Forge of Creation

Electricity in the Ancient World?

The Tem­ple of Hathor at Den­dera, on the Nile north of Luxor, is one of the latest Egyp­tian tem­ples. Dedi­ca­ted to the wife of the god Horus, it was built in Roman times and depic­tions show Roman empe­rors along­side Egyp­tian gods. Along with Aby­dos, which is further north, Den­dera is a day trip from Luxor. The village of Den­dera is situa­ted 60km north of Luxor on the west bank of the Nile, oppo­site the pro­vin­cial town of Qena, where the Nile Valley road branches off to the Red Sea town of Hurghada. It’s ancient name was Lunet and it was also known as Tenty­ris during clas­si­cal times.
 This tem­ple may depict the usage of elec­tri­city, mag­ne­tism, and the prin­ci­ples of the modern light bulb.

The Tem­ple was built bet­ween 30 BC and 14 AD, but it was built on top of an older tem­ple, the date of which remains unc­lear. It is pro­ba­ble that the design of the later tem­ple is based on that of the older one. It was known as the ‘Castle of the Sis­trum’ or ‘Pr Hathor’, which means House of Hathor.

Hathor was the god­dess of love, joy and beauty. The walls, rooms and roof are extraor­di­na­rily well pre­ser­ved. It’s sup­por­ting pillars, which had capi­tals sculp­ted in the image of Hathor, were defa­ced by the Chris­tians. The stone steps of the spi­ral stair­case are time-worn but still used to ascend to the roof, where there is a small cha­pel deco­ra­ted with intact Hathor-headed columns.

Den­dera was an ancient hea­ling cen­ter, com­pa­ra­ble to a Greek Askle­pion or the Catho­lic Lour­des. Hathor, who was the wife of Horus, was the god­dess of the sky, fer­ti­lity and hea­ling, and the rituals per­for­med by her pries­tes­ses inc­lu­ded the use of a sis­trum, or rattle.

Simi­lar to other tem­ple sites in Egypt, the com­plex at Den­dera marks the loca­tion of a very old holy place. An indi­ca­tion of the anti­quity of the tem­ple site is given by the astro­no­mi­cal align­ment of the main tem­ple to the cons­te­lla­tion Gamma Dra­co­nis before 5000BC. Early texts refer to a Pre-dynastic tem­ple that was rebuilt during the Old King­dom, and further deve­lo­ped by New King­dom pha­raohs inc­lu­ding Thut­mose III, Amenho­tep III, and Ram­ses II and III. The pre­sent struc­ture dates to the Greek and Roman periods, with the sanc­tuary and its surroun­ding cha­pels built by the later Pto­le­mies in the 1st cen­tury BC. Den­dera was the chief place for the worship of Hathor, who is variously seen as the patro­ness of earthly love, the god­dess of hea­ling, and the great femi­nine source of all nou­rish­ment (like the Hindu god­dess Kali, Hathor also has her terri­ble aspects; in one ancient myth she is a raging lio­ness sent to punish man­kind for its rebellion).

Beneath the Tem­ple of Hathor at Den­dera there is a crypt with walls insc­ri­bed with some very strange reliefs. Krassa and Habeck desc­ribe the site in their book “Light for the Pharaoh”:

“The walls are deco­ra­ted with human figu­res next to bulb-like objects remi­nis­cent of over­si­zed light bulbs. Inside these “bulbs” there are sna­kes in wavy lines. The sna­kes’ poin­ted tails issue from a lotus flo­wer, which, without much ima­gi­na­tion, can be inter­pre­ted as the soc­ket of the bulb. Something simi­lar to a wire leads to a small box on which the air god is knee­ling. Adja­cent to it stands a two-armed djed pillar as a sym­bol of power, which is con­nec­ted to the snake. Also remar­ka­ble is the baboon-like demon hol­ding two kni­ves in his hands, which are inter­pre­ted as a pro­tec­tive and defen­sive power.”

 François Dau­mas desc­ri­bed the eas­tern­most of the five crypts along the southern end, telling us that:

“In the last room, one sees, care­fully car­ved on the Southern wall, a fal­con with detai­led feathers, pre­ce­ded by a snake emer­ging from a lotus blos­som within a boat. Whe­reas the whole of the tem­ple is cons­truc­ted of sands­tone, to faci­li­tate a relief of fine qua­lity there was pla­ced in the wall, at the level of the figu­res, a block of limes­tone sui­ta­ble for very detai­led work, and of this the artist took full and per­fect advan­tage. These reliefs are cos­mo­lo­gi­cal repre­sen­ta­tions. The snake that comes out of the lotus is equa­ted with the shi­ning deity Har­sam­tawy (Ihy) as he appears for the first time out of the pri­mor­dial sea. He is again repre­sen­ted near the bot­tom of the crypt in the form of two sna­kes also coming forth, but this time wrap­ped in lotu­ses like pro­tec­tive enve­lo­pes. Some­ti­mes those that were on the Mesktet-barque colla­bo­ra­ted with Horus; other times the Mandjet-barque with its crew hel­ped to reveal the god: Djed rai­ses his body, a supreme man­ner of worship, atten­dant of the god’s pres­ti­gious ka. The sta­tuet­tes appear to have been used for the New Year cele­bra­tion and the fes­ti­val of Har­sam­tawy. It is likely that on these solemn occa­sions these objects were trans­por­ted to the vault [i.e. the room above the crypt].”

Here is a trans­la­tion of the text of the south wall:

“Resom­tus is alive with gloss in the sky (and) lives at the day of the New Year cele­bra­tion. 
He lights up in its house in the night of the child in his nest, by dona­ting the light to the country from the birth bricks. The sky is jubi­lant, the earth is plea­sed and the God cha­pels is glad, when he appears in his cham­ber in his pro­ces­sion barge at his beau­ti­ful cele­bra­tion of the New Year. The God with his disk has come to see him. Neheb­kau gives him repu­ta­tion, and the god­dess with her disk, with godly body, reju­ve­na­tes him in his sanc­tuary. Tchnt tpjt jnr  is con­tent because of her majesty. She prai­ses Re because of him with praise for his Ka, with wine from schfjt and meat bits on the altar before him. The “land-of-Atum” is pre­pa­red with his most dis­tin­guished plan, as Hu and Sia are subor­di­na­ted to him. He may pro­tect the son of Re, forever. ”

Elec­tri­cal engi­neers have stu­died the design and deter­mi­ned that the car­vings on the tem­ple walls actually repre­sent a type of light­bulb called a Croo­kes tube. Chris Dunn explains in his book, “The Giza Power Plant”;

“When the [Croo­kes] tube is in ope­ra­tion, the ray ori­gi­na­tes where the cathode elec­tri­cal wire enters the tube to the oppo­site end. In the tem­ple pic­ture, the elec­tron beam is repre­sen­ted as an outs­tretched ser­pent. The tail of the ser­pent begins where a cable from the energy box enters the tube, and the serpent’s head touches the oppo­site end. In Egyp­tian art, the ser­pent was the sym­bol of divine energy.…  ”

This video shows Erich von Dani­ken pre­sent while a Croo­kes tube is being lit:

The tem­ple seems to show a various ren­di­tions of this tube. Another tem­ple dra­wing shows one tube, on the extreme left of the pic­ture, to be ope­ra­ting under nor­mal con­di­tions. But with the second tube, situa­ted clo­sest to the energy box to the right, an inte­res­ting expe­ri­ment has been por­tra­yed. Michael R. Free­man, an elec­tric and elec­tro­mag­ne­tic engi­neer, belie­ves that the solar disc on Horus’ head is a Van de Graaf gene­ra­tor, an appa­ra­tus which collects sta­tic elec­tri­city. A baboon is por­tra­yed hol­ding a metal knife bet­ween the Van de Graaf-solar disc and the second tube. Under actual con­di­tions, the sta­tic charge built up on the knife from the gene­ra­tor would cause the elec­tron beam inside the Croo­kes tube to be diver­ted from the nor­mal path, because the nega­tive knife and nega­tive beam would repel each other. In the tem­ple pic­ture, the serpent’s head in the second tube is tur­ned away from the end of the tube, repul­sed by the knife in the baboon’s hand.

Accor­ding to Dunn, all aspects of the Den­de­rah reliefs corres­pond exactly to modern elec­tri­cal spe­ci­fi­ca­tions. The bulb size and shape, the posi­tion of the ele­ments rela­tive to each other, and even the wiring pat­terns and insu­la­tors all match their modern coun­ter­parts. The arran­ge­ment and varia­tions in the exam­ples of how to mani­pu­late the elec­tri­cal energy of the bulb is also strongly remi­nis­cent of modern scien­ti­fic dia­grams, the only major dif­fe­rence being the use of sym­bo­lic ima­gery, such as gods and ani­mals, to com­mu­ni­cate cer­tain con­cepts. — Source: Mys­te­rious World.

But if there were elec­tric lights, how were they powe­red? There seems to be another out of place arti­fact that has been given some atten­tion, the Bagh­dad Bat­tery. This jar-shaped arti­fact is desig­ned in the con­fi­gu­ra­tion of a crude but accu­rate bat­tery. Using wine or citrus juice as an elec­trolyte, if it had been con­nec­ted to others, it could have done some serious elec­tri­cal voltage.

 On the Dis­co­very chan­nel pro­gram Myth­bus­ters, the Bagh­dad bat­tery “myth” was put to the test.

On Myth­bus­ters’ 29th epi­sode (which aired on March 23, 2005), the Bagh­dad bat­tery “myth” was put to the test. Ten hand-made terra­cotta jars were fit­ted to act as bat­te­ries. Lemon juice was cho­sen as the elec­trolyte to acti­vate the elec­troche­mi­cal reac­tion bet­ween the cop­per and iron. (Oddly enough, it was dis­co­ve­red that a sin­gle lemon pro­du­ced more vol­tage than one of the bat­te­ries). When all of the bat­te­ries were lin­ked together, they pro­du­ced upwards to 4 volts. Then, the major ques­tion was, “What were these ancient bat­te­ries used for?”

The show’s research staff dis­co­ve­red three pos­si­ble rea­sons: Elec­tro­pla­ting, Medi­cal pain relief (through Acu­punc­ture), and Reli­gious expe­rience. It was dis­co­ve­red that the “lin­ked” bat­te­ries indeed had suf­fi­cient power to elec­tro­plate a small token. For acu­punc­ture, the bat­te­ries pro­du­ced a “ran­dom” pulse that could be felt through the need­les; howe­ver, it began to pro­duce a pain­ful bur­ning sen­sa­tion when the bat­te­ries were groun­ded to two need­les at once. For the reli­gious expe­rience aspect of the bat­te­ries, a replica of the fabled Ark of the Cove­nant was cons­truc­ted, com­plete with two angels. Ins­tead of lin­king the angels’ gol­den wings to the low power bat­te­ries, an elec­tric fence gene­ra­tor was con­nec­ted. When touched, the wings pro­du­ced a strong fee­ling of tight­ness in the chest. Although the bat­te­ries them­sel­ves had not been used, it was sur­mi­sed that, due to the appa­rent lack of know­ledge of elec­tri­city, any form of elec­tri­cal sen­sa­tion from them could equate to the “divine pre­sence” in the eyes of ancient peo­ple. In the end, the Bagh­dad bat­tery myth was found “plau­si­ble” on all three accounts.

SOURCE — Wikipedia

Refe­ren­ces

    * Dub­per­nell, G., “Evi­dence of the use of pri­mi­tive bat­te­ries in anti­quity”. Selec­ted Topics in the His­tory of Elec­troche­mistry, The Elec­troche­mi­cal Society, I-22 Prin­cetn, NJ. 1978.
    * Eggert, G., “The Enigma of the ‘Bat­tery of Bagh­dad”. Pro­cee­dings 7th Euro­pean Skep­tics Con­fe­rence. 1995.
    * Eggert, G., “The enig­ma­tic ‘bat­tery of Bagh­dad”. Skep­ti­cal Inqui­rer, May-June 1996 V20 N3 PG31(4).
    * Mac­Kech­nie, J. C. “An Early Elec­tric cell?” Jour­nal of the Ins­ti­tute of Elec­tri­cal Engi­neers, 6:356–57. 1960.
    * Paszthory E., “Elec­tri­city gene­ra­tion or Magic? The analy­sis of an unu­sual group of finds from Meso­po­ta­mia”. MASCA Research Papers in Science and Tech­no­logy 6:31–8. 1989.
    * Zymet, Matthew, “Elec­tric Arti­fact”. The Lear­ning Channel.