Sacsayhuamán: lost art of stone softening?

Originally posted by JayinAR
reply to post by Harte

 

I don't buy it. Have you seen their quarry site? With the large cubes of stone removed from the face of a cliff many feet off the ground? Their EXTRACTION technique was flawless and the left rounded corners in the cliff face where they removed the stone. So unless they went back and hammered out their block cuts in the quarry, they MUST have had a more efficient way of doing this.

I've seen the rectangular recesses carved into stone, like these at Ollantaytambo:


but I've not seen evidence that this was where the stones used for construction came from. From what I've seen, evidence at Incan quarries supports the theory that stones were literally "bashed out" of the quarry using stone pounders (exactly like the Egyptians quarried granite.)
Incan quarry:



Source for these pics is davidpratt.info.... You'd probably enjoy reading there.

Here's two links to PDFs by Protzen - same guy in the vid I linked - who is a recognized expert on Incan stonemasonry:
Link 1

Link 2

Lots of info there, such as the pounding stone marks that have been observed on stones at Tiahuanaco and Pumapunku.

Harte

Protzen says:
"The technique for fitting two stones is thus one of trial and error. I concede that this technique appears to be tedious and laborious, especially if one thinks of the cyclopean blocks at Saqsaywaman or Ollantaytambo. It should be remembered, however, that to the Incas time and labor were probably of little concern. My experiments show that with some practice one develops a very keen eye for matching surfaces, so that the number of trials can be reduced considerably. The suggested method works and has the advantage of not postulating the use of tools and other implements of which no traces have been found......."
www.michaelsheiser.com...

So all Protzen can offer as a defence of his absurd suggestion that the complex fitting of stone blocks was done simply by trial and error is that the builders had plenty of time on their hands.

This is ridiculous. He fails miserably to address the crucial issue presented by the amazing walls and buildings, namely, that it would be IMPOSSIBLE to cut niches out of huge blocks weighing dozens of tons and then keep raising and dropping them in place more than a dozen feet high until the masons found that all their irregular corners fitted gaps like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. Such a scenario is totally unbelievable, and it is the height of dishonesty for an academic to dismiss the problem so lightly! He feels forced to offer the silly explanation of pounding by trial and error until everything fits because it avoids having to invoke tools and technology that could do the job but which have never been found. His position is exposed as intellectually bankrupt.

They use oxalic acid combined with citric acid to soften the rock. It only works on certain rocks though. But it allows for bio tooling, such as drilling the stone with a soft bit made out of wood. Or complete dissolving into a cement.

Originally posted by micpsi
Protzen says:
"The technique for fitting two stones is thus one of trial and error. I concede that this technique appears to be tedious and laborious, especially if one thinks of the cyclopean blocks at Saqsaywaman or Ollantaytambo. It should be remembered, however, that to the Incas time and labor were probably of little concern. My experiments show that with some practice one develops a very keen eye for matching surfaces, so that the number of trials can be reduced considerably. The suggested method works and has the advantage of not postulating the use of tools and other implements of which no traces have been found......."
www.michaelsheiser.com...

So all Protzen can offer as a defence of his absurd suggestion that the complex fitting of stone blocks was done simply by trial and error is that the builders had plenty of time on their hands.

Sure, if you ignore the vid that shows him replicating the joints on the first time he tried it.

Other than his actual joint making and the perfect fit he accomplished, there's nothing behind his theory but logic.

BTW, if you watch the vid(s) you can see that in your quote he was talking about the smaller stones. He states that the larger ones couldn't have been done by the trial and error method, then proceeds to perfectly join two larger stones (though not exactly megaliths) using the method the hypothesizes for them, resulting, again, in a fit that looks almost exactly like it was done by the Inca.

So, what method do you suggest, and do you have a vid you can link that shows you accomplishing a stone joint in a way that proves that it works as well as Protzen's method?

After all, that's what that "absurd" Protzen did. Haven't you done this?

Harte

What I find really intriguing about these sites in Peru is how the newer builds onto the ruins are done with smaller stones and mortar. Somehow over the years these people just forgot how to build and had to start making everything smaller??

They(locals) even say the ruins were already old when they got there(legend).

This has always been a 700 pound gorilla to me. If we(humans) advance and get better at everything we do, why was the ability to create these magnificent builds lost??

To me this leans more towards a lost civilization more than alien intervention. Just look at the giant megaliths at this site and many more all over Peru and they just look so much older than the small stones with mortar do.

That is another thing that always gets me, the mortar. We could fashion gigantic stones to fit together perfectly like a jigsaw puzzle piece but for some reason as time progressed, we got lazy and decided we didn't want to build that way any more. We decided to use crappy stones and use mortar. Why? Because it is easier? Maybe, but I tend to go with because nobody on Earth currently can recreate these megalythic builds found all over the world. Great thread. S&F

Originally posted by mcx1942
They(locals) even say the ruins were already old when they got there(legend).

This has always been a 700 pound gorilla to me. If we(humans) advance and get better at everything we do, why was the ability to create these magnificent builds lost??

Not only the ability to create the structures, also their writing was lost. And traces of what happened to the people seem to be impossible to scientifically identify.

reply to post by maddog99


The holes at the bottom are in order to transport the stones I am told. They are all over Cusco from huge rocks to smaller stones, and are also often visible at Machu Picchu. Here is a great newsletter on the Incas and a Machu Picchu FAQ, it may be of help to some of you wanting to visit.
www.dosmanosperu.com...
All the best

Originally posted by mcx1942
What I find really intriguing about these sites in Peru is how the newer builds onto the ruins are done with smaller stones and mortar. Somehow over the years these people just forgot how to build and had to start making everything smaller??

They(locals) even say the ruins were already old when they got there(legend).

This has always been a 700 pound gorilla to me. If we(humans) advance and get better at everything we do, why was the ability to create these magnificent builds lost??

To me this leans more towards a lost civilization more than alien intervention. Just look at the giant megaliths at this site and many more all over Peru and they just look so much older than the small stones with mortar do.

That is another thing that always gets me, the mortar. We could fashion gigantic stones to fit together perfectly like a jigsaw puzzle piece but for some reason as time progressed, we got lazy and decided we didn't want to build that way any more. We decided to use crappy stones and use mortar. Why? Because it is easier? Maybe, but I tend to go with because nobody on Earth currently can recreate these megalythic builds found all over the world. Great thread. S&F

You bring up some very good points. Whenever I look at these megalithic structures, the first thing that comes to mind is "Why" instead of "How". Why build such huge structures using these massive stones that require very little maintenance, unless it's out of necessity. If we assume that most (if not all megalithic structures) were built during or just after the last ice age (approximately 8 to 25 thousands years ago), then the world these people lived in would've been a lot more treacherous than what we see today. Perhaps the large stones were required to counter against extremely high winds or massive earthquakes that were very common as the ice began to melt over many thousands of years. Perhaps these people lived near coastal areas during the ice age, but were annihilated by rising waters and accompanying tsunamis. The remaining survivors decided to move to the highest area possible and build unpenetrable defenses to counter against past mistakes. Water will have a hard time penetrating thru these massive stones especially if there's no mortar in between. The other thing that comes to mind is a 3 layered fortress type structure that can combat against an attacking army from down below. Even if this attacking army was launching fireballs at the fortress, anyone standing behind these large stone walls would generally be safe due to their relative height and strength.

Another thing that can't be rules out when looking at megalithic structures designed to last hundreds if not thousands of years, is the longevity of a person's lifespan at that time. If the Bible and ancient chinese writings are taken at face value, then people at that time lived for several hundred years. As a civil engineer, we are trained to design things to genrally last 75 to 100 years. Once the infrustructure nears its design life then it's left to a future generation to rebuild things according to their own design standards with probably better technology. By that time, I along with all other engineers working on the project would have been long dead. However, if someone like Noah lived to be 750 years old, then why not build something to last his entire lifetime instead of having to reconstruct the same structure 10 times over. If people did live longer lives many thousands of years ago, then it's very likely that they would use larger stones with no mortar to extend the longevity of the structure beyond their life spans. I highly doubt that they built these sites so that future generations could marvel at their ingenuity. The human race has always been very self centric so I doubt there was much thought put into how a great great grand son 10 times removed would view these sites.

This makes me wonder what they haven't found...

I mean if there is a possiblly 12,000 year old retaining wall of this size and magnitude, I wonder how many other 'natural formations' aren't natural at all.

People didn't live longer lives in ancient times. You basically were old when you reached your early 40's. People lived harder lives back then, as they do in many (non developed) countries today. That is a pure fact and not a theory. The Bible contains myths and legends, not scientific facts, that is very important to remember.

Many societies back then had little or no regard for workers (or slaves) health and because of it they used up a lot of lives building the many fantastic structures that still stand today.

They probably didn't have some long lost knowledge that helped them build monoliths, temples and Pyramids. It wasn't 1 or 2 worker grinding each stone with acid or with the help of aliens. Each of these marvelous stones as an example were probably carved by hundreds of workers or slaves, until their arms fell of. Then in with a new crew. Mass graves is not rarely to be found near these kind of structures. Or under and in them as in the case with the Great Wall of China.

Some structures is a bit mysterious and you sometimes wonder how they were made, sure Very interesting indeed, I agree. But maybe we don't have to play the ancient alien card every time we don't understand something from our own history.