DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.15#0038
28 THE GREAT PYÈAMÎD.
have accepted with unquestioning confidence'• all
that they told him respecting the particular sub-
ject over which they seemed to possess so perfect
a mastery.
But having formed the opinion, on grounds
sufficiently assured, that the strangers who visited
Egypt and superintended the building of the Great
Pyramid came from the land of the Chaldasans, it
is not very difficult to decide what was the subject
respecting which they had such exact information.
They were doubtless learned in all the wisdom of
their Chaldaean kinsmen. They were masters, in
fact, of the astronomy of their day, a science for
which the Chaldœans had shown from the earliest
ages the most remarkable aptitude. What the
actual extent of their astronomical knowledge may
have been it would be difficult to say. But it is
certain, from the exact knowledge which later
Chaldaeans possessed respecting long astronomical
cycles, that astronomical observations must have
been carried on continuously by that people for
many hundreds of years. It is highly probable
that the astronomical knowledge of the Chaldasans
in or long before the days of Terah and Abraham
was much more accurate than that possessed by the
Greeks even after the time of Hipparchus.' We
1 It has been remarked that, though Hipparchus had the
have accepted with unquestioning confidence'• all
that they told him respecting the particular sub-
ject over which they seemed to possess so perfect
a mastery.
But having formed the opinion, on grounds
sufficiently assured, that the strangers who visited
Egypt and superintended the building of the Great
Pyramid came from the land of the Chaldasans, it
is not very difficult to decide what was the subject
respecting which they had such exact information.
They were doubtless learned in all the wisdom of
their Chaldaean kinsmen. They were masters, in
fact, of the astronomy of their day, a science for
which the Chaldœans had shown from the earliest
ages the most remarkable aptitude. What the
actual extent of their astronomical knowledge may
have been it would be difficult to say. But it is
certain, from the exact knowledge which later
Chaldaeans possessed respecting long astronomical
cycles, that astronomical observations must have
been carried on continuously by that people for
many hundreds of years. It is highly probable
that the astronomical knowledge of the Chaldasans
in or long before the days of Terah and Abraham
was much more accurate than that possessed by the
Greeks even after the time of Hipparchus.' We
1 It has been remarked that, though Hipparchus had the