Four Ways to Pharaoh Khufu (27 page)

Chapter 40

The Great Pyramid, Giza Plateau, Egypt

820 A.D.

H
e could not believe his eyes: at his feet lay a dehydrated corpse.
A tomb robber?
But Al-Mamun, the son of the Caliph of Baghdad, was absolutely sure that nobody had ever been inside the Great Pyramid. They had thoroughly searched the Great Pyramid’s exterior. Not even the slightest single aperture had been detected. Over the last several months his workers had been trying to crack open the colossal stone structure, spurred on by the knowledge that they would be the first ones inside!

But there was this corpse.

Was it the pharaoh himself that somehow had fallen out of his own sarcophagus?
This seemed impossible. The ancient structure had been tightly sealed for centuries.

Once again, Al-Mamun circled the pyramid’s hollows. He stopped inside the King’s Chamber and leaned on the empty sarcophagus. Even if the corpse was indeed Pharaoh Khufu, then where was the lid to the sarcophagus? Even if some muscular robber had managed to lift it off, it would have been impossible to carry away: the passages were too narrow. Maybe the lid had been decorated with precious stones and metals. Could the burglar have broken the lid into pieces in order to carry it away? Then why was the sarcophagus made of only simple, dark granite without any decorations or carvings?

Al-Mamun looked around the empty room with its polished red-granite blocks; this room did not look like the burial place of one of the greatest pharaohs. Pharaoh Khufu had spent more than 30 years gathering people, money and treasures from all of his subordinated lands with the simple purpose of constructing his eternal abode.

In 820 A.D. the young Caliph Al-Mamun, son of Harun Al-Rashid from the famed “Arabian Nights,” had assembled a vast conglomeration of engineers, architects, builders and stonemasons in order to force entry into the Great Pyramid. Al-Mamun was diligently looking for the plate, which he had read about in Strabo’s writings.

On the side of the Great Pyramid there is a stone that can be moved, and if the stone is lifted open it will expose the winding passage leading to the g
rave.

But all the stones were identical. To find only one out of thousands of twins was an impossible task. Al-Mamun ordered his workers make their own entrance, but the stones and calcareous shell were so hard that the cutters and chisels could not break them. They began splitting the stones by heating them up with fires and spraying them with cold vinegar. It was exhausting drudgery, but inch-by-inch the treasure hunters got deeper and deeper inside the pyramid. For over one hundred feet, they tunneled into the pyramid’s solid core. They excavated a narrow passage that only became hotter, dustier and more constricted as they continued. Torches and candles consumed the precious oxygen and poisoned the air.

The legends of Queen Scheherazade in the famous “Arabian Nights” recalled that there were supposed to be “thirty underground chambers made of multicolored granite alongside the fabled Holy Gallery and filled to the top with precious stones, bountiful riches, exotic images and luxurious weapons that were greased by the fats cooked by using the ancient wisdom. And there exist glass that can be bent and does not break, and different miscellaneous potions and salutary waters.” The treasures were not the only reason Caliph Al-Mamun was attracted to the Great Pyramid, he was also intrigued by the legends told by Herodotus and Strabo about the ancient steles with ancient knowledge written on them.

Al-Mamun was about to give up when one of the workers heard something heavy falling somewhere within the pyramid. Renewing their efforts and altering the direction of the bore, the workers managed to break into a hollow path. It was a passage three and a half feet wide by almost four feet high, sloping at a steep angle of twenty-six degrees. It was the entrance Strabo had mentioned in his writings.

Next, his workers moved in the opposite direction: down. This course led them into an empty cave with jagged, rough-hewn walls. On one wall they discovered a blackened, horizontal entrance to a passage. The workers followed the path, but after about fifty feet it was a dead-end. When the workers followed the path in the other direction, they found that after another thirty feet it ended with a well dug into the cave floor.

Yet, Al-Mamun continued searching. He carefully examined the entrance tunnel and found a granite plug that covered the opening of yet another passage, which had never been mentioned before. Al-Mamun figured he had stumbled onto a secret, hidden passage.

The workers tried to chip away at the granite plug, but it was tightly wedged, of indeterminate length and evidently weighed several tons. Spurred by the prospect of a new passage leading to some hidden treasure chamber, Al-Mamun ordered his men to cut around the plug through the softer limestone blocks of the surrounding walls. Even this turned out to be a huge job. After boring beyond the first granite plug, the workers encountered another granite plug, equally as hard and equally as tightly wedged. Beyond it laid yet another, third plug. Beyond the third granite plug they came upon a passage filled with a limestone plug that could be cracked with chisels and removed piece by piece.

On their hands and knees and holding their torches low, Al-Mamun and his men were obliged to crawl through roughly 150 feet of a dark passage, at the same steep slope of twenty-six degrees before they could raise their heads and stand on a level spot.

In front of them stretched another low horizontal passage, no higher than the one they had just ascended. At the end of this passage, they found themselves in a rectangular limestone room with a rough floor and a gabled limestone roof. Because of the Arab custom of placing their women in tombs with gabled ceilings (as opposed to flat ones for the men), this room became known as the Queen’s Chamber.

The bare room was eighteen feet long and had an empty niche in the east wall, large enough for a life-sized statue. Thinking the niche might conceal the entrance to a second chamber, the Arabs hacked their way into its solid masonry for another yard before giving up.

Retracing their steps back to the low Ascending Passage, the Arabs raised their torches to get a better look at the ominous void above them. They discovered joist holes in the walls indicating that the floor of the Ascending Passage had continued upwards, blocking and hiding the low passage to the Queen’s Chamber.

Climbing on the top of each other, Al-Mamun’s workers found themselves at the bottom of a grandiose gallery, later known as the Grand Gallery. It was about twenty-eight feet high and appeared to stretch upward at the same steep slope into the mysterious heart of the Great Pyramid. The center of this new passage was very slippery, but on either side were narrow ramps slotted at regular intervals; they afforded a better foothold.

Holding their torches high, the workers proceeded to climb these ramps. At the end of another 150-foot climb, they came upon a huge solid stone, raised three feet from the floor. They scaled the stone and reached the platform located on the top of the Grand Gallery. Beyond the platform the floor was level, but the ceiling fell to a mere forty-one inches, forming a sort of portcullis entrance to a small antechamber. Past the portcullis, Al-Mamun’s men were again obliged to stoop along a short passage that led to yet another chamber. Their torches revealed a great and well-proportioned room; the walls, floor and ceiling were all of beautifully wrought and polished red-granite blocks, squared and extremely finely jointed. Because of its flat ceiling, the Arabs named it the King’s Chamber.

Al-Mamun’s men frantically searched the chamber’s every cranny, but could find nothing of interest or value. There was no sign of any treasure besides an empty, lidless, granite sarcophagus with a broken corner: no treasure or papyruses with ancient writing were found. The workers started angrily striking the walls with their hammers, attempting to find another passage. But it was all in vain: the walls responded back with the lifeless sound of intact rock. It appeared that the whole place had already been looted. It was hard to imagine though, considering the enormous number of stones they had been obliged to break in order to gain the entrance.

Al-Mamun’s caravan of camels moved slowly through the Libyan Desert dunes on its way back to Baghdad. Alongside his cheerful workers, the Great Caliph kept silently to himself, analyzing the events of the last few months.

Chapter 41

Russian State Library, Moscow, Russia

Sunday, September 24

11:45 a.m.

T
he edifice of the Russian State Library would take anybody’s breath away. Surrounded by enormous steps and columns, the Library complex has five grand buildings connected in an elaborate system around several courtyards.

Inside the Grand Hall entrance, Michael and Anna stood staring at the columns, art and sculptures. A sweeping marble staircase led to many halls. Anna nodded toward a glass-enclosed desk with an attendant inside. Once at the front of the line, Michael spoke, “Excuse me, sir, but do you speak English?”

“Yes, how may I help you?” The man spoke English well, enunciating each word with a British accent.

Michael grinned, “We are looking for
The Histories
book by Herodotus. Of course, we need it in the English translation.”

“Certainly, just a moment while I find someone to man this desk.” The man walked away, disappearing behind a door. Michael expected to hear exasperated sighs and comments from the people behind him in line. Amazingly, there was just the usual sound of general conversation that a line seemed to generate. Michael supposed everyone was simply used to lines and waiting patiently. It reminded him of being in the Army: lines and more lines.

The man returned with a lady who stepped up to the desk and took charge. The man motioned to them. Anna and Michael joined him in walking through the gorgeous hallways and up palatial steps. Noticing they were intrigued by the art and sculptures, their guide eagerly lectured on the various world-famous Russians depicted and their accomplishments. Anna and Michael were wide-eyed at his depth of knowledge. Eventually they ended up in an enormous room filled with card catalogs. He turned, saying, “
The Histories
book by Herodotus?” Upon their nodded approval, he quickly made his way to a certain card catalogue and started searching the nameplates on the front of the boxes. Abruptly, he pulled one out and started flipping through the cards. He pulled out a small notepad and pencil out of his suit jacket, quickly writing down the reference. Pushing the box back into place, he turned, saying, “Let’s go find it now.”

“We really appreciate you are doing it for us,” Anna gushed with a huge smile.

The Russian man looked uncomfortable, “You’re welcome,” he bowed slightly. “Now, please follow me.”

Anna looked at Michael, confused. “Yikes,” she whispered, “I didn’t mean to overdo it.” Michael just shrugged his shoulders; the Russian culture was a mystery to him.

After more stairs, rooms and corridors, Michael whispered mischievously to Anna, “I wish we had some bread crumbs or pebbles to lead us back to the entrance.” Anna just grinned and shushed him.

Their guide suddenly stopped and said, “We will find the book in here.” They were standing at the entrance of yet another grand room with high ceilings and bookshelves that soared above them. Quickly walking past the rows, their guide turned down an aisle. He stopped, his finger pointing in the air, his eyes searching. “Aha!” He cried softly, as he put his fingers around the edge of a rather large book and pulled it out gently. Michael and Anna leaned forward and looked at the book. “This is the first of the volumes, translated into English by George Rawlinson,” the librarian continued. “Which story are you looking for?”

After taking the book into their own hands, Michael and Anna decided they needed Volume IV. “Please return it to that cart when you are finished,” the librarian instructed, gesturing toward a cart. “You may find the next room over a good place to sit and look at your book.”

Michael reached out and shook hands with the librarian. “Again, thank you for your assistance,” he said solemnly.

“It was my pleasure,” the librarian replied. He nodded at Anna, turned and departed.

“I guess he would have rather spoken with you,” Anna pouted a little, a bit embarrassed that she had spoken up so enthusiastically before.

Michael smiled, “I think their custom is that the men speak and the ladies do not.” They walked to the reading room the librarian had indicated. As they entered, several people looked up at them and returned quickly to their books.

“Have you noticed that no one smiles around here either?” Anna frowned a little.

“We are in an entirely different culture here. At least when they do smile, their smiles are genuine.”

“True,” Anna sighed.

They found an empty table and sat down. Anna opened
The Histories
and started reading. For a period of time, Michael just looked around the enormous reading room. Then he reached down into his backpack and pulled out Kirilov’s cigar box. Pulling away the adhesive tape, he opened it and pulled out the paper. He began rereading and examining it.

“Michael,” Anna whispered, closing
The Histories
, “there isn’t much here besides what Kirilov already told us or mentioned in his diary. So, what about that corpse?” she asked.

“You mean the corpse mentioned in Kirilov’s notes by the Arabian doctor, Al Kaisi?”

She nodded.

“You know what, the more I think about it, the more sense it makes.”

Anna looked puzzled.

“OK, let me try to explain it to you,” said Michael. “You see, HemIwno and the builders of the Great Pyramid were humans and thus capable of making mistakes. I think that the corpse found by Al-Mamun was the result of HemIwno’s unintentional mistake.”

“Let’s hope it was his fatal mistake!” Anna said eagerly. “And that mistake will help us uncover what he tried to hide so diligently.”

“OK, do you remember what Kirilov mentioned about the debris and rubble found inside the King’s Chamber?” asked Michael.

Anna shook her head.

Michael said, “I’ll be back,” as he got up from the table, strode across the enormous room and disappeared into the next. After about ten minute’s time, Michael returned holding another book. He quickly opened it up to the necessary page and read a short passage from there.

The crypt was sealed off carefully. At its entrance the granite slabs of the portcullis were lowered down. The workers remaining inside the pyramid used the special well to get down to the underground level and from there by the inclined passage climbed outside. Later this passage was filled with stones. The true entrance to the pyramid was closed off and covered by the outer casing and nothing indicated its loca
tion.

Michael shuffled several pages until the diagram of the cross section of the Great Pyramid appeared.

“OK, so according to Kirilov’s statement, the corpse was found somewhere between the Grand Gallery and the King’s Chamber’s entrance.”

“So what kind of evil plan was that? Did they purposely leave the last worker behind to die?” asked Anna, visibly outraged.

“I would like to think that was an unintentional mistake,” Michael said quietly. “However, taking into account the customs of that period, the death of the … hmmm … let’s call him ‘the janitor’ was well suited with Chief Architect HemIwno’s plan.”

“I still can’t understand why HemIwno needed to leave a person who would ultimately die and decompose inside this sacred place next to Pharaoh Khufu’s mummified body.” Anna remained persistent.

“Well, there could be two reasons for such a devilish plan,” Michael calmly continued. “One reason would be to seal off the Ascending passage that was used as the conveyor in order to transport limestone blocks toward the Grand Gallery. The second reason would be that he served as a decoy for the first tomb robbers penetrating the pyramid. Think about it for a moment,” Michael gently touched Anna’s hand, trying to distract her from her fuming, “A corpse discovered at the footsteps of the Grand Gallery or, even better, inside the King’s Chamber was like a sign shouting to your face that
you are not the first one here
and as further proof to that testimonial, the robbers were to find nothing except the empty chipped sarcophagus. And as we already know, that’s exactly what Al-Mamun encountered.”

“OK, wait,” said Anna, putting her hands to her forehead, “I don’t understand how it was possible that the Great Pharaoh Khufu’s burial ceremony was conducted inside a dirty chamber filled with rubble. And if the stone plug was sealed off before the Pharaoh’s burial, then it means that besides the janitor, nobody else remained inside the pyramid.”

A minute or two passed until Michael said a word. His suddenly straightened up in his chair. “Do you even realize what you just said?” he asked.

“What do you mean?”

“You just proved that Pharaoh Khufu’s mummy was never buried inside the King’s Chamber,” Michael said, his mind whirling with the idea, “The King’s Chamber never contained Pharaoh Khufu’s mummy!”

“So, Pharaoh Khufu was buried in an entirely different place?”

“That’s exactly right,” said Michael.

“Michael, do you think the janitor could’ve known about his destiny? Did he ever suspect anything?” asked Anna, her eyes filled with sadness.

“I don’t think he did. Most likely he hoped to use so-called transportation passage. He probably knew the plan was to go through the opening inside the Grand Gallery and climb outside the pyramid. But while performing the final touches to the Ascending passage, he was intentionally blocked inside.”

“You’re absolutely right,” Anna declared softly, “However, based on Kirilov’s theory, the plug located at the intersection of the Workmen’s and Descending Passages is one of the secrets of the pyramid.”

“And it’s not hard to imagine that anybody familiar with this secret should die. Therefore, nobody could compromise the integrity of the pyramid.”

“So, basically the poor janitor became HemIwno’s sacrifice,” continued Anna. “He was the last witness and had to die.”

“I guess HemIwno had no other choice.” Michael was shaking his head sadly.

“But Michael, that is really sad and outrageous. I hope HemIwno is burning in hell.”

“I think we can avenge the poor janitor’s death.”

“How?”

“How? Hmmm. Good question. Basically, HemIwno wanted to improve his decoy design by adding an extra element: the corpse. That’s exactly where HemIwno messed up. Instead of further mystifying the King’s Chamber’s real purpose, he unwillingly revealed its secret. And I think that the corpse is the weakest link in HemIwno’s Great Pyramid project,” said Michael triumphantly.

“Michael, I’m proud to say you just avenged the janitor!”

“Well, Anna, you can give yourself credit as well. It was you who made the ingenious realization about the impossibility of the pharaoh and the janitor sharing the same quarters.”

“And now we know that the real burial place was nowhere near the King’s Chamber,” Anna said proudly.

“Yes, we now know HemIwno’s secret. And I’m pretty sure Kirilov uncovered it as well. He just didn’t have a chance to let us know.”

“No, remember the
‘
four ways’ in Kirilov’s paper in the cigar box?”

“You’re right!” exclaimed Michael, quietly pounding his fist on the desk.

“Michael, we need to establish our next plan of action,” said Anna, looking mischievously at him as she picked up her iPhone.