Hall of Records

The Hall of Records is an ancient library claimed by Edgar Cayce to have been deposited at the time of Imhotep at Saqqara in Egypt. It has been suggested that the Hall of Records is under the Great Sphinx of Giza, which is in the Giza pyramid complex.[1]

There is no evidence to indicate that the Hall of Records ever existed. In 1998, Zahi Hawass, Chief Director of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, undertook excavations beneath the main body of the Sphinx at Giza and rediscovered access tunnels to several large, apparently natural, caves directly under the Sphinx. No artifacts were found and a survey was undertaken to assess any potential threats in the substrate that might affect the ancient monument above. There was evidence of earlier ancient excavations. Hawass commented in a documentary about the 1998 excavations that he suspected that there could be other cavities beneath the structure, based on the evidence of the small watercourse that had caused some minor structural damage to stonework on the flank of the Sphinx.

Overview

The story of the Hall of Records is popular among those who hold alternative theories of Ancient Egypt. The phrase "Hall of Records" originated with Edgar Cayce although Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince suggest that the idea of the existence of lost Egyptian records "has a long pedigree".[2]

Graham Hancock and Robert Bauval, in Message of the Sphinx, stated that American archaeologists and the Egyptian government had blocked investigations around the Sphinx, including attempts to locate any underground cavities.[3] Bauval later wrote Secret Chamber in 1999. According to Bauval, Egyptian authorities granted an American team a license to search for the Hall of Records under the Sphinx. It has been postulated that there may be three passages around the Sphinx; two with unknown origin and one is supposedly a small dead-end shaft behind the head of nineteenth-century origins.

Various alternate theories on the origin of the Hall have been proposed, including that the Hall was not the work of Ancient Egyptians at all but another society such as advanced prehistoric societies or a superior race of intelligent beings. Accordingly, this original society sealed the Hall away with scrolls of their accumulated knowledge at about 10,500 BC—the last period of time when the constellation of Leo was located between the Sphinx's paws when it rose in the night sky.

The "Sleeping Prophet" Edgar Cayce also stated in 1939, that the Hall of Records had a twin counterpart library that was anciently deposited on the Yucatán Peninsula somewhere by the eastern coastal temple complex sites. He mentioned that the Yucatán Depository was currently under water.

The study of and the search for the Hall is considered by many academics to be pseudo-archaeology. These academics make clear distinctions between precise methodological scientific hypothesis and the rest of possible subsequent implications and speculations.

In fiction

The myth of the Hall of Records is featured in many creative works.

References

  1. ↑ Is There a Chamber Beneath the Sphinx? catchpenny.org.
  2. ↑ MacDonald, Sally; Rice, Michael (2003). Consuming Ancient Egypt. UCL Press. p. 180. ISBN 978-1-84472-003-3.
  3. ↑ Graham Hancock and Robert Bauval, The Message of the Sphinx. Three Rivers Press; 1 edition (May 27, 1997). page 59, 71. ISBN 0-517-88852-1

Further reading

  • Zahi Hawass, H E Farouk Hosni, and Gaballa Ali Gaballa, "The Secrets of the Sphinx: الترميم بين الماضى والحاضر". American Univ in Cairo Press, 1998. ISBN 977-424-892-9
  • Robert Bauval, Secret Chamber: The Quest for the Hall of Records. Arrow; New Ed edition (7 Sep 2000). 572 pages. ISBN 0-09-940528-8
  • H. Spencer Lewis, "Symbolic Prophecy of the Great Pyramid", The Rosicrucian Press, San Jose, 1936. ISBN 0-912057-55-6
  • Garrett G. Fagan, "Archaeological Fantasies: How Pseudoarchaeology Misrepresents the Past and Misleads the Public". Routledge (UK), 2006. 417 pages. ISBN 0-415-30592-6
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