Subj: IMAGES: Archaeologists report new chambers and tunnels in Pyramids
Date: 4/17/00 3:50:50 AM Pacific Daylight Time

*Archaeologists report new chambers and tunnels in Pyramids
April 14, 2000 08:30 CST

French and Egyptian Egyptologists say they've discovered a previously unknown
network of chambers and tunnels beneath the Meidum Pyramid, which is thought
to be one of Egypt's oldest, built about 4,600 years ago.

The archaeologists used a fiber optic device to probe a tunnel and chambers
that extend more than 130 feet into the heart of the pyramid, said to be one
of Egypt's most puzzling structures of the era. The fiber-optic endoscope is
based on the technology that doctors use to examine internal body organs.

Currently in partial ruin, the pyramid was originally constructed using the
so-called "stair-step" method-giving it a shape similar to a wedding cake.
Then, another layer was added to the "steps," which evolved into the
distinctive triangular shape of later pyramids. But it was unstable, partly
due to its 300-foot height. When they discovered the tunnel shaft that leads
from the outside of the collapsed structure, two recesses that were found at
the bottom puzzled them.

Based on its construction, the weight above the shaft and recesses would be
too great to support the structure at all, said Gaballah Ali Gaballah, of
Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities. He discussed his research at the
recent Eighth International Congress of Egyptologists in Cairo.

Using the fiber-optic instrument, he and the French archaeologists found
evidence that subsequent builders modified the design, shoring up the
structure to overcome the design flaw. When they examined the masonry along
the top of the shaft, they found what appeared to be a hidden window.

Further probing discovered another tunnel directly above the first, with a
"corbelled" roof, built of overlapping blocks that rise to a point. The
modifications demonstrated that the early builders of the pyramid understood
the principal of weight distribution, to prevent structural collapse.

The second shaft does not open to the outside of the pyramid as the first
did, but it extends toward the two unstable recesses, and was perhaps built
to protect the tombs that would be located there. And last year, two more
corbelled roof structures were found above the recesses, as well.

Gaballah told the conference that the purpose of the tunnels and recesses is
not clear, and that no one was ever entombed in the pyramid. "The work is
still in progress and we don't know what to expect," he said.

Staff Writer Sally Suddock