

Answers

"Clemmons ... now sees evidence for her theory in everything from hieroglyphs to wings etched in ancient tombs to kite-flying stances in classic Egyptian poses."

Interesting theory.

One of the holes in the ancient monument speculations is that even if there were outside assistance, the basic tools should have inadvertently been left behind on occasion. Some clue, somewhere. I would expect there to be documentation, so the ideal that we have misunderstood the significance of the hieroglyphic images appeals to me.

I spent considerable time researching one of my town's large ponds/small lakes (11 acres). It is associated with a commerical medicinal (springs) resort from the turn of the century. One of our historic and scenic treasures. A great deal has been written about it. The town's definitive history came out not too long after it opened. IOW, the author must have been living in town when it was built. We have always known that it was an "artificial" lake, but nothing anywhere describing what must have been a significant effort at the time to dig it out.

-- Anonymous, June 08, 2001

Brooks, I spent the first 90% of my life trusting in "scientific" explanations for any and all mysteries or questions about so many unusual things. For all that time I figured we humans were alone here and that history on the face of the earth was relatively recent (museum time lines stated this) and therefore everything we saw, such as the Great Pyramid, could be explained in some logical way.

As time went on, I could see that we didn't have answers for so many of these questions. We *should* have had answers since it was all being treated as just some human engineering feat that needed further study. No dice. The further we looked into these things the further the mystery deepened. No single scientific answer got us even close.

Lately, we have heard so much about ETs, structures on Mars, structures on the back side of the moon, according to astronaut statements and some folks who worked with the photographs. *That* would explain it all easily, wouldn't it? But the majority of the public simply doesn't want to, or can't, accept that explanation, so we come up with kites, and rolling logs, and all sorts of ideas to explain how 10 ton, 20 ton, and more, stones were placed so exquisitely in place, without cement. And fitting so perfectly that you can't even push a plastic credit card into the joints in many cases. How could this be, and in some cases from cultures that didn't even have the wheel as one of their tools?

Personally, I think the evidence is in, and the explanation is available. We have only to read, watch, or listen to countless witnesses being presented for over 50 years, such as the recent Dr. Steven Greer press conference. Then, we have only to wonder why and how it has been kept from public awareness for so long?

The quest to answer this last question is where the fun really begins. Everything prior to that was only a physical mystery, but now we have an extraordinary psychological question to deal with, and the answers I have seen to that matter are pretty stunning, and chilling. You will note that (so far) even the US Congress won't touch this item with a ten foot pole. I know the media is corrupted/fearful/self muzzled. Congress too?

-- Anonymous, June 08, 2001

Gordon, what confuses me is why there isn't any, or any more obvious, clue about how monster projects like the pyramids were pulled off. If the Egyptians were solely responsible, I would expect their writing to tell us. (Or perhaps they have and we didn't notice.) If ETs or whatever provided major technical assistance, I would expect them to have inadvertently left a hammer-equivalent behind. As I understand it, no ET-related archaeological dump sites have been discovered. Perhaps there was a primary directive approach, but why leave the results of the superior technology and be so careful not to let us know how they did it?

-- Anonymous, June 08, 2001

They could have been built by using levitation. I have read eyewitness accounts of that very thing being done by Tibetan monks doing that with the aid of sound frequency accomplished by certain musical instruments and chanting. If that is the case, we don't need ETs

-- Anonymous, June 08, 2001

Beebartwo has the answer for you. It has been noted and discussed on various sites. The story of the building of the Coral Castle in the Homestead, Florida area mentions the guy using tonal vibration. But whether we need ETs or not, we got them, as far as I can see. That's just another of the fascinating details that goes with these stories.

I had a good long posting ready to submit in answer to Brooks, but it got glitched into cyberland. When that happens to me, which isn't often, but always seems to involve my making lengthy comments about some particularly sensitive issue, I just take it as a sign that I am not "supposed" to, or allowed to, print such ideas. Who knows what is really lurking behind the scenes, causing our present "reality" to move in a way that is desired by the movers? Remember Y2k?

-- Anonymous, June 08, 2001

Gordon, always look forward to your insights. If it was in reaction to what I was saying, I don't think I have been expressing myself very well.

I keep coming back to something one of my history professors said, that if you want to know if a population was a great civilization, just ask! They'll tell you! I think it had to do with one of the Sumerian rulers. At any rate, I think for such massive public works projects (like my small lake at the time), someone of the age would be bound to boast at all the effort and expertise that went into it.

Do you have any theories for why there aren't any ET (or whatever) archaeology dump sites? Maybe the women ETs were in charge, and did an extra good job of picking up after themselves?

-- Anonymous, June 08, 2001

here's a site that has a unique reason for how and why the pyramids were built
at least...it's not one i had heard until i ran across it a few years ago on the net Pharaoh's Pump btw....thanks firemouse
cool article on the kites


-- Anonymous, June 09, 2001

Mebs,

That's an interesting site you listed. I had never heard that particular theory before, and the diagrams are very well done. However, for me, it has to go down with the kites, rolling logs, and other such "scientific" attempts to explain the Great Pyramid. While this particular theory is a valid attempt, it does nothing to explain the countless other places on earth that pose the same question.

Stonehenge, Easter Island, various sites in Peru that are high in the mountains, even above 10,000 feet for that matter. Or sites on some Pacific Islands that are just barely above sea level. Levitation through tonal vibration seems a better area to search in, even though that doesn't have any serious acceptance from the academic community.

-- Anonymous, June 09, 2001

Brooks,

We just recently had a new roof put on our church and bell tower. The main roof is steeply angled at 45 degrees and presents a challenge to a roofing crew, since it's too steep to walk on like a normal house roof which is usually less than 30 degrees. The small roof on the bell tower spire is 50 above ground and presents an even tougher situation. If you looked at the work the day after it was finished you could never guess how they did it. Hint: they didn't have the men hanging from kites in order to replace the bell tower roof. Further hint: hydraulics was used in a very effective way.

Nothing of the equipment, or residue from the previous roofing (which was stripped to bare wood) remains. Clean as a whistle. A real mystery to the uninformed. That's what I think we are dealing with in regard to the great construction mysteries around the world. They *were* done, and the job was left clean, no hammers, chisels, lasers, whatever, left lying around.

But, there are some clues, facts, and artifacts to be found here and there. Unfortunately, there seems to be a concerted effort from governments/churches/academics to suppress the information. And this has worked. Unless people hear it from an accepted "official" source, they tend to shrug it off as not worth paying attention too, mostly.

Here are two places to start an adventure. They are both valid and have been reported by numerous credentialed/credible professionals.

The Dropa Stones: Link 1

Forbidden Archeology: Link 2

-- Anonymous, June 09, 2001

Gordon, one of the more influential books I have read recently is Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs & Steel". Although he is extremely careful not to say anything that would directly contradict accepted norms for what civilizations did what and when, I think his theories very much support the inability of the earliest accepted civilizations to have produced the monuments assigned to their ages. I was already influenced by Forbidden Archaeology by the time I dove into Diamond.

-- Anonymous, June 09, 2001