V
11

That false claim about the pyramids being 20,000 years old is still floating around

I saw this article shared on Facebook yesterday with over 50k likes, saying the Great Pyramid was built way before 2560 BC based on some weathering marks. Guy who wrote it wasn't even an archaeologist, just some blogger who cited one sketchy study from the 90s. I checked three actual Egyptology sources and they all confirmed the standard timeline is solid with carbon dating from multiple digs. Anyone else tired of seeing this same bad claim pop up every few months?
3 comments

Log in to join the discussion

Log In
3 Comments
cole_murphy
I actually used to buy into that 20,000 year thing for a while. Read some blog that talked about water erosion on the Sphinx and thought it sounded legit. Then a friend who works in geology explained that the weathering marks could come from a few thousand years of rain and flash floods, not some lost ancient flood. Plus the carbon dating on mortar between the pyramid blocks lines up right around 2560 BC, and there's no reason to ignore that data unless you just want a cooler story. The blogger who wrote that original piece had zero credentials and cited one paper from 1991 that even other geologists disagreed with. So yeah, I feel dumb for ever sharing it, but at least I learned to check actual sources before hitting post.
4
hannahcraig
hannahcraig20d agoTop Commenter
omg YES this drives me nuts. Every time I see that weathered stone theory my eyes roll so hard I pull a muscle. I literally fell for it once in 2018 shared the exact same post and then my buddy who's an actual geologist was like "hey so you know erosion happens faster in different climates right" and I felt about two inches tall. Learned my lesson now I just screenshot those posts and send them to my group chat for a good laugh. Trust me I'm the last person who should be fact checking anything but even I know 20,000 years doesn't add up when we have actual tools and wood from the site dated right to 2560 BC.
2
nancy_king29
@hannahcraig why do people cling to bad theories so hard anyway?
7