Kind: captions

Language: en

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You can best appreciate the specialness of egypt from space or she can't run space
travels them from a plane

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What you do is you look down?

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And you just see this vast stretch of Golden Brown [desert]

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And running through the center of it the Ribbon of Magic

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[blue] the Nile and the Green of the Fertile Nile Valley around

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This was [geography's] gift to the region, but of course it took now some
determination turned that

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Geographical Luck the draw to Egyptian advantage

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The egyptians were key players in North Africa [in] the Middle East for thousands
of years

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but rather than think of them as some kind of

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Monolithic entity

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The ancient egyptians. It's actually much more satisfying to get to the bottom of
the stories of the individuals who made them so grave

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But through the old and the new kingdom the fortunes of egypt changed and there was
a particular group of people

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Who helped to catalyze that change?
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These were the pharaohs now don't forget this at the time when the pharaoh was
thought to have one foot on Earth

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And one foot planted very firmly in the heavens a person capable of superhuman in
[beds]

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So in this film we look at the genius of two

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particularly high achieving [pharaohs] who actually lived

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1200 Years apart

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First up is khufu a man [is] burnt his named popular imagination

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by constructing the giant pyramid at Giza to have his tomb and secondly we meet the
pharaoh ramses II

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Now ramses lived in very different times when things were politically very jumpy

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And his priority was to promote [the] ramses brand right across the region

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Something he did in aspect a ambitious form the rock card temple at Abu simbel

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Even as a [child] I was gobsmacked by the magnificence of these endeavors

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But when I hope that this film does is to use 21st century technology to
investigate not just the what

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but the how and [the] why and one of the real treat for me is when we take a
computer right inside the

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Superstructures to analyze how they were made and what that can tell us about the
inner lives of the [Pharos] who constructed?

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Egypt one of the most impressive civilizations the world has ever known

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We think we know egypt?

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the awesome Ruthless power of pharaohs

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The Golden tombs the astonishing building projects that defied the limits of
technology

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The truth is far more intriguing [ancient]

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[Egypt] was not one kingdom

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But many each ruled by pharaohs who faced different challenges and wrote different
chapters in the tale of human

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civilization

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This is the story of the architectural legacy of two of the greatest pharaohs

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under then egypt, enjoyed two Golden ages monumental building

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the first one of the great Innovators of history the preeminent pyramid builder of
the old Kingdom Khufu the

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Second [field] more than [a] thousand years later

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It was probably the most famous Pharaoh in a newly resurgent egypt
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ramasees the second

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These are tales of tyrannical cruelty to achieve feats of miraculous engineering

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But the story of a real people with an unshakable belief in a single man

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their God king

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Both of these men craved one ultimate prize an eternal life amongst the gods

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So they also shared something else, and that [was] a gargantuan drive to achieve
power here on Earth

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Sama [thiis] [II] believed that he was the [most] powerful pharaoh of all time

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He commissioned thousands of statues of himself that he then dispersed throughout
his kingdom. It is the most brilliantly

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Megalomaniac [exercising] branding, but because artifacts like this survived

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And they're very charismatic it means that we can begin to try to understand the
pSychology of the man

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Situation with khufu though is rather different

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[Peta] was operating

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4,500 years ago so it's hardly surprising that his character has been virtually
obliterated by the sands of time

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Still we do have one measure of his raw ambition is
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extraordinary architectural Legacy an extreme fortress to the Great pyramid

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for almost four thousand years the great pyramid at Giza was the largest man-made
structure on the planet and

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It was built at the [height] of what is now known [as] the old kingdom

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at a time before writing became commonplace

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Records are rare

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Just think of it

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Largely illiterate men were the simplest of tools the coordinate to create one of
the wonders of the world

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pyramids inhabit our imaginations of something mysterious

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unfathomable to

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Understand the great pyramid we need to understand an otherwise shadowy figure from
history an enigmatic pharaoh

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called Khufu

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How did his people build such an ambitious structure?

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What was its purpose?

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Luckily if monuments can give us some answers
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If you have sent interpret them they lie in the stones the passageways in the
chamber of this

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Remarkable structure and in the care and precision of the engineers who raised it

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Through this building we can start to bring an ancient civilization to life

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their concerns their belief systems

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But above all their dedication to khufu the pharaoh who for over twenty [years] was
the most powerful

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human being in the known world

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To try to get into the minds of the egyptians [the] [old] kingdom

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You need to appreciate their religion and their complex concept of the afterlife

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two and a half thousand years before christ

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Sneferu the first pharaoh of the fourth addiction Dynasty Lay Dead and his son
khufu

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prepares to take the throne

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His father had been an incredibly popular king, but if people weren't mourning

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They believed that life continued after death and his father's death was especially
significant

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Because in the afterlife the dead pharaohs spirit would join the gods

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in death

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affarin could influence the gods

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encourage them to look after the living and when a time came to shepherd their
spirits [safely] across to the afterlife but

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In Father's place amongst, the gods was not guaranteed

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First they were precise rituals to Initiate

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The Dead Kings body had to be embalmed and those preserved remains must stay
untouched for all eternity

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So important were these two rituals, but even as smackeroos body was being prepared

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There's evidence that khufu was already planning for his own death

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His life will be little more than a preparation for the afterlife

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Where he will provide security and wealth for his people for all eternity

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It's really hard for us to credit that egyptian bought into this idea unfortunately

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Which gave khufu enormous strength?

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Khufu has more power and authority than any other ruler in egyptian history or
Perhaps world history

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he is a living God with absolute command over all of the subjects to

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[Immelt] [allottee] Khufu's Glory and the prosperity of his people were
inextricably linked

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the Key would Lie in the preservation of his dead body and

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No, pharaoh in history has done more to ensure his mummy would remain safe and
[Kusas] own father

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Smurfaroo

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To try to understand how the ancient egyptians lived we had to explore the cities.
They built so bear dead

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Burial monuments were as old as mankind itself that the pyramid was still a very
recent development

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The forerunners of the pyramids were rectangular tombs called Mastabas made out of
mud brick

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But as egypt grew wealthier the [Mostarda] [has] got grandeur and the pharaohs
built the grandest to the wall

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precinct one Mustafa on top of another created a tombs fit for a pharaoh the
[first] basic pyramid was born

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By the time khufu father came to the throne these step pyramids were already the
ultimate status symbol

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Over his 50-year reign Sneferu took the art of the pyramid to new heights

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his first pyramid had stepped sides

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Then he tried unsuccessfully

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to build a smooth sided pyramid

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finally Sneferu achieved his goal, the

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[world's] first true pyramid

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Now his son's ambition was [to] perfect what his father had started

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Khufu is looking at this and thinking you know I can do it better

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I can learn from the mistakes that my father made I can build something bigger
grander

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Something that will really capture the attention of both my own people and anyone
coming into egypt

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The sons of Powerful men have often wanted to mark their own territory [to] have a
visible impact on the landscape

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The new Pharaoh Khufu Chose built his pyramid north of Egypt's ancient capital
Memphis on a plateau at Giza

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Where no previous king had been buried?

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It would be the biggest single stone structure the world had ever seen

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Because his father died believing that he perfected the pyramid but khufu intended
to take the art form to the opened expression

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to cement his own place in Eternity and
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He would throat the entire resources of a nation at his [grand] project. This is a
monument that khufu is making to say here

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I am look at me. I am king I have power. I have wealth on the [other] hand. It's
also his tomb [and]

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[Khufu's] thinking about the fact that he needs a place where he can transform

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Where he can rise into the afterlife join with the gods?

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The project would cost a fortune, but then khufu was unbelievably wealthy

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The source of Egypt's Prosperity is one of the greatest Rivers on Earth the nile

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the River teamed with fish

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perch [Mullis] and Catfish it was major trade route and

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Its annual floods brought Egypt's farmers life-giving water and astonishingly
fertile mud

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[eat] [is] the gift of the nile and basically the rest of egypt is just one large
chunk of Data

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The nile is Egypt's Lifeblood

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It's highway the reason why Youtube survives in the middle of the world's largest
desert the Sahara

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The egyptians believed that their pharaohs privileged relationship with the gods

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intimately linked to the Male's generosity

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the fact that the nile flooded was in part due to

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things being right in the world in a cosmic sense in a sense that the gods were

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Placated they were happy things were being done correctly

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but despite his wealth success was by no means assured a

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pyramix of huge protect decades to complete and in ancient Egypt even a pharaoh
could die young

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If khufu didn't live to see his great pyramid completed his dreams of immortality
would be blown apart

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The Egyptian security that very souls would be in Jeopardy

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Even as a young man, it's vitally important that khufu start his pyramid and
finished it during his lifetime

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He doesn't know how long he will rule. He could die at any time

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Khufu and his people knew that time was not on their side they had to complete this
massive project

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The Egyptian old kingdom just has to be one of the most vigorous and groundbreaking
epochs in the whole of human

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civilization

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This is a society that left behind of a prehistoric
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Mindset and mastered a really beautiful and distinctive form of writing

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Of course we are talking about

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2500 Years before Christ [and] so much of that writing [hasn't] survived

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we just don't have the personal correspondence and the

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Architectural plans that would give us a clue [to] power man like khufu planned and
built his great work

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That we have to do is interrogate the pyramid itself

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[Ku's] easyjet occupied much the same sort of area as Modern egypt

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Although its population was 50 times smaller

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No more than a million other half people

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But if cooper wanted a pyramid that would dazzle the gods he would need an enormous
[Workforce]

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around

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25,000 healthy Young men

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It would be the greatest mobilisation of people that egypt had ever seen

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So where did he raise them?
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People own stalin the foreign slave from incursions into Libya and Nubia

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It's an enduring myth that these captives built the great pyramid

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[the] story fits our technical of fantasies that egyptian wonders were built on the
blood and sweat of slaves on broken lives

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But it's not true

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Modern-day, analysis of Dna taken from the bones of the workers proves that they
were not foreigners, but native egyptian

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Three people and we now believe there were very good reasons

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Why khufu didn't have to press gang men to work for him? So we actually be somebody
who is helping?

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Guarantee that the current pharaoh will pass successfully into the next world is
quite an important

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contribution to society and it's a part of the cosmic insurance policy if you like
for an

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Egyptian to make sure his key is properly buried and therefore to work on his
pyramid it has a very definite personal importance

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Each labor had an emotional investment in making this project work

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Cooper's relationship to his people was farness tyrannical far more paternalistic
and has previously been thought

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But for a long time it's been very hard to see how so many of Egypt's farmers could
be diverted from food production
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without Crippling Egypt's economy

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today egyptologists believe the answer lies in the seasonal egg and flow of the
river

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The Egyptians organized the building schedule around the Rivers flood season

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The floods stopped farmers from working for up to four months of a year if you
organize his schedule carefully

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khufu could offer an attractive alternative

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the annual slavs nile is Terribly important for building the pyramid because when
it's

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Deniers flooding there three months [of] four months out of the year where the
peasants can't really work the land

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So at the [king] very cleverly has organized it so that during those four months
that it would be out of work anyway

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It can actually be gainfully employed

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Scheduling the most labor intensive periods of the build around the flood season is
a solution that kept everyone happy

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The flooded [mile] [of] also the most efficient means of transporting men and
materials this ancient waterway over

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4,000 miles long

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Fed Khufu's [fur] and project
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As the building site at [Giza] stood nearly five miles from its banks

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engineers carved a canal system through the fields that lay between

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The building that was about to take shape was more than a fortress grave

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[it's] design was infused with Powerful religious symbolism

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We now think [that] perhaps the classic pyramid Shape represented the creation of
the world

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The first [possibleand] rear up at the water with a great mountain

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The egyptians named it tart genin and made it one of their gods

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Like the Garden of Eden this place was harmonious and blissful and earthly paradise

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this primeval state of Perfection was known as marked a

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pyramid shape Echoes the emerging land and represents this perfect state

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Marthe is basically

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Truth or order the right way as opposed to the way of Chaos so for the egyptians
one balances

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Mart which has order against Chaos and that world is always chaotic and the king
has to maintain this balance between the two

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Codes pyramid had to strictly follow the rules of [mart]
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These were the magical sparks that the [transformer] giant pile of stones into a
stairway to the afterlife

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His first critical at was to align the pyramid with the heavens a mysterious place

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Just Beyond the Mortal human experience and home of the gods

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the greatest of the [gods] to be honored with the sun gold

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[rah-rah] they believed carried the sun across the sky [from] the east to the West

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When the pyramid was completed the east and west walls would face the rising and
setting sun

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honoring [Roz] Journey

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that the East-West alignment

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His priests believed that although the perfect state of mark is rarely achieved on
Earth

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it could still be found in the night sky and

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the sight of their North star

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to ban

216
00:20:46,470 --> 00:20:50,209
By configuring it to point towards the North Star

217
00:20:50,210 --> 00:20:56,210
[it] makes a stronger connection between his own preservation of order and the
order in the heavens

218
00:21:02,580 --> 00:21:04,580
to realize this massive undertaking

219
00:21:04,950 --> 00:21:11,929
One foot [on] the Earth one foot in the heavens from every corner of the kingdom
the men of ancient Egypt converged on Giza

220
00:21:14,010 --> 00:21:20,030
This Gathering was in all probability the largest workforce ever assembled in the
history of mankind

221
00:21:22,980 --> 00:21:27,950
The scorching heat of the Giza flame would be home to some of them for decades

222
00:21:32,600 --> 00:21:39,219
As if engineered not loud the pyramids ground plan the workers would get their
first glimpse of the scale of tasks ahead

223
00:21:42,730 --> 00:21:45,329
It would not have been a comforting sight

224
00:21:46,990 --> 00:21:54,390
The thoughts going [through] one's mind when looking out over the giza plateau on
sort of always day one

225
00:21:56,890 --> 00:22:00,779
Those thoughts must be how on Earth are we ever going to do this?

226
00:22:01,840 --> 00:22:04,319
It's fairly daunting to think

227
00:22:04,990 --> 00:22:08,819
Okay, there's nothing here now in 20 years. We have a mountain here

228
00:22:16,190 --> 00:22:21,490
These men had to build the pyramid before - who died and it had to be perfect

229
00:22:21,950 --> 00:22:28,240
This was a huge structure the potential for error was massive as Khufu's own father
had learned

230
00:22:35,750 --> 00:22:42,369
Snow-free might have finally achieved the first perfect pyramid in his red pyramid,
but he made some major mistakes along the way
231
00:22:45,409 --> 00:22:48,369
his first attempt at a true pyramid ended in disaster

232
00:22:51,350 --> 00:22:55,870
He started a structure on an area of desert where the Bedrock was a little unstable

233
00:22:59,029 --> 00:23:02,888
So as the sides rose the foundations starts to crack

234
00:23:08,070 --> 00:23:14,059
In a desperate bid to lessen the load halfway up, they reduced the angle of the
pyramid solids

235
00:23:16,410 --> 00:23:20,779
creating the bent pyramid but at some price

236
00:23:22,620 --> 00:23:29,540
The pyramids glaringly in perfect shape broke the rules of Mars devaluing it as a
resurrection machine

237
00:23:33,870 --> 00:23:40,130
[snapper] II was lucky enough to reign for more than 50 years [long] enough to
start over and finally achieve his goal

238
00:23:46,740 --> 00:23:49,099
Because we couldn't gamble on having that luxury

239
00:23:49,350 --> 00:23:52,670
he might only have one shot at getting his pyramid rise and

240
00:23:53,130 --> 00:23:58,729
His priority was to ensure that his pyramid was built on solid foundations

241
00:23:59,730 --> 00:24:04,040
Who was definitely looking to not repeat the mistakes of father me?

242
00:24:04,410 --> 00:24:11,660
He's looking for a place where the limestone foundation is a bit stronger where he
can actually use that to his advantage?

243
00:24:12,300 --> 00:24:15,080
to construct an enormous monument

244
00:24:16,260 --> 00:24:19,670
That's why in a land made up, Mostly Modern sand

245
00:24:20,160 --> 00:24:24,769
Koufos surveyors identified the perfect spot as the stony plateau of Giza

246
00:24:29,170 --> 00:24:35,580
Ghita Bedrock promised Khufu solid foundation, but it also brought another big
bonus an

247
00:24:37,720 --> 00:24:41,549
inexhaustible supply of quality Limestone a

248
00:24:48,340 --> 00:24:54,329
Quarry right [on] the pyramids doorstep at a stroke would cut millions of man-hours
from the project

249
00:24:55,810 --> 00:25:01,200
People may be thinking you know my sons could build here as well. [I] can set up
[a] sort of family

250
00:25:01,720 --> 00:25:06,360
generation of tombs on this one site because the plateau is so large and

251
00:25:07,690 --> 00:25:11,940
I can house my workforce nearby I can put them off at the edge of the plateau

252
00:25:12,280 --> 00:25:17,820
Near to the cultivation area and so it's a site that has a lot [of] different
things going for it

253
00:25:26,170 --> 00:25:33,479
The pyramid was swallow almost two and a half million blocks of Limestone playing
an average of two 1/2 tons each

254
00:25:35,950 --> 00:25:41,519
Some of the blocks at the base of the pyramid were even heavier as much as 15
[tonnes]

255
00:25:43,480 --> 00:25:45,780
Khufu and his engineers [that] made a good start

256
00:25:46,420 --> 00:25:49,289
solid foundations and an abundance of stone

257
00:25:50,230 --> 00:25:52,230
But they still faced a big challenge
258
00:25:54,580 --> 00:25:57,839
They had to ensure [that] every stage was constructed

259
00:25:58,480 --> 00:25:59,950
absolutely level

260
00:25:59,950 --> 00:26:03,929
If it was rising even slightly out of line it would be imperfect

261
00:26:04,780 --> 00:26:08,879
Useless a disabled insult to the very gods it was aiming [to] delight

262
00:26:17,440 --> 00:26:21,599
egyptologists believe that the engineer used a basic, but effective leveling device

263
00:26:24,910 --> 00:26:32,609
Two pieces of wood the same [lengths] were fixed to a cross piece creating an
iSosceles triangle and a mark was made precisely

264
00:26:33,010 --> 00:26:35,010
Halfway on the Cross piece a

265
00:26:37,510 --> 00:26:44,640
Plumb line hung from the Apex intersected the cross piece at the Fastway Mark only
when it was placed on level surface

266
00:26:46,870 --> 00:26:53,130
Pyramids called a square level allowed the engineers to check that every stone was
perfectly horizontal

267
00:26:55,090 --> 00:26:58,410
The Device was simple but incredibly effective

268
00:26:59,660 --> 00:27:04,279
As [Cooper's] great project started to take shape each side of the pyramid base

269
00:27:04,680 --> 00:27:07,729
over two football fields long were almost

270
00:27:08,280 --> 00:27:10,110
perfectly horizontal

271
00:27:10,110 --> 00:27:12,110
less than an inch out
272
00:27:25,590 --> 00:27:29,360
At the quarry workers faced a daunting daily schedule

273
00:27:30,690 --> 00:27:33,649
In a 10-day week, they only had one day of rest

274
00:27:34,350 --> 00:27:40,579
We know that the teams of quarry men cut and delivered one stone block every three
minutes to the pyramid

275
00:27:41,039 --> 00:27:45,498
each Limestone block was hacked from the Rock face and cut to size in situ

276
00:27:46,619 --> 00:27:48,619
They had really simple tools

277
00:27:49,110 --> 00:27:51,499
primitive stone Pounders and chiseled made of copper

278
00:27:51,629 --> 00:27:57,498
Which is a vertically soft metal my dude limestone is easier to cut than many other
kinds of stone

279
00:27:58,110 --> 00:28:01,789
The ancient egyptians used the same tools to cut [stone] for centuries

280
00:28:01,860 --> 00:28:09,379
And it would be another five hundred years before they started using bronze to
create a new generation of much tougher tools

281
00:28:10,590 --> 00:28:17,269
Like their forerunners Cooper's builders relied on dogged persistence and shear man
numbers to succeed

282
00:28:18,809 --> 00:28:25,638
The fundamental thing about egyptian technology [at] this time is its practical
technology. They

283
00:28:26,220 --> 00:28:30,919
Don't really go in suspect [that'd] stuff it what we need to get the job done

284
00:28:31,470 --> 00:28:34,100
And that's really as far as they wish to go

285
00:28:35,770 --> 00:28:40,470
Once each stone was roughly prepared the quarry workers had to get into the
building site

286
00:28:41,290 --> 00:28:48,779
Even though the quarry was beside the pyramid it was unmanned [ahthe] undertaking
most of the stones were many tons in weight

287
00:28:50,950 --> 00:28:57,059
so how did they carry [6] million tons of stone up the side of the emerging pyramid

288
00:28:57,970 --> 00:29:01,110
Once again, it seems [the] solution was simple and practical

289
00:29:05,680 --> 00:29:10,289
They're near neighbours the sumerians had been using wheeled carts for over a
thousand years

290
00:29:13,450 --> 00:29:16,319
[Pcs] engineers would certainly have been aware of the technology

291
00:29:18,220 --> 00:29:23,519
But the sheer weight [of] the stones and the [buildup] [of] sand would have made
cars hugely impractical

292
00:29:25,000 --> 00:29:28,079
the Egyptians opted for the most straightforward approach

293
00:29:36,430 --> 00:29:42,029
They built an enormous ramp and simply drag the blocks on wooden sleds

294
00:29:43,920 --> 00:29:50,149
The Ramp was made from quarried rubble and stone [and] [lined] [would-wouldn't]
[red] to help the sled move more easily

295
00:29:54,510 --> 00:29:58,010
the Rapid sled system had been around for at least a century and

296
00:29:58,230 --> 00:30:03,439
It allowed 20 men to hold two tons lots of stone at the side of [a] pyramid in

297
00:30:03,750 --> 00:30:10,369
The past the Egyptians refusal to use wagons has been seen as an example of their
entrenched traditionalism

298
00:30:10,920 --> 00:30:14,989
Not so these men are just systematically getting the job done

299
00:30:16,740 --> 00:30:23,120
That said it's a low-tech labor-intensive solution. That is brutally tough on the
workers

300
00:30:25,800 --> 00:30:28,969
No matter how you cut it building a pyramid is back-breaking work

301
00:30:30,450 --> 00:30:37,970
We actually [have] the bones of some of the men that build these pyramids and they
all show the strain and stress of its construction

302
00:30:39,570 --> 00:30:42,830
The work of Skeletons are a grim record of their lives

303
00:30:45,610 --> 00:30:47,610
broken Or deformed bones

304
00:30:48,130 --> 00:30:50,489
severed Limbs damaged Spine

305
00:30:51,460 --> 00:30:56,279
[tests] [suggest] that the men's average Lifespan was just 32 years

306
00:30:57,130 --> 00:30:59,760
compared to 55 for a member of the mobility

307
00:31:01,960 --> 00:31:05,819
punishing price the [Cooper's] workers paid without complaint

308
00:31:06,430 --> 00:31:10,710
Because their [labour] [secured] skill and their immortality

309
00:31:11,620 --> 00:31:14,669
As long as the job could be completed in time

310
00:31:25,510 --> 00:31:29,549
stone by Stone [Cooper's] great pyramid was slowly taking [shape]

311
00:31:31,900 --> 00:31:33,990
the blocks arrived unfinished the

312
00:31:35,200 --> 00:31:40,439
[underneath] on one side were carved flat but on site Mason's finish the services
313
00:31:40,930 --> 00:31:45,060
Smoothing the sides and then atop to create perfectly leveled faces

314
00:31:47,440 --> 00:31:52,289
this [mystic] Workforce brought with them their own logistical problems

315
00:31:55,780 --> 00:32:00,450
Around 25,000 men are generally thought to ab work on his grand project

316
00:32:03,620 --> 00:32:08,620
[4,000] cutting calling and finishing stones and more than 20,000 [of] support jobs

317
00:32:14,030 --> 00:32:20,920
Over the course of the year that accounted for around 1 in 30 of EgyPt's male
population working on the pyramid

318
00:32:24,380 --> 00:32:26,800
one of the most exciting discoveries of recent years

319
00:32:27,200 --> 00:32:31,659
Someone you feel just a breath away from the long bed have been the work of Village

320
00:32:33,260 --> 00:32:38,739
Once again, it seemed khufu Solution was characteristically pragmatic and single-
Minded

321
00:32:39,770 --> 00:32:44,739
He ordered an entire town to be built just half a mile from the pyramid site

322
00:32:47,090 --> 00:32:51,850
For some such as stonemasons and other master craftsmen it was their home for over
20 years

323
00:32:56,380 --> 00:33:04,080
The cottage was basic, but a town had a sophisticated infrastructure with Baker's
posters and brewers even teachers and physician

324
00:33:05,920 --> 00:33:11,159
Scribblings from Ordinary Egyptians, so if there was a community spirit and a
buzzing [street] scene

325
00:33:12,730 --> 00:33:19,020
If you're coming to work on the pyramid for two three ten years you have your
entire family [house] [there]
326
00:33:19,540 --> 00:33:21,540
Your children have to go to school there

327
00:33:23,200 --> 00:33:27,539
You will have medical facilities. They'll get places for entertainment

328
00:33:28,630 --> 00:33:34,890
All the women will have their jobs, so it is a very large thriving bustling city

329
00:33:36,370 --> 00:33:42,479
Each worker almost certainly got a daily ration of ten [loaves] for a family and a
generous beer ration

330
00:33:44,290 --> 00:33:46,979
Kapil and Farmers must have seen the high life

331
00:33:50,290 --> 00:33:56,369
all the people who are working for [the] [king] are being very well fed much better
than if they had stayed home and

332
00:33:56,620 --> 00:34:00,120
[remained] peasants on the land because the [king] gives them meat and

333
00:34:00,550 --> 00:34:07,050
Poultry and fish and bread and beer plus extra rations that they can send back to
their extended families

334
00:34:07,390 --> 00:34:10,890
At home, so they are really getting food fit for okay?

335
00:34:12,690 --> 00:34:17,960
Organizing the thousands of men into an effective Coherent Workforce was perhaps
the biggest challenge

336
00:34:22,980 --> 00:34:25,009
the Egyptian achieved a [level] of coordination

337
00:34:25,950 --> 00:34:33,889
Efficiency and camaraderie that would put many modern building projects to shame if
their ability to organize because no

338
00:34:34,349 --> 00:34:36,649
rabble would ever have been able to build

339
00:34:37,289 --> 00:34:41,748
of any of the pyramids [they] are given if they were given a century to do, so

340
00:34:42,899 --> 00:34:47,689
The Foreman Devised a complex chain of command that ensures everything then like
clockwork

341
00:34:51,490 --> 00:34:55,080
They divided the main work force of 4,000 into two crews

342
00:34:56,470 --> 00:35:03,330
These crews were then split into two gangs and these divided down further finally
reaching units of ten

343
00:35:05,859 --> 00:35:11,519
The system insured everyone knew exactly his daily targets and [who] he answered to
it

344
00:35:15,280 --> 00:35:22,889
was hardly a coincidence that these basic [10-man] units were also the ideal number
to work on a single block making each unit the

345
00:35:23,109 --> 00:35:25,109
driving Force of the build

346
00:35:25,570 --> 00:35:31,019
Splitty workers into these small groups made the project's easier to control and
have an added bonus

347
00:35:33,430 --> 00:35:38,070
Their overseers could up the work rate by introducing Little competition

348
00:35:40,190 --> 00:35:46,150
The first [teams] to hit the overseas Target [will] be rewarded with extra beer
ration

349
00:35:52,220 --> 00:35:55,660
There definitely are psychological tricks better in play here

350
00:35:55,910 --> 00:35:57,620
Ways to get these guys to [work]

351
00:35:57,620 --> 00:36:03,519
Faster ways [to] get them to compete a little bit to get [that] stone raised a
little higher to get that extra block in place

352
00:36:03,520 --> 00:36:05,520
before the end of the day

353
00:36:16,449 --> 00:36:19,859
It must have seemed like achingly slow progress

354
00:36:20,619 --> 00:36:26,188
But stone by stone the world's largest building projects began to take [shape]

355
00:36:30,410 --> 00:36:36,160
In the old Kingdom the pharaoh was truly a remote figure a [God] [king]

356
00:36:37,400 --> 00:36:42,849
If he visited the [signs] at all would have been thrilling for the workers lucky
enough to catch a glimpse of him

357
00:36:51,089 --> 00:36:56,539
The King's person has definitely such a supernatural or about it

358
00:36:57,869 --> 00:37:04,699
So if you were doing work on the pyramid and he was appearing that certainly would
be quite something to tell your grandchildren about

359
00:37:06,390 --> 00:37:10,099
Once the foundations were in place the pyramid reached a critical phase

360
00:37:16,500 --> 00:37:22,040
Using later Evidence we can extrapolate back to this period To envisage the task
ahead of the workers

361
00:37:23,520 --> 00:37:28,819
Deep in what would become its core engineers constructed their pharaohs burial
chamber?

362
00:37:31,660 --> 00:37:34,139
This was where his mummified body would be aid

363
00:37:36,339 --> 00:37:43,229
After intense religious ceremony the belief was that he could begin to make a
journey to meet his makers

364
00:37:47,769 --> 00:37:55,379
father khufu expected to join the gods after his death it was vital that his body
remained preserved and

365
00:37:55,930 --> 00:37:57,930
untouched
366
00:37:58,720 --> 00:38:03,539
Khufu was the first king to decide that his body should be sealed up in one of
these

367
00:38:04,150 --> 00:38:05,710
It's a sarcophagus

368
00:38:05,710 --> 00:38:07,710
and the word translates as

369
00:38:08,319 --> 00:38:09,819
flesh-eater

370
00:38:09,819 --> 00:38:15,359
This has been carved out of solid granite which was the toughest rock available to
the egyptians

371
00:38:15,640 --> 00:38:21,989
And really it's a kind of fortress the corpses and you can see that this one's got
some decoration down here

372
00:38:21,989 --> 00:38:24,209
but khufu tomb was

373
00:38:25,089 --> 00:38:26,769
Absolutely [your] steer

374
00:38:26,769 --> 00:38:33,569
It was a simplicity that was designed to put people off the scent because rammed
and here were rich

375
00:38:34,059 --> 00:38:38,998
Ritual Goods that were accompany khufu on a glittering Journey to the afterlife

376
00:38:40,180 --> 00:38:43,680
Of course, it's all the mind-blown [ly] beautiful stuff in here

377
00:38:43,930 --> 00:38:48,989
That's attracted to raiders, and I'll kill just the like over the centuries

378
00:38:50,920 --> 00:38:57,989
and that was the pharaohs living nightmare if truth his body was harmed or removed
the tomb tampered with

379
00:38:58,359 --> 00:39:06,088
His eternal soul would perish leaving his people unprotected and his [molé] during
court shot out of Paradise

380
00:39:08,849 --> 00:39:11,569
paradoxically of course the sheer scale of a pyramid

381
00:39:12,180 --> 00:39:15,859
advertised the pharaohs treasure [filled] to far and wide

382
00:39:16,380 --> 00:39:18,920
making it a magnet for tomb robbers

383
00:39:22,830 --> 00:39:27,169
EgyPt's first ever pyramid the Step [pyramid] was created by the Pharaoh dJoser

384
00:39:28,470 --> 00:39:29,839
To protect his mummy

385
00:39:29,839 --> 00:39:36,709
He had a build of excavate nearly 100 feet into the Bedrock beneath the pyramid to
create a secret burial chamber

386
00:39:37,710 --> 00:39:39,710
but in the early 19th century

387
00:39:39,900 --> 00:39:45,589
When opportunist Adventurers reached the interior they found that it had been
devastated [by] thieves

388
00:39:46,170 --> 00:39:53,899
Then when archaeologists finally penetrated the burial chamber itself in the 1930s
all that was left were a few pitiful fragments

389
00:39:57,620 --> 00:40:04,899
Khufu's Fear was to meet a fate such as this so his design team ensured that the
main passages could be blocked

390
00:40:05,600 --> 00:40:07,600
Rock-Solid after burial

391
00:40:08,930 --> 00:40:14,500
To deter the tomb robbers his engineers also constructed his burial chamber from
granite

392
00:40:15,590 --> 00:40:17,829
The stone was specially sourced from a quarry

393
00:40:18,710 --> 00:40:24,310
580 miles away, it's Harder than steel and near impossible to Tunnel through

394
00:40:24,860 --> 00:40:26,860
But the chamber was just the start

395
00:40:31,040 --> 00:40:34,300
His chief engineer devised a further set of security features

396
00:40:35,900 --> 00:40:43,840
When the pharaohs body was placed on the burial chamber [a] series of three granite
slabs would be lowered into place ceilings inside

397
00:40:45,650 --> 00:40:50,290
At the third line of defense another series of giant slabs would be released

398
00:40:50,750 --> 00:40:56,439
Bulking the ascending corridor that links the chamber to the main entrance passage
with impregnable granite

399
00:40:56,990 --> 00:40:59,830
Khufu believed his pyramid would be a fortress

400
00:41:02,400 --> 00:41:07,700
But as the pyramid grew it seems that the engineers discovered a potential flaw in
their plans

401
00:41:08,760 --> 00:41:11,959
This burial chamber was the first ever to be built with a slat

402
00:41:12,030 --> 00:41:17,630
Granite [ceiling] and they feared that it might not be strong enough to support the
[weight] of the pyramid above

403
00:41:18,870 --> 00:41:24,140
With the specter of smitheroons [bend] pyramid before them they decided to make
double sure

404
00:41:26,580 --> 00:41:29,269
They devised a series of stress relieving Chambers

405
00:41:30,000 --> 00:41:31,470
sixty eight feet high
406
00:41:31,470 --> 00:41:38,090
Above the burial chamber [at] the top huge lintels were intended to channel the
immense load away from the chamber itself

407
00:41:39,510 --> 00:41:46,790
Today we know that these relieving chambers were completely useless, but they
clearly set the ancient architects minds at rest

408
00:41:52,620 --> 00:41:56,660
We believe it took two decades for the pyramid to reach its final stages

409
00:41:57,870 --> 00:42:01,489
Khufu had divided to see his pyramid climb to an iMpressive height

410
00:42:03,330 --> 00:42:05,749
But the work was fast and finished

411
00:42:07,620 --> 00:42:15,529
polished stone cladding would transform the pyramid from a pile of carefully laid
stones into [a] deadly monument a beacon and

412
00:42:15,900 --> 00:42:17,900
Aesthetic as well as an architectural triumph

413
00:42:20,080 --> 00:42:23,340
His workers still many months of hard labor ahead of them

414
00:42:26,260 --> 00:42:32,489
Highly skilled Stonemasons [encase] the rough [Hewn] steps blocks with high-quality
white limestone

415
00:42:34,120 --> 00:42:38,969
They had to ensure the casing stones fitted against each other perfectly with no
visible [gas]

416
00:42:41,119 --> 00:42:46,179
Then they carved and polished the limestone to an iridescent smooth finish

417
00:42:49,730 --> 00:42:52,480
They work the chisels that were just a third of an inch wide

418
00:42:54,230 --> 00:43:00,580
Full time tutor short nose toils alongside the stonemasons to keep them supplied
with freshly honed blades

419
00:43:02,330 --> 00:43:05,409
the casing stones which when they're added [to]

420
00:43:06,140 --> 00:43:12,100
Pyramids change their appearance completely rather than being sort of Fairly dull

421
00:43:12,830 --> 00:43:20,169
These casing blocks are fairly highly polished and with the sun in the right
direction. They almost make the compare me to glean

422
00:43:20,810 --> 00:43:22,810
Almost like it's made [of] polished silver

423
00:43:25,670 --> 00:43:28,420
But the finish was more than just cosmetic

424
00:43:31,530 --> 00:43:34,729
Anyone approaching confused pyramid after it's been sealed up

425
00:43:34,730 --> 00:43:41,840
[we'll] have no idea how on Earth anything could have been placed inside it or how
you would even try to get into it

426
00:43:42,120 --> 00:43:44,630
It'll just be [one] huge smooth-sided pyramid

427
00:43:45,540 --> 00:43:47,540
all structure

428
00:43:48,600 --> 00:43:54,410
When the casing was completed it concealed all trace of the entrance to Khufu's
chamber [just]

429
00:43:56,610 --> 00:44:00,829
[Imagine] it his pyramid with a giant shimmering slime

430
00:44:01,500 --> 00:44:07,489
Inscrutable puzzle a puzzle [the] khufu and his engineers must have [believed] was
impossible to crack

431
00:44:13,170 --> 00:44:19,250
[20] years after he started the pharaoh khufu had survived to see his masterpiece
complete

432
00:44:20,790 --> 00:44:27,499
He and his subjects had won his race with death and in the process had created a
benchmark

433
00:44:27,720 --> 00:44:29,720
human Civilization

434
00:44:46,690 --> 00:44:50,069
khufu in the End was probably the most bodacious of pharaohs if

435
00:44:50,350 --> 00:44:55,620
He wanted to be guaranteed to have a complete pyramid when he died he should have
built a smaller one

436
00:44:55,690 --> 00:45:00,839
But in fact he built the largest ever built there was no guarantee that we was
going to live long enough to see it even

437
00:45:00,840 --> 00:45:02,830
half Complete

438
00:45:02,830 --> 00:45:06,420
combining simple technology with extraordinary resolve and determination

439
00:45:07,330 --> 00:45:09,420
if people have delivered the vision

440
00:45:10,030 --> 00:45:12,030
It must have been a proud

441
00:45:12,250 --> 00:45:18,029
Inspiring moment the fact that you've probably outdone what your grandfather did
when he was looking for snap through?

442
00:45:18,430 --> 00:45:25,950
Must have given a certain satisfaction there and possibly also feeling that having
done [it] that much probably no

443
00:45:25,950 --> 00:45:27,460
There's ever going to quite

444
00:45:27,460 --> 00:45:29,460
manage something quite that big again

445
00:45:37,610 --> 00:45:43,400
The Egyptians are rejoicing the pyramid is complete the afterlife of the [king] is
ensured
446
00:45:43,400 --> 00:45:50,539
He will join with the gods he will preserve order in the afterlife, so this is a
time when all of egypt is in celebration

447
00:45:53,190 --> 00:45:59,960
Khufu built, the pyramid at Giza that was the tallest structure in the world and
remained so for four thousand years

448
00:46:03,989 --> 00:46:06,559
But the Pharaoh barely had time to enjoy it

449
00:46:13,080 --> 00:46:20,959
Having against the odds [seen] his pyramid completed khufu died by our standards
probably still only a middle-aged man

450
00:46:27,989 --> 00:46:33,649
For over two decades [an] entire country had worked and planned for one moment

451
00:46:35,249 --> 00:46:40,399
Now they would lay their pharaoh to rest in his resurrection chamber

452
00:46:53,570 --> 00:46:57,580
From the chamber they were convinced that his spirit would ascend to the heavens

453
00:46:58,910 --> 00:47:05,800
As long as his body remained safe for eternity when the time came he would help
their own [souls] to make the same journey

454
00:47:09,510 --> 00:47:15,080
The engineers had created two sharks over 200 feet long on either side of the
chamber

455
00:47:17,580 --> 00:47:23,360
These were the secret passages through which the [pharaoh] spirit could leave and
re-enter the pyramid

456
00:47:27,120 --> 00:47:29,989
Now his spirit would reside among the stars in Heaven

457
00:47:30,960 --> 00:47:32,960
home of the Gods

458
00:47:33,060 --> 00:47:38,689
There he would repay his people's great sacrifice by guarding over them for
eternity
459
00:47:45,720 --> 00:47:52,520
As for the generations of egyptians that followed khufu it must have seemed that
the great pyramid was proving. It's worth

460
00:47:53,070 --> 00:47:55,070
reaping Rich rewards

461
00:47:56,190 --> 00:48:01,820
Egypt was prosperous and peaceful Cooper's son and Grandson built their own
pyramids on the Giza Plateau

462
00:48:05,520 --> 00:48:07,610
but none surpassed khufu

463
00:48:08,310 --> 00:48:13,009
extremely [monument] it [remained] the pinnacle of ancient Egypt pyramid builders

464
00:48:13,650 --> 00:48:16,759
& Khufu's Divine Status was assured

465
00:48:19,320 --> 00:48:23,179
Centuries are for his death. He was still worshipped to the powerful. God

466
00:48:24,840 --> 00:48:29,360
And [it] been suggested that the Sphinx World-famous and still resolutely enigmatic

467
00:48:29,970 --> 00:48:34,130
might even have been a tribute to the now legendary, God king

468
00:48:36,800 --> 00:48:42,429
after khufu drain egypt, enjoyed almost 400 years of Unbroken Peace and prosperity

469
00:48:43,880 --> 00:48:49,450
The country was stable its people fled peacefully in their beds at night their
stomachs were full

470
00:48:53,750 --> 00:49:00,250
It seemed as if the gods were happy but [sometimes] [soon] the spell would have to
break

471
00:49:01,790 --> 00:49:06,009
Khufu's Cosmic Insurance, Policy would no longer offer any protection

472
00:49:21,290 --> 00:49:28,359
Eventually the stability of egypt descended into Chaos & Khufu's Architectural
achievements were never matched

473
00:49:31,170 --> 00:49:36,709
This Visionary Pharaoh illuminated the old kingdom during the early stages of
Egypt's development

474
00:49:38,519 --> 00:49:44,659
Khufu was Lucky. He lived in an age of wealth a time of twenty relatively free of
the threat of invasion

475
00:49:45,539 --> 00:49:49,609
Without the distraction of War famine or epidemic disease

476
00:49:49,709 --> 00:49:55,639
This was your hair time when an entire generation could dedicate themselves to a
single project of national

477
00:49:56,430 --> 00:49:58,430
importance

478
00:50:08,710 --> 00:50:12,809
But the fundamental purpose of the pyramid was to deliver their pharaoh

479
00:50:13,600 --> 00:50:19,890
Immortality and preserve their kings body they created the greatest fortress tomb
in history

480
00:50:26,920 --> 00:50:33,059
They believed that it ingenious security system would form an impassable [barrier]
to even the most determined

481
00:50:33,430 --> 00:50:35,849
to mothers for eternity

482
00:50:40,859 --> 00:50:42,509
820 Ad

483
00:50:42,509 --> 00:50:50,419
long after the ancient Egyptian Empire had fallen an Arab [Kali's] something for
Treasure tried to tunnel into the great pyramid

484
00:50:52,160 --> 00:50:58,119
Meeting the first set of granite blocks it men tunneled over them entering into the
passageway ceiling

485
00:50:59,810 --> 00:51:03,620
And on reaching the [slags] bar on the entrance to Cooper's burial chamber

486
00:51:04,110 --> 00:51:07,939
They simply chiseled through the doorframe, but a granite was thinner

487
00:51:09,589 --> 00:51:13,629
But inside they discovered it empty

488
00:51:16,130 --> 00:51:18,130
someone had got their first

489
00:51:18,650 --> 00:51:22,450
Khufu's Mummy along with the unimaginable Treasures had gone

490
00:51:23,480 --> 00:51:29,139
Ultimately to through the lifetime mission to protect his remains, but all eternity
has failed

491
00:51:35,970 --> 00:51:38,150
Khufu is not having the good afterlife

492
00:51:38,700 --> 00:51:46,069
the whole point in building this pyramid was to get into the afterlife [this] was
what was so important and because

493
00:51:46,590 --> 00:51:49,459
his remains don't last his job was

494
00:51:50,010 --> 00:51:51,780
completely unfinished

495
00:51:51,780 --> 00:51:58,190
In the end khufu and his people were betrayed by descendants from new
civilizations. They could only imagine

496
00:52:02,610 --> 00:52:04,610
They're carefully laid plans

497
00:52:04,830 --> 00:52:12,049
Preserving the Kings body in a work of art to guarantee his and their own
immortality were pathetically frustrated

498
00:52:14,850 --> 00:52:20,989
Actually really lucky to be talking about khufu at all because his name was nearly
forgotten by history
499
00:52:21,930 --> 00:52:23,930
He is named checked in a few places

500
00:52:24,300 --> 00:52:26,659
on the walls of tombs of High-ranking

501
00:52:26,880 --> 00:52:32,719
Officials and priests and on a few artifacts that there's a really lovely little
statuette where its main checked

502
00:52:32,970 --> 00:52:36,740
But none of this evidence is very articulate all very expensive

503
00:52:37,350 --> 00:52:43,579
We even here on this inscription. [we] just get his name and the fact that he was
associated with the God horus

504
00:52:44,340 --> 00:52:48,079
It's very hard to get a sense of the real man

505
00:52:51,119 --> 00:52:56,629
But poof ooh the master builder does live on thanks to the great pyramid

506
00:52:57,509 --> 00:52:59,839
Through it he has triumphed over death

507
00:53:00,720 --> 00:53:08,569
He illuminated the old [kingdom], and he still commands the respect of men and
women born over [4000] years after his death

508
00:53:10,229 --> 00:53:14,359
Now he will always be remembered as EgyPt's most visionary Pharaoh

509
00:53:17,630 --> 00:53:20,890
Remarkably though idiot would later become much more powerful

510
00:53:21,560 --> 00:53:29,409
Who'd be more than a thousand years [before] a pharaoh appeared who could begin to
Match Khufu's architectural achievements

511
00:53:37,820 --> 00:53:45,759
after the death of the great pharaoh of the pyramid Era khufu egypt enjoyed almost
400 years of unbroken peace and prosperity

512
00:53:47,420 --> 00:53:49,869
but then the unthinkable happened

513
00:53:55,100 --> 00:54:01,509
The River Nile Egypt's beating heart and the source of all its wealth went bad

514
00:54:08,680 --> 00:54:10,680
EgyPt prosperity

515
00:54:11,109 --> 00:54:16,709
Fundamentally relies on the nile flood if a nile that is too high or too low

516
00:54:17,290 --> 00:54:22,199
[famines] going to result [you're] not going to have your crops properly watered or
everything's we washed away

517
00:54:23,260 --> 00:54:27,629
Nowadays, it's fairly clearly understood that is what brought it all to an end

518
00:54:30,970 --> 00:54:32,970
When the nile was reduced to a trickle

519
00:54:33,880 --> 00:54:37,260
crops failed and flies by Famine followed

520
00:54:38,319 --> 00:54:40,319
The Gods were obviously unhappy

521
00:54:41,109 --> 00:54:46,769
The privileged relationship the pharaohs apparently had with the immortals had gone
sour

522
00:54:47,290 --> 00:54:54,509
The Kings lose control they [no] longer are perceived as being strong [and]
powerful the way khufu certainly was in his day

523
00:54:55,180 --> 00:54:57,569
They can't control. What's happening

524
00:54:58,420 --> 00:55:00,010
egypt eventually recovered

525
00:55:00,010 --> 00:55:07,050
But after a second period of prosperity the nile failed [pharaohs] again believing
their people vulnerable to another threat

526
00:55:08,260 --> 00:55:10,770
Invasion by our people [call] the hits off

527
00:55:17,970 --> 00:55:23,089
They are a conquering force they come with chariots that the egyptians haven't seen
before they come with

528
00:55:23,250 --> 00:55:26,209
composite bows that have much better range and accuracy

529
00:55:26,849 --> 00:55:30,259
They come with a force that touches egypt by surprise

530
00:55:31,770 --> 00:55:34,759
The Country fell to the invader

531
00:55:44,450 --> 00:55:51,609
You have something which has never occurred before and which khufu certainly never
would have thought to have occurred that you have non

532
00:55:51,769 --> 00:55:54,758
egyptians in control the Significant portion of the country

533
00:55:55,730 --> 00:55:59,019
the Hyksos ruled the North of Egypt for over a century [but]

534
00:55:59,750 --> 00:56:02,079
Eventually the egyptians managed to expel them

535
00:56:07,960 --> 00:56:15,180
Their territory was finally back in the hands of the egyptians just as the nile
recovered to feed its land once more

536
00:56:17,440 --> 00:56:20,729
New leaders Emerged and were crowned as God kings

537
00:56:23,400 --> 00:56:27,420
The bond between the Pharaoh and the people had been stretched and weakened

538
00:56:31,360 --> 00:56:37,239
In [Kufa] Vera Egypt knew little but peaceful prosperity and pharaohs took the
credit

539
00:56:38,000 --> 00:56:44,380
That the cataclysmic events of the intervening centuries showed the people that
their God kings were not all-powerful
540
00:56:45,020 --> 00:56:48,430
after all and their borders were far from impregnable

541
00:56:49,910 --> 00:56:55,389
And then a new pharaoh appeared he would equal khufu his ambition

542
00:57:01,170 --> 00:57:05,180
12 centuries after the death of Khufu Egypt was once again on the rise

543
00:57:07,200 --> 00:57:09,679
there was now a genuine superpower a

544
00:57:10,500 --> 00:57:15,559
United Country with an extensive Empire in Africa and on the fringes of the middle
East

545
00:57:16,350 --> 00:57:17,550
and

546
00:57:17,550 --> 00:57:24,680
It seemed the personal ambition of this new pharaoh was a match for EgyPt's rich
and vast

547
00:57:25,230 --> 00:57:27,230
Geographical reach

548
00:57:29,310 --> 00:57:35,389
he was one of the most famous Pharaoh's at the new Kingdom Rammurthy is the second
a

549
00:57:37,350 --> 00:57:44,330
King with unshakeable self-confidence and then not from the leafstalk who has to be
[fittest] powerful of his

550
00:57:44,580 --> 00:57:47,359
Predecessors, but who by mastering the art of Warfare?

551
00:57:48,030 --> 00:57:50,030
politics and Propaganda

552
00:57:50,550 --> 00:57:55,159
Excels in a complex world which posed an imagined threat?

553
00:57:56,370 --> 00:57:59,990
the achievements and ramasees II became popular mythology

554
00:58:00,840 --> 00:58:04,790
This was a man whose ambitions changed the world

555
00:58:09,660 --> 00:58:11,899
He lived in the 13th Century BC

556
00:58:15,060 --> 00:58:17,509
he was the son [of] the Great Pharaoh Seti

557
00:58:22,450 --> 00:58:28,560
Who wasted no time [in] having his priest anoint his eldest son as heir to the
throne

558
00:58:31,870 --> 00:58:36,449
Ramasees was born into the 19th dynasty [a] line of immense wealth and influence

559
00:58:39,280 --> 00:58:47,100
These new bloods had overseen a renaissance in the empire and rameses would go on
to become the most iconic [pharaoh] of the [new] Kingdom

560
00:58:49,930 --> 00:58:52,290
To understand the scale of his achievements

561
00:58:52,290 --> 00:58:57,179
They need to be put in the context of the empire that he had been born into and in
particular

562
00:58:57,670 --> 00:59:02,639
How that territory had evolved in the [1300] years since the old kingdom?

563
00:59:04,760 --> 00:59:06,760
oh

564
00:59:09,670 --> 00:59:16,889
The pharaohs of the old Kingdom were blessed with wealth, but they had also enjoyed
something quite unknown to ramasees in his family

565
00:59:18,609 --> 00:59:20,410
security

566
00:59:20,410 --> 00:59:28,049
During his earlier period Egypt had been virtually free from the threat of invasion
and there were other signs that the gods were happy
567
00:59:33,069 --> 00:59:35,189
The nile was full and flowing

568
00:59:35,470 --> 00:59:41,099
Its annual floods which in nutrients ensured that the farmers enjoyed per harvest

569
00:59:44,259 --> 00:59:51,419
and as the living breathing conduit to the gods the old pharaoh's took the credit
for this period of abundance

570
00:59:52,210 --> 00:59:57,210
The Kuda allowed them to mastermind architectural projects of breathtaking

571
00:59:57,880 --> 00:59:59,880
ambition

572
01:00:01,599 --> 01:00:08,399
Armies of workers were mobilized to build their pyramids the largest constructions
in the known world

573
01:00:10,930 --> 01:00:18,899
But although these [pharaoh's] could harness and exploit the manpower of an empire.
They will remote rulers worship from afAr

574
01:00:20,109 --> 01:00:22,109
rarely seen by their subject

575
01:00:23,829 --> 01:00:29,969
The pharaohs of the old Kingdom did things one way the ramses would living in
different times?

576
01:00:30,430 --> 01:00:32,579
He had to find his own path

577
01:00:34,630 --> 01:00:36,630
the

578
01:00:37,119 --> 01:00:43,529
single-Minded Divine image of the Pharaoh the pyramid building age had gone

579
01:00:44,800 --> 01:00:52,379
Although still a divine being in the new Kingdom. He is a little bit closer to
Earth

580
01:00:54,250 --> 01:00:57,149
Ramasees was clearly aware of that

581
01:01:03,460 --> 01:01:08,460
Ramasees father the Great [Sethi] Groomed him in this more exposed

582
01:01:09,220 --> 01:01:12,659
crowd-Pleasing role of Accessible accountable Pharaoh

583
01:01:13,810 --> 01:01:16,709
In ramses the Pharaoh has to work much harder at public relations

584
01:01:17,200 --> 01:01:21,990
He can't afford to hide in his palace and let the monuments do talking for him

585
01:01:22,390 --> 01:01:26,969
He has to appear regularly before his people and very carefully [staged] [craft]

586
01:01:28,270 --> 01:01:31,800
Ceremonies yet regularly so that they can see that he exists

587
01:01:32,440 --> 01:01:39,000
In the outer courtyards of the temples remedies as crown prince took care of
business with his father

588
01:01:40,240 --> 01:01:42,120
pyramids were part of a long distant

589
01:01:42,120 --> 01:01:49,019
Era the buildings were still central to the pharaohs authority and religious
symbolism was as potent as ever

590
01:01:50,980 --> 01:01:55,050
In a new Kingdom Giza was no longer the center of [Saronic] power

591
01:01:55,690 --> 01:02:00,929
The Heartland had shifted 400 miles south to Karnak on the nile

592
01:02:09,400 --> 01:02:11,730
the Temple complex at Karnak

593
01:02:13,390 --> 01:02:19,859
Like the Great pyramid [destructions] had secret power which offered a viable path
to the afterlife

594
01:02:20,770 --> 01:02:26,310
But unlike the elitist pyramids at Giza the contemporary temples were far more
accessible

595
01:02:29,250 --> 01:02:35,000
One of Ramsey's first tasks was to expand alongside his father this existing merger
site

596
01:02:37,710 --> 01:02:41,329
together they created the biggest temple complex ever built and

597
01:02:41,880 --> 01:02:46,910
crammed it with one of the great engineering achievements of the ancient world the

598
01:02:47,549 --> 01:02:49,549
[Hipa] styled Hall

599
01:02:51,770 --> 01:02:58,989
These halls form the route between the bustling outer temple courtyards and the
sacred areas deep within the architectural fantasy

600
01:03:01,640 --> 01:03:09,010
Supporting a massive stone ceiling were 134 towering Columns the tallest over 70
feet high

601
01:03:12,970 --> 01:03:18,750
At their base these shafts are so fake that it takes more than seven people holding
hands

602
01:03:18,910 --> 01:03:21,420
to encircle a single column

603
01:03:23,670 --> 01:03:30,740
But like the great pyramid builders of the old kingdom [Circus] engineers used
deceptively simple methods to build the hall

604
01:03:32,490 --> 01:03:38,270
as a column section derived from the quarry the builders stood one on top of the
other as

605
01:03:39,420 --> 01:03:47,149
A wolf the hall [rose] they feel that with sand [to] raise the floor so that each
new section could be easily set in place

606
01:03:50,250 --> 01:03:56,270
When the roof slab were on the workers drained the sand finishing the columns on
the way down
607
01:04:02,440 --> 01:04:09,510
like the ancient pyramids Karnak temples symbolized the search for perfection and
order within universal Chaos

608
01:04:11,740 --> 01:04:13,740
But they were more than symbolic

609
01:04:13,810 --> 01:04:20,729
The deities were thought to inhabit the inner sanctum where only the pharaoh and
his high priest could enter

610
01:04:22,600 --> 01:04:29,759
the hippest aisle hall ramasees great work was a kind of fossilized incarnation of
oral creation with the

611
01:04:34,090 --> 01:04:37,380
[great] Columns resembled giant Papyrus plans

612
01:04:38,410 --> 01:04:43,170
they represented the primeval marshland that covered the Earth at the dawn of
creation [A]

613
01:04:45,100 --> 01:04:49,709
Significant development in the cult of the afterlife gave this building even more
potency

614
01:04:51,760 --> 01:04:56,880
So when rama [seized] inherited the task of supervising the carving of the interior
of the hippest aisle hall

615
01:04:57,280 --> 01:05:00,479
He was continuing a cosmically vital task

616
01:05:03,890 --> 01:05:07,510
the Dead pharaohs spirit was no longer sustained in the heart of a massive pyramid

617
01:05:09,380 --> 01:05:14,049
It [mount] [with] it from the very stone and [the] paint of the statues and relief

618
01:05:17,470 --> 01:05:24,929
His artists were more than merely decorating this imagery was transforming the hall
into a potent source of religious and political

619
01:05:26,049 --> 01:05:28,049
power
620
01:05:29,330 --> 01:05:34,149
The Pharaoh in [waiting] was beginning [to] create the ramasees brand

621
01:05:35,180 --> 01:05:42,520
The temples are where the pharaoh projects his image there the billboards in which
he can advertise his glory and also his

622
01:05:42,980 --> 01:05:49,419
Faithfulness to the gods in parties trying to Impress the gods themselves, not just
the general populace so he has two audiences

623
01:05:59,800 --> 01:06:04,020
Religious association and image management were [only] classic ramasees training

624
01:06:06,340 --> 01:06:10,980
Still a teenager ramasees was put in charge of EgyPt's Elite fighting force

625
01:06:12,970 --> 01:06:20,490
They were highly trained super [fit] warriors able to endure long hard [months] of
fighting far from home

626
01:06:23,500 --> 01:06:29,039
Ramsey's Father said he had put him at home of the world's largest full-time army
for a reason

627
01:06:30,280 --> 01:06:34,560
Now a would-be Ruler had to prove he could command a professional army

628
01:06:35,230 --> 01:06:39,240
another important distinction between the world of the old Kingdom and a new

629
01:06:41,800 --> 01:06:45,989
The New Egypt had become just one of many competing superpowers each

630
01:06:46,390 --> 01:06:54,119
struggling for control of the region to the West it faced bandit libyans to the
east the might [of] the hittites and assyrians and

631
01:06:54,400 --> 01:06:57,960
To the South say the troublesome province of Nubia

632
01:07:00,160 --> 01:07:07,950
These were turbulent times and the rulers [of] the new kingdom couldn't take the
prosperity and peace of the old kingdom for granted

633
01:07:09,190 --> 01:07:13,409
So [ramses] was groomed in the skills of a Modern pharaoh

634
01:07:14,890 --> 01:07:17,879
military might like the Faith of his people

635
01:07:19,030 --> 01:07:21,479
I'm sure [Ramsey] can't wait to become pharaoh

636
01:07:21,640 --> 01:07:23,820
He's getting one of the best training that any

637
01:07:24,010 --> 01:07:29,310
future Pharaoh ever got of the hands of his father studied first who very carefully
prepares him to the throne but

638
01:07:30,280 --> 01:07:33,089
[of] course he wants to have to talk job for himself

639
01:07:35,310 --> 01:07:39,320
But when his chance came would he be up to the challenge?

640
01:07:54,960 --> 01:07:59,030
1290 BC the Pharaoh Seti died Suddenly

641
01:08:08,190 --> 01:08:11,149
ramasees was crowned ruler of egypt

642
01:08:21,359 --> 01:08:27,528
Like every Fairy before him the young ramasees expected to reach the afterlife and
become a god

643
01:08:27,870 --> 01:08:33,079
But before that he was determined to make [it] marked on the Mortal world

644
01:08:33,509 --> 01:08:37,939
This was clearly a man who wanted to be remembered in the history books

645
01:08:39,630 --> 01:08:46,430
He knew that in the new Era building great temples was not enough. He had to shed
blood

646
01:08:59,359 --> 01:09:02,349
Ramsey's when he exceeds to the throne and become king himself

647
01:09:03,530 --> 01:09:05,450
Now it's his turn to shine

648
01:09:05,450 --> 01:09:08,289
It's his turn to show the egyptians and to show

649
01:09:08,390 --> 01:09:14,979
the other powers of the near east [that] he is a powerful pharaoh and he can
compete on the [world] scale and

650
01:09:16,040 --> 01:09:19,660
[ramses] must have thought I can create for myself an empire of

651
01:09:20,300 --> 01:09:25,239
Magnificent proportions, I'm not just going to be immortalized in stone

652
01:09:25,430 --> 01:09:29,829
But I'm going to be immortalized by means of how far afield I can rule

653
01:09:40,580 --> 01:09:45,850
Just four years into his reign the young king unleashed his forces to [Egypt's]
[east]

654
01:09:48,650 --> 01:09:54,220
He skillfully subdued a string of small City-States in Canaan Modern-day Palestine
in Israel

655
01:09:55,190 --> 01:09:57,460
Securing a lucrative trading corridor

656
01:10:02,500 --> 01:10:05,939
ramasees Victories swelled the Royal Coffers and

657
01:10:06,520 --> 01:10:13,349
He lost no time in embarking on an epic building programs to thank the gods and to
proclaim

658
01:10:13,630 --> 01:10:15,489
to anyone who would listen

659
01:10:15,489 --> 01:10:17,489
his glorious triumphs

660
01:10:18,489 --> 01:10:25,348
Amazing thing about ramses is how confidence when he becomes king? He's a young
king untried and yet? He hits the ground running
661
01:10:25,840 --> 01:10:32,639
He immediately launches into this huge building program very ambitious and starts
fighting Wars overseas

662
01:10:33,429 --> 01:10:35,429
people and [whenever] [you] lose

663
01:10:36,219 --> 01:10:37,300
You have this

664
01:10:37,300 --> 01:10:38,050
Balancing Act

665
01:10:38,050 --> 01:10:45,029
Happening where you need to have a strong military in part to ensure that the
wealth keeps coming into egypt so that you can

666
01:10:45,190 --> 01:10:49,199
Send that wealth off to your temples and thank [Alan] roth for helping you to

667
01:10:49,900 --> 01:10:51,900
Have this huge Empire

668
01:10:51,969 --> 01:10:58,078
At luxor [Mae] Karnak he extended the temple creating a great wall court

669
01:10:58,389 --> 01:11:01,319
filled with colossal statues of himself

670
01:11:02,289 --> 01:11:07,469
And in front of them he sent two giant obelisks carved from single Blocks of pink
granite

671
01:11:08,139 --> 01:11:12,629
Like the pyramids before them they pointed to the power of the skies

672
01:11:17,270 --> 01:11:21,489
Ramasees was riding high it's called some memorable conquests

673
01:11:21,489 --> 01:11:27,098
But if he was to be remembered as the greatest pharaoh ever and he had to
outperform his ancestors

674
01:11:30,679 --> 01:11:36,399
Military Victories brought ramasees some prestige and treasure that these were
regional land grab

675
01:11:36,710 --> 01:11:38,889
They didn't play on an epIc scale

676
01:11:40,340 --> 01:11:46,509
He decided to take his campaign to Egypt's most feared enemy the hittites

677
01:11:51,139 --> 01:11:54,788
Here Rama feed would face the biggest challenge of his military career

678
01:11:57,170 --> 01:12:00,369
the Hittites were a sophisticated organized

679
01:12:01,250 --> 01:12:05,949
expansionist civilization and a rival superpower [to] egypt

680
01:12:07,579 --> 01:12:10,299
His father said he had won a famous victory over the hittites

681
01:12:11,270 --> 01:12:16,179
Commemorated on the walls of Karnak temple when he captured the strategic town of
Kadesh

682
01:12:16,820 --> 01:12:21,699
But the hittites won it back a reverse the egyptians could not forget

683
01:12:22,880 --> 01:12:29,230
This is a strategic [location] in Syria, but there's something in the egyptian
psyche that I think makes them obsessed with [Kadesh]

684
01:12:30,530 --> 01:12:35,860
[Kadesh] sat on the Borderlands between Egypt and the Hittite Kingdom ruled by King
Mortalis

685
01:12:37,579 --> 01:12:44,709
Whoever controlled it also, enjoyed the surrounding prime agricultural land an area
today known as the bekaa Valley

686
01:12:48,300 --> 01:12:52,250
For pharaohs and try to secure this crucial strategic prize

687
01:12:53,370 --> 01:12:59,569
Now [ramasees] [stages] reputation on succeeding where so many of his predecessors
had failed
688
01:13:02,340 --> 01:13:06,350
Ramses has a lot riding on [Kadesh]. He is a young pharaoh

689
01:13:07,710 --> 01:13:10,430
the Egyptians are after one of the

690
01:13:11,370 --> 01:13:15,169
Richest valleys and richest territories in that area

691
01:13:15,840 --> 01:13:22,400
That's the prize catch if they control [kadesh] they control the rest of the
territory as well

692
01:13:23,940 --> 01:13:27,379
only five years into his reign ramasees marched his army

693
01:13:27,780 --> 01:13:33,470
[400] miles out of egypt to a [plain] now in Syria then just west of Kadesh

694
01:13:34,500 --> 01:13:40,430
Remedy spires informed him that the hit I [king] Metallus commanded an awesome
force

695
01:13:42,030 --> 01:13:46,700
[37] thousand foot Soldiers supported by [tWenty-Five] hundred chariots

696
01:13:48,000 --> 01:13:50,569
Who were tireless raged at this incursion?

697
01:13:53,540 --> 01:13:56,799
The Young [Pharaoh] have reason [to] be confident

698
01:14:01,650 --> 01:14:05,750
The army that ramses II is mustering to go against Kadesh is

699
01:14:06,570 --> 01:14:12,620
The ultimate Army it's vastly superior and vastly different from anything which
came before it

700
01:14:15,150 --> 01:14:19,879
technologically conservative the Egyptians had at last embraced new technology

701
01:14:20,670 --> 01:14:26,720
They were interfused to the chariot during the hicks off invasion and had adapted
it to cope with Sandy Terrain

702
01:14:27,540 --> 01:14:29,540
creating a really formidable weapon

703
01:14:31,050 --> 01:14:37,310
This Chariot was lightweight. Highly maneuverable and above all fearsomely fast

704
01:14:42,040 --> 01:14:49,499
Mudding alongside a charioteer was the archer armed with a new composite both
combined wood and bones are [coloured] flexibility and power

705
01:14:50,949 --> 01:14:54,719
The new Design Meander Arrows could be delivered with deadly accuracy

706
01:14:55,540 --> 01:15:02,819
Across the length of three football pitches and with enough power to punch through
the bronze armor of the hittites

707
01:15:07,449 --> 01:15:09,839
Alongside the Chariots March the infantry

708
01:15:10,150 --> 01:15:15,779
Carrying another improved weapon the khopesh a short sword with a lethal curved
blade

709
01:15:20,900 --> 01:15:25,509
ramasees was about to put these weapons to the test in his biggest challenge yet if

710
01:15:25,939 --> 01:15:33,639
He could capture [Koresh] the young king would become a legend among his people and
the spoils would fund a building and public relations program

711
01:15:34,010 --> 01:15:36,459
That ensured his name lived on forever

712
01:15:39,070 --> 01:15:42,180
It is a do or die situation for him

713
01:15:42,520 --> 01:15:50,489
He needs to prove that egypt is in control both to the hittites, but also to his
own followers also to the people in egypt

714
01:15:51,400 --> 01:15:55,560
Has lyme disease and his army approached [Kadesh] he received encouraging news
715
01:15:56,290 --> 01:15:58,410
Egyptian Scouts found two men

716
01:15:59,050 --> 01:16:02,550
Double agents as it would turn out hiding in a [nearby] forest

717
01:16:03,640 --> 01:16:08,309
when the captains were interrogated they claimed that the hittite army was

718
01:16:08,920 --> 01:16:15,480
120 miles away the Town stood unprotected it seemed [Kadesh] with his that are
taking

719
01:16:16,270 --> 01:16:23,100
in patients of victory ramasees split away from his troops and took a single
[division] to within striking distance of the town

720
01:16:23,800 --> 01:16:27,870
He ordered the second division to circle around to the north in a pincer action

721
01:16:28,870 --> 01:16:31,049
But just as victory seemed within his grasp

722
01:16:32,650 --> 01:16:34,510
disaster

723
01:16:34,510 --> 01:16:37,800
Ramasees realized he'd fallen into acutight trap

724
01:16:40,310 --> 01:16:48,109
The fact of the matter is that the hittite king is hiding behind the city of Kadesh
at old Kadesh and waiting to Ambush [ramses]

725
01:16:53,690 --> 01:16:56,020
the Hittites [struct] hard-and-fast

726
01:16:57,320 --> 01:17:01,630
buttress by the possession of a new military technology iron weapons

727
01:17:03,380 --> 01:17:10,809
The Young Pharaoh faced a disastrous defeat, but just as the hittites seemed poised
to crush the egyptian

728
01:17:12,560 --> 01:17:17,080
If second division swooped down from the North and took the hittites by surprise
729
01:17:20,290 --> 01:17:26,399
Inspired by their arrival Egypt's [the] [troops] regrouped and began a furious
counter-attack

730
01:17:28,970 --> 01:17:33,909
Although the battle would become legendary this was not the stuff of history

731
01:17:35,540 --> 01:17:41,350
This was an awkward Messy unsatisfying and wasteful conflict

732
01:17:44,789 --> 01:17:50,809
With the army [did] these teeth ancient superpowers fighting each other directly so
it's probably the largest military

733
01:17:51,209 --> 01:17:53,209
Engagement in world history up to that time

734
01:17:59,940 --> 01:18:07,550
The battle between Rampant [Acumen] ahead taste is enormous. You've got massive
amounts of slaughter on both sides

735
01:18:08,520 --> 01:18:10,700
the Battle claimed thousands of lives

736
01:18:11,580 --> 01:18:15,320
But at the end of the day there was no outright victor

737
01:18:22,110 --> 01:18:27,769
at Dawn [Rama] [II] stood facing the heat I king Metallus outside the walls of
Kadesh the

738
01:18:28,170 --> 01:18:32,780
[massed] ranks of their two enemy armies poised for another gory battle

739
01:18:37,270 --> 01:18:43,470
But just to the bloodbath of appalling proportions seemed inevitable something
remarkable happens

740
01:18:46,240 --> 01:18:48,329
in the face of certain slaughter

741
01:18:49,000 --> 01:18:52,110
ramasees and the Hittite King both pulled back [from] the brink

742
01:18:53,200 --> 01:18:58,829
Each was unsure their own strengths and [levels] standoff neither wants to risk
Total annihilation

743
01:18:59,740 --> 01:19:01,829
the two men agreed a truce

744
01:19:03,040 --> 01:19:10,919
Now this wasn't what rameses came for he'd failed to capture the hit I prize and
now he must slink home empty-handed

745
01:19:12,460 --> 01:19:13,780
rameses is

746
01:19:13,780 --> 01:19:20,610
Thinking oh God what have I done? I didn't win the day. I didn't even manage to
capture [-] - back

747
01:19:21,220 --> 01:19:27,389
Nothing has gone the way I planned it now. What do I do? How do I showed a gypped
that?

748
01:19:27,390 --> 01:19:28,980
I'm still the king that

749
01:19:28,980 --> 01:19:35,820
[I'm] still should be king even you know what's going [to] make them believe that
this isn't a complete disaster

750
01:19:38,079 --> 01:19:44,579
Ramasees ambitions to become Egypt's greatest ever pharaoh [were] looking misguided
and Hollow

751
01:19:50,280 --> 01:19:57,019
well when rameses gets home this is going to be very embarrassing he set out to
conquer Ganesh, and he doesn't get it, so

752
01:19:57,570 --> 01:19:59,570
[he] has some explaining to do

753
01:20:02,249 --> 01:20:08,419
Remember this wasn't the differential egypt of the great pyramid builders the
pharaoh was no longer Beyond criticism

754
01:20:08,880 --> 01:20:11,150
He knew people would be asking questions
755
01:20:14,780 --> 01:20:20,379
Just like any Modern-day spin doctor ramasees set out to bigger [to] the positives

756
01:20:20,960 --> 01:20:27,399
We haven't actually lost the battle which was a start and although he must have
been sick to the stomach with disappointment

757
01:20:28,010 --> 01:20:30,819
He knew that he had to salvage a situation

758
01:20:31,430 --> 01:20:38,769
This is now an age where the [pharaohs] are accountable, and it's really important
that he [gets] good news out there and fast

759
01:20:39,650 --> 01:20:42,460
It's a relatively recent development this in Egyptian Society

760
01:20:42,560 --> 01:20:47,979
[I] mean a fairy like khufu would never have had [to] explain himself to his
subjects

761
01:20:48,470 --> 01:20:53,709
For ramasees public opinion and public confidence is really important

762
01:20:54,230 --> 01:20:58,780
He knows that he has to keep not just his gods, but his people on side

763
01:21:02,460 --> 01:21:07,250
But if this was a more risky, era for a pharaoh it also offered more choices

764
01:21:08,520 --> 01:21:13,819
ramasees reached for a weapon even more punches and chariots and bronze swords

765
01:21:15,270 --> 01:21:17,270
Propaganda

766
01:21:18,420 --> 01:21:19,920
this is a

767
01:21:19,920 --> 01:21:25,219
Wonderful opportunity for [rameses] to broadcast something to his audience that
will

768
01:21:25,739 --> 01:21:28,459
Make him the king [that] you will someday to come
769
01:21:30,210 --> 01:21:37,969
Ramasees commissioned a series of stone reliefs to commemorate the battle [of]
Kadesh on temple walls the length and the Breadth of the kingdom

770
01:21:39,270 --> 01:21:46,609
As a part of these of the heavy spin put onto the onto the whole Kadesh campaign
clearly is to make sure that his image

771
01:21:46,800 --> 01:21:51,469
Remains what he wants it [to] be that of the all-Powerful all-conquering pharaoh

772
01:21:54,900 --> 01:22:01,609
well when he sets up his record of the battle of Kadesh ramses proves that he's the
greatest spin [doctor] of the ancient world the

773
01:22:03,090 --> 01:22:08,690
[carvings] tell the story not of an inconclusive truth, but a clear-cut victory

774
01:22:10,080 --> 01:22:16,039
Rama [thiis] is portrayed [as] the hero of the hour who separated from his troops
stand alone

775
01:22:16,380 --> 01:22:18,620
Valiant against the Hittite Ambush

776
01:22:22,390 --> 01:22:25,740
Who claims he wept him good, but [he] didn't?

777
01:22:29,190 --> 01:22:35,089
He's not going to show what really happened. He's going to show what he wants to
have happen

778
01:22:35,699 --> 01:22:43,578
So the image that he has depicted there is one that shows him routing the hittites
pretty much single-handedly

779
01:22:44,639 --> 01:22:50,479
leading the way sending them, please trampling them under his horses and chariots
and

780
01:22:51,119 --> 01:22:52,469
Really?

781
01:22:52,469 --> 01:22:58,848
Creating a sense of egypt and ramses himself as the personification of egypt is the
ultimate

782
01:23:02,290 --> 01:23:04,680
It was a political masterstroke

783
01:23:05,710 --> 01:23:12,120
[granath] Eve had rewritten history and set his version of events in stones for all
time

784
01:23:17,920 --> 01:23:23,310
The king Lifelong talent for self-promotion had only just begun [now]

785
01:23:25,870 --> 01:23:30,839
[he] would start show building on a grand scale, [but] [though] he had the ambition

786
01:23:31,360 --> 01:23:36,750
He did have the resources [available] to his predecessor the Great pyramid Builder
khufu

787
01:23:38,230 --> 01:23:44,339
Ramasees would have to find new ways of realizing his grand architectural
statements

788
01:23:45,040 --> 01:23:47,640
It's far fewer resources to play with

789
01:24:00,820 --> 01:24:04,110
Abu Simbel on Egypt's Southernmost border with Nubia

790
01:24:06,310 --> 01:24:12,810
In the sixth year of ramses reign he chosen this [spot] to build a monument to his
own great self

791
01:24:13,360 --> 01:24:18,299
Something soap studded lee vain glorious. It would be admired long after his death

792
01:24:20,739 --> 01:24:26,698
The age of the pyramids was over no longer can Pharaoh harness egypt economy and
population to his own ends

793
01:24:28,480 --> 01:24:36,029
Employing tens of thousands of men to pouring millions of tons of stone and builder
monuments block by block was just too costly unfeasible

794
01:24:38,260 --> 01:24:40,260
but Rama Thieves had a plan
795
01:24:40,750 --> 01:24:42,610
Here overlooking the nile

796
01:24:42,610 --> 01:24:48,299
He would create a great new temple a shrine to himself and to the gods

797
01:24:48,790 --> 01:24:51,689
But it wouldn't be built from quarried stone blocks

798
01:24:52,570 --> 01:24:56,099
Ramasees monument would be tarred out of the cliff face

799
01:24:58,230 --> 01:25:00,620
the cliffs at Abu simbel for good quality

800
01:25:00,990 --> 01:25:06,949
Sandstone ideal for the Job Which would require a workforce of hundreds rather than
thousands?

801
01:25:08,220 --> 01:25:10,639
My jew it would still take decades

802
01:25:19,980 --> 01:25:26,240
Twelve Hundred and Eighty four beefy [highly-skilled] Stonemasons started work at
Abu simbel

803
01:25:28,140 --> 01:25:34,700
Our first task was to create 470 foot tall statues of [ramses] himself to guard the
temple entrance

804
01:25:39,720 --> 01:25:44,599
technical problems must have been amazing you [have] to figure out how to scale
these figures and

805
01:25:44,670 --> 01:25:47,180
carve them out of the side of the mountain you have to put

806
01:25:47,430 --> 01:25:50,180
Scaffolding up to support the workers that are going to do all this

807
01:25:50,490 --> 01:25:54,649
You have to be able to envision these statues emerging from a raw mountainside

808
01:25:55,020 --> 01:25:58,879
The colossal stone men would embody ramasees reach in potency

809
01:25:59,280 --> 01:26:04,909
but the carvings had another aim one that blinking with his Predecessor khufu the

810
01:26:05,490 --> 01:26:06,840
pursuit of

811
01:26:06,840 --> 01:26:08,840
immortality

812
01:26:12,349 --> 01:26:18,189
In Ramsey's time pharaohs were laid to rest in secret underground tombs in the
valley of the Kings

813
01:26:19,940 --> 01:26:25,089
But determined looters were still ransacking tombs for their treasure and their
mummies

814
01:26:30,050 --> 01:26:36,309
in the face of this threat egyptian beliefs about how to achieve immortality
gradually evolved

815
01:26:37,639 --> 01:26:43,419
It was no longer essential for the pharaohs mortal remains to Lie untouched for
eternity

816
01:26:44,540 --> 01:26:46,540
by the time of [ramasees]

817
01:26:47,119 --> 01:26:51,308
incarnation in stone offered a new insurance policy against death

818
01:26:53,059 --> 01:26:55,479
By having his face and his name

819
01:26:56,090 --> 01:26:57,230
these are

820
01:26:57,230 --> 01:27:01,149
magical symbols symbols that have power symbols that themselves have

821
01:27:01,699 --> 01:27:05,439
immortality in them and so even without the tomb

822
01:27:06,020 --> 01:27:10,479
lasting properly and perhaps the mummy being moved out [of] the tomb or

823
01:27:10,940 --> 01:27:17,500
Being destroyed even there are still other means by which he can ensure that he is
remembered and is returned

824
01:27:25,800 --> 01:27:29,900
ramasees hopes of Eternal Life relied on Grand monuments and

825
01:27:31,170 --> 01:27:34,039
There are few grander than a do symbol

826
01:27:35,310 --> 01:27:38,990
Just like the pyramid builders you [have] to see it finished before he died

827
01:27:39,870 --> 01:27:44,539
But he had only a tiny fraction of the workforce available for the old kingdom
[pharaohs]

828
01:27:45,600 --> 01:27:50,420
and the tools the stone cutting had barely changed in the certain centuries since
the great pyramid

829
01:27:51,390 --> 01:27:55,490
The only significant Innovation was tougher chisels made of Bronze

830
01:27:57,240 --> 01:27:59,240
as statues began to take shape

831
01:28:00,030 --> 01:28:02,059
workers Tunnel Deep into the rock face

832
01:28:03,000 --> 01:28:06,199
The finished Temple would stretch an incredible

833
01:28:07,440 --> 01:28:09,589
197 [feet] into the mountainside

834
01:28:11,100 --> 01:28:15,559
Abu simbel interior has to be precisely aligned to the movements of the sun

835
01:28:17,310 --> 01:28:23,269
because ramses was a showman he planned aspect to give a surprise [eat] inside his
temple a
836
01:28:24,990 --> 01:28:28,639
light show worthy of the Gold two centuries to come

837
01:28:29,520 --> 01:28:34,670
But in the here and now ramasees was still fretting about his old enemies

838
01:28:36,880 --> 01:28:43,200
The E-type [Mammoth] II launched a new assault striking deep into enemy territory

839
01:28:44,740 --> 01:28:50,939
Soon he was locked in another series of frustrating battles cat transitive only to
lose control again

840
01:28:51,160 --> 01:28:53,910
As soon as his army marched [onto] new Targets

841
01:28:55,330 --> 01:29:01,919
If any point he died his temple would lie unfinished risking his chance of an
eternal life

842
01:29:02,320 --> 01:29:04,680
he could end up a forgotten pharaoh a

843
01:29:05,920 --> 01:29:08,069
Footnote a lost soul

844
01:29:15,250 --> 01:29:19,260
For around 15 years [Mammoth] ignored away at the hittite Empire

845
01:29:21,040 --> 01:29:25,260
Frontier towns passed back and Forth that neither superpower gained the [upper]
[hand]

846
01:29:26,590 --> 01:29:31,469
Eventually the two sides signed one of the world's first peace treaties

847
01:29:35,830 --> 01:29:42,689
True to form [Rama] thieves used it to Spin his skills as a diplomat on the walls
of the temple at Karnak

848
01:29:44,770 --> 01:29:52,140
With peace guaranteed at last he could dedicate his energies wholeheartedly with
Grand project [Abbie] symbol

849
01:29:59,860 --> 01:30:07,139
It was a brash scheme a nouveau riche [king] digging it up trumpeting the turkish
Dynasty

850
01:30:09,130 --> 01:30:13,950
He might not have employed the massive labor Forces that built the pyramids, but in
his absence

851
01:30:14,590 --> 01:30:17,099
hundreds of Egyptians had sweated for him

852
01:30:17,860 --> 01:30:22,860
Shaping this sheer mountainside into a monument fit for the pharaoh

853
01:30:36,170 --> 01:30:42,580
1266 BC ramasees had ruled for 24 years when he could finally unveil his
masterpiece

854
01:30:49,470 --> 01:30:54,919
[this] homage to himself his self-centered gift to the goal

855
01:31:01,949 --> 01:31:08,829
[hubble] symbol is a temple par excellence it is a masterpiece

856
01:31:15,659 --> 01:31:20,759
It has the king it has the dD. It's fulfilling a particular function

857
01:31:21,429 --> 01:31:28,859
The restoration of order ensuring that Chaos doesn't enter into the world, but it
does it in an Incredibly Ecstatic way

858
01:31:33,130 --> 01:31:38,609
In tune with this more troubled complex age the temple serves a double purpose

859
01:31:39,070 --> 01:31:43,080
It was also an imposing warning to Egypt's neighbors to the south

860
01:31:46,670 --> 01:31:47,580
I

861
01:31:47,580 --> 01:31:49,580
Don't think [our] symbol is just a spectacular

862
01:31:50,070 --> 01:31:57,980
Engineering feat built to the glory of rameses and his godhood it also serves as a
stark warning to the Nubians in case lease rebel
863
01:31:58,219 --> 01:32:00,379
It's a giant Beware of [Pharaoh] sign

864
01:32:02,550 --> 01:32:08,690
Inside stands a spectacular avenue of 33 foot tall statues of rama sees

865
01:32:09,510 --> 01:32:13,699
Evidence of his belief in himself and his incarnation as a living God

866
01:32:16,830 --> 01:32:22,339
Deep inside the Mountain Ramasees Brilliant trick of the light was finally
triggered

867
01:32:25,570 --> 01:32:32,279
In the sanctuary at the heart of the temple sits rameses enthroned the God
alongside three other deities

868
01:32:36,030 --> 01:32:38,030
Twice a year at sunrise

869
01:32:38,250 --> 01:32:41,449
The Sun's Rays penetrate through the Dim in a [halt]

870
01:32:42,060 --> 01:32:45,080
Hunter in almost 200 feet of Darkness

871
01:32:50,429 --> 01:32:54,768
Here they illuminate the [deified] ramasees and his companion gold

872
01:33:03,380 --> 01:33:11,230
The message is unmistakable here ramasees will overcome death long night and live
forever

873
01:33:20,139 --> 01:33:23,279
But [a] [bee] symbol wasn't his last gift to the world

874
01:33:24,070 --> 01:33:26,489
Still buoyed up [by] his own success

875
01:33:27,159 --> 01:33:31,319
ramasees made a concerted bid for eternal magnificence

876
01:33:35,440 --> 01:33:41,790
his builders erected hundreds more temples Giant statues even a whole City, so
877
01:33:42,790 --> 01:33:50,189
Ramses embarked on this huge building campaign he's going to put temples throughout
egypt from the North down to the south

878
01:33:51,400 --> 01:33:54,150
Ramasees is everywhere in stone and Bronze

879
01:33:54,969 --> 01:33:59,459
Promoting the ramasees brand today and perhaps in the hereafter

880
01:34:00,159 --> 01:34:02,519
His insurance policy to cheat death

881
01:34:04,000 --> 01:34:05,349
ramasees

882
01:34:05,349 --> 01:34:08,159
Manik covering of monuments with his names and images

883
01:34:08,920 --> 01:34:11,219
may well be at least partly A

884
01:34:11,949 --> 01:34:17,999
Desire to ensure that there's always be enough images of him left on Earth to
[Guarantee] his eternal life

885
01:34:28,530 --> 01:34:35,090
Despite a lifetime of warfare [magnus's] lived to an astonishing age almost
certainly into his 90s

886
01:34:50,840 --> 01:34:58,509
He left at least 45 sons and 40 daughters and more monuments than any other pharaoh
before or since

887
01:35:00,860 --> 01:35:06,580
His self-Conscious Pr. Strategy had worked his nation wept for their loss

888
01:35:11,680 --> 01:35:15,329
It must have been a unbelievable shock when Ramsey finally died

889
01:35:18,500 --> 01:35:24,699
You have to remember that he lived for three times the average lifespan of typical
egyptian of his day

890
01:35:27,050 --> 01:35:33,520
Imagine how traumatic that would be to lose a leader that had ruled you for that
long in which even your grandfather couldn't remember

891
01:35:33,590 --> 01:35:35,590
another King

892
01:35:37,670 --> 01:35:39,670
Ramasees had served his country well

893
01:35:40,040 --> 01:35:43,149
giving his people three generations worth of peace and security

894
01:35:43,670 --> 01:35:48,399
Doing his bit to cool down onto Earth the holistic harmony of Mars

895
01:35:50,060 --> 01:35:56,289
Now priests preserved his body in accordance with the rituals that have survived
since the old kingdom

896
01:35:58,650 --> 01:36:06,500
Back then Khufu's Mummy had been protected by an unprecedented security system
involving massive slabs of granite

897
01:36:09,780 --> 01:36:12,630
But Ramsay's mummy. Wasn't placed in a pyramid

898
01:36:14,200 --> 01:36:20,099
He was destined for a secret - gouged out of a mountain in the valley of the kings

899
01:36:24,250 --> 01:36:28,259
Would this ruse work would the tomb robbers be frustrated?

900
01:36:35,560 --> 01:36:43,470
Although the Egyptian Empire flourished for another thousand years no single
pharaoh could quite match up to ramses the second

901
01:36:45,170 --> 01:36:51,250
He had ruled over Egypt 267 years leaving behind a wealth of monuments

902
01:36:52,610 --> 01:36:55,839
his life spanned nine decades

903
01:36:59,570 --> 01:37:00,240
I

904
01:37:00,240 --> 01:37:05,780
Think one of the greatest testaments to Ramsey's success as a pharaoh is that he
had so many imitators

905
01:37:06,690 --> 01:37:09,799
You have [rameses] the third through [ramses] 11

906
01:37:10,890 --> 01:37:13,999
several pharaohs that tried to imitate ramses II

907
01:37:15,000 --> 01:37:19,970
But none of them ever equalled him for the length of [they] [rained] or the
greatness of their accomplishments?

908
01:37:20,970 --> 01:37:26,329
The discovery of Ramasees ultimate Fate would remain a mystery for another thousand
years

909
01:37:27,540 --> 01:37:29,010
on

910
01:37:29,010 --> 01:37:31,010
the 6th of July 1881

911
01:37:31,770 --> 01:37:38,749
Each ecologist [meo] brush was lower than the sheer cliffs of deir El Bali near the
Valley of the Kings

912
01:37:39,240 --> 01:37:41,240
to the entrance of a cave

913
01:37:42,570 --> 01:37:47,720
Inside he discovered a secret cache of around 40 mummies

914
01:37:48,720 --> 01:37:52,189
inscriptions revealed most of them to be egyptian pharaohs and their queens

915
01:37:53,190 --> 01:37:58,399
After their original tombs were ransacked they'd been reburied without valuables

916
01:37:58,740 --> 01:38:02,149
The canny tricked [as] prostrate other would be to motors

917
01:38:05,290 --> 01:38:12,100
And one of them was the body of the man celebrated as the greatest pharaoh of all
time
918
01:38:13,490 --> 01:38:15,490
ramses the second

919
01:38:20,330 --> 01:38:26,709
ramasees mummy endured perfectly preserved for [3,000] years in humblest of tombs

920
01:38:31,320 --> 01:38:36,920
Scientific analysis has revealed that he was surprisingly tall for his time five
foot seven inches

921
01:38:39,809 --> 01:38:43,729
He had red hair in his youth reproduced with embalmers. Dye

922
01:38:45,539 --> 01:38:50,839
By the time he died he suffered from severe arthritis and mouth Decay

923
01:38:53,100 --> 01:38:58,910
But what site this ravaged splendid Faith has seen

924
01:39:03,869 --> 01:39:10,819
The fact that we're sitting here today talking about ramses II is in a sense
exactly what he would have wanted it

925
01:39:12,599 --> 01:39:16,788
Is his immortality [that's] being achieved right here right now

926
01:39:29,730 --> 01:39:35,870
Ramasees architectural achievement and those of khufu the great pyramid builder a
thousand years before

927
01:39:36,720 --> 01:39:40,760
were the two high points of egyptian monumental building

928
01:39:44,460 --> 01:39:50,930
These two [pharaohs] bookend Egypt's most splendid age and the contrast in their
lives

929
01:39:51,360 --> 01:39:54,440
Illustrates the Profound shift in Egyptian civilization

930
01:39:56,380 --> 01:39:59,250
from an age of gods and absolute leaders

931
01:40:01,030 --> 01:40:04,199
to want the political maneuvering and warfare

932
01:40:12,950 --> 01:40:14,950
ah

933
01:40:35,630 --> 01:40:42,489
Ramasees expanded his country's borders and for four decades. [he] protected the
empire from his powerful rivals

934
01:40:46,820 --> 01:40:52,239
Other symbols fans today as one of the most audacious and beguiling temples in the
world

935
01:40:56,579 --> 01:41:01,068
But ramasees architectural legacy extends Beyond that single monument

936
01:41:01,799 --> 01:41:06,919
The blustering buildings and statues can still be found right across egypt

937
01:41:09,750 --> 01:41:13,160
Perhaps most of all ramasees was an imaginative

938
01:41:13,620 --> 01:41:18,590
Forward-thinking Ruler who did more than survive in a complex and dangerous time?

939
01:41:19,290 --> 01:41:21,290
he thrived a

940
01:41:21,570 --> 01:41:28,459
Man skilled in warfare politics and propaganda he embodied a very changed egyptian
world

941
01:41:29,100 --> 01:41:34,760
Less certain less safe than that experienced by khufu a thousand years before

942
01:41:38,640 --> 01:41:40,910
These two men led very different lives

943
01:41:41,760 --> 01:41:48,590
Khufu was an absolute Ruler whereas ramasees had to dive a bit to keep a grip on
political power

944
01:41:49,200 --> 01:41:57,079
And if he set their stories up side by side what you see is a profound shift in the
way that egyptian society worked I
945
01:41:58,020 --> 01:42:00,020
Tell you what they both share

946
01:42:00,630 --> 01:42:05,450
Both men believed that they could achieve eternal life by traveling to the stars

947
01:42:06,540 --> 01:42:14,300
[but] actually it was human inspiration. It was the work of men with feet of clay
that's given them immortality

948
01:42:15,000 --> 01:42:19,850
But we still remember them because their structures still survived

949
01:42:20,730 --> 01:42:26,540
These are [pharaohs] who thought that their feats of engineering would bring them
physically closer to their gods

950
01:42:27,390 --> 01:42:31,189
Or is actually they brought them closer to all of us

951
01:42:38,249 --> 01:42:42,049
The achievements these men struggle to realize that today

952
01:42:42,050 --> 01:42:48,800
We celebrate as wonders of the world remind us that ancient Egypt was not some kind
of Mythical kingdom

953
01:42:48,900 --> 01:42:50,670
But a real place

954
01:42:50,670 --> 01:42:53,119
inhabited by real flawed

955
01:42:53,909 --> 01:42:55,909
inspiring people