The Great Pyramid;
Symbols and Hieroglyphs in the King's Chamber (cont.)
By Richard E. Ford

The following table depicts the products of these numbers when multiplied by the factor of 9.

Angular or celestial coordinates in degrees

Table 2

The numbers from Table 2, ranging from 9-90, with their associated cardinal direction, are polar or celestial coordinates. Each number from the north or south wall defines an angular measure of altitude and when paired with either a number from the east or west wall, each of which defines an angular measure of azimuth, yields a coordinate pair (e.g. 45º N, 36º W; 27 º S, 18 º E, etc.) that defines a specific location on the underside of a dome or half of a celestial sphere. If we were to stand under the night sky and look up at the heavens, we would perceive that the stars all appeared to be located equally distant from us in their positions in the firmament, which would have the appearance of the underside of a great dome surrounding us on all sides, from horizon to horizon. This dome is the visible half of the celestial sphere that surrounds the Earth. The zenith, or highest point of the dome from our perspective, is the point on the dome that is directly above us. It is from this vantage point, directly below the zenith, that we should properly consider the Chamber's coordinate pairs with our imagination's eye. Each pair from each of the Chamber's five courses can be plotted on the underside of the celestial dome.

The numbers derived from each course each provides four coordinate pairs. When each of the coordinate pairs are located on the celestial sphere and their locations are then projected downwards onto a flat surface, as a priest or navigator would do to create a plot, and then connected together with one another, they depict figures-circles, parallelograms, and triangles. The 1^st, 3^rd, and 5^th courses depict symmetrical figures; the 2^nd and 4^th courses depict asymmetrical ones. This paper will focus on the symmetrical figures, but the asymmetrical ones are not without their significance as well.

These figures would probably occasion little more than a passing curiosity if they lead to nothing more than just themselves, but as is readily apparent to anyone with a smattering of understanding of the ancient Egyptian religion and hieroglyphs, they have meaning beyond their mere geometric shapes. They are also symbols and hieroglyphs, many of which were of the most profound religious and cosmic significance to the ancient Egyptians. The symbols and hieroglyphs that derive from the figures on the three symmetrical celestial spheres are analyzed in the following sections.[1]

IV. The first celestial sphere and its figures

In considering the coordinates from the Chamber's 1^st course, their locations on the celestial sphere when projected downwards onto a flat surface, create the following plot:

The figures created by the celestial coordinates in the 1^st course of stones
Figure 3

The figures consist of two concentric circles, a long, narrow rectangle, and a series of triangles formed by the lines drawn from the center point to the coordinates. The circle within a circle figure from the first sphere forms the symbol for Atum-Re, the ancient Egyptian god of creation. A variation of this circle within a circle is the ancient Egyptian symbol for the Sun and time, and in very old Egyptian texts is also a symbol for the eye. The eye hieroglyph , ir, is the ancient Egyptian verb meaning, to do or to make (create?).

The figure from this sphere appears to be a variation of the hieroglyph which is the ancient Egyptian letter . When the figure is combined with the figure from this sphere, a variation of the ancient Egyptian word, , n , is formed, which means eternity.

1. The interpretations of all hieroglyphs are based on, Mark Collier and Bill Manley, How to Read Egyptian Hieroglyphs (Berkeley and Los Angeles, California: University of California Press, 1998), unless otherwise noted. [back to text]