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Egypt's Oldest Pyramid Is Being Destroyed By Its Own Restoration Team

Taffykay writes The oldest pyramid in Egypt, the Pyramid of Djoserat Saqqara, is being destroyed by the very company the Egyptian government has hired to restore it. The roughly 4,600-year-old structure has been in trouble since an earthquake hit the region in 1992, but in a difficult political and economic climate for the country, those now tasked with preserving the pyramid are said to be doing more harm than good.

11 of 246 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Why SPAM? by rebelwarlock · · Score: 3, Informative

    Maybe because you keep spamming the fucking link everywhere, dumbass.

  2. The biggest risk to the pyramids is Islam by Chrisq · · Score: 4, Informative
    1. Re:The biggest risk to the pyramids is Islam by Idimmu+Xul · · Score: 5, Informative

      In 1994 there were 23,730 homicides in the USA source.

      Isis are responsible for way more than 23,730 deaths source.

      Read in to that what you like :)

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      The problem with slashdot is that most of its users were bullied and stuffed into lockers as kids!
    2. Re:The biggest risk to the pyramids is Islam by Amtrak · · Score: 4, Informative

      Let's not forget that Christians and Muslims are both religions with divergent sects. As such it might be helpful to see the following list:

      • Christians (General) 2.5+ Billion
      • Catholic Church: 1.2 Billion
      • Islam (General): 1.2 Billion
      • Sunni Islam: 0.9 Billion
      • Protestantism: 0.8 Billion
      • Shia Islam: 0.3 Billion
      • Eastern Orthodox (Christian): 0.25 Billion
      • Other Christian: 0.2 Billion

      By that account the Catholic Church is still the biggest religion.

    3. Re:The biggest risk to the pyramids is Islam by AC-x · · Score: 2, Informative

      It is how Neil Degrasse Tyson said when talking about how religion can kill progress "The Arab world was the center of science and mathematics for centuries, and then came Islam"

      You mean the Islamic golden age? Which many consider to have ended at the destruction of Baghdad by the Mongols?

    4. Re:The biggest risk to the pyramids is Islam by Mashiki · · Score: 3, Informative

      Oh you want precise data? Like large support across muslim countries, where terrorism is supported. 20% of muslims support the 7/7 bombings 1:4 muslims in the UK say the bombings were justified 31% of muslims in turkey support suicide bombings against westerners 32% of palestinians support the murder of jews, including children. 55% of muslims support hezbollah 26% of young muslims in america believe suicide attacks are justified 26% of egyptian muslims believe that suicide attacks are justified

      You're now enlightened to this "tiny minority." Which is roughly 25% having extremist views, out of 1.6 billion that would be a "mere" 400,000,000 individuals. You know, I could keep going and posting, so again--there is something fundamentally broken with islam and muslims. And I haven't even gotten to the stuff on specific groups, which vary between 6% as a low to 51% support across muslims. Or the 50-75% that believing that killing apostates is a good idea. I guess none of that is large swaths.

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  3. Re:Oldest stone complex? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    This happens when writers compulsively replace words with what they think are synonyms. Some writer with thesaurus OCD didn't want to use the word pyramid twice.

  4. Re:a shame but... by AC-x · · Score: 5, Informative

    The pyramids being made by slave labour is something of a myth. There's not much evidence available for early pyramids, but there's plenty of evidence that later pyramids were made by skilled craftsmen and not slaves.

  5. Re:a shame but... by stephanruby · · Score: 3, Informative

    Looking at that picture I wonder how people can be so amazed by it.

    That's exactly the problem. Pyramids are like the Grand Canyon. Modern photography may have gotten super good at capturing a likeness of their image, but nothing actually beats going there in person and seeing those things in real life!

    Doesn't even sound hard other than the heat (which was called fucking life back then, cause no one had air conditioning).

    Actually, don't believe your hollywood movies, Egypt was lush with vegetation and had plenty water (which provided its own natural air conditioning during the time those pyramids were built). Please read this article and this article.

    Considering that it was made with slave labor, makes it even less impressive.

    Yes, that was the totally unproven interpretation of the Europeans when they first visited Egypt. And as another poster already replied (and provided a reference), they're now finding physical evidence that this wasn't actually the case.

    There's these steps in northern california, laid by like 80 japanese slave laborers like 100 years ago...

    If you think the work of 80 laborers 100 years ago is equivalent to the work of ~10,000 laborers ~7,000 years ago, then that's your choice. Personally, I can't even visualize a period of 7,000 years. So if you're not impressed by several supremely huge man-made structures that have stood the test of time for 7,000+ years, then let's just agree to disagree because I am surely impressed by them.

  6. Re:... all in the name of "Allah" by omems · · Score: 4, Informative

    I visited Cairo and Giza in the spring of 2013 and can confirm there were almost no tourists. There are, however, men with machine guns guarding the pyramids and sphynx, as well as the main museum, in addition to metal detectors and visual inspections upon entering these places (though you could enter from the desert and avoid them in the case of Giza). The violence I witnessed wasn't random acts of terror, but civil/political unrest before Morsi got the boot.

    Money, including tourism dollars, is very much a motivating factor for the parties involved. I don't have a comprehensive knowledge of the politics, but the locals I talked to reviled Morsi precisely because of his lack of money (and his allegiances). Most visibly, infrastructure and the jobs created in its construction and maintenance, that Mubarak had, was sorely missed.

  7. Re: Oldest stone complex? by Cealestis · · Score: 3, Informative

    Worded poorly and inaccurately. It is however considered by most archaeologists to be the oldest large scale cut stone structure in antiquity.