entitled "Hieroglyph"
Welcome to the first 'Keeper of Genesis' newsletter, dedicated to the work and theories of Graham Hancock & Robert Bauval.
The purpose of this newsletter is to provide all those people who were intrigued, interested and shocked by the situation at Giza revealed by Graham Hancock & Robert Bauval in their best-selling book 'Keeper of Genesis' with up-to-date information on the developments that have happened since its publication in May 1996. Although, officially at least, there are no new discoveries to report, there have been numerous developments in the situation itself. A week, as they say, is a long time in politics, and the ins and outs of the past few months vis-a-vis the situation at Giza would fill an entire book, not just a newsletter, so here we shall present just a summary of the main points.
Already public pressure has seemingly led to the cancellation of the Schor Foundation-funded project at the Sphinx (see Recent Events section). Graham & Robert would like to thank you for your continuing support on this issue.
This newsletter, as well as giving information on books in the pipeline by Graham & Robert, will provide details of up-and-coming events and conferences in which Graham & Robert are taking part. Please do make every effort to come to these events. Graham & Robert would love to see you there, so come and hear the latest news from the horses' mouth, so to speak.
I do hope you find this newsletter informative and interesting. The public has a right to know what is happening as regards the great monuments at Giza, for they are a legacy, not just to a few individuals who can buy access and exclusivity to the sites, but to the whole of the human race.
RECENT EVENTS
The 'Door' in the Great Pyramid
Concerning the door at the southern shaft of the Queen's chamber in the Great Pyramid, since the book was published a number of developments have taken place, but the situation still lies unresolved.
Up till the end of 1995 the Egyptian Antiquity Organisation's official position was of disinterest. They had refused Gantenbrink's offer to train an Egyptian technician to use his Upuaut Robot which he would donate to the Egyptian government. The official line was that they were too busy. The Director General of the Giza Plateau said, 'I do not think this is a door and nothing is behind it.' But in March 1996 the "Egyptian Gazette" reported him as saying that it was of huge interest, and said that it would be opened in September by a multinational team led by Egyptian geologist (and NASA contact) Dr. Farouk El Baz.
Another robot was commissioned, and was to be built by Canadian Amtex and Spar Aerospace (who built the robotic arm for the Space Shuttle), headed by a Dutch-Canadian businessman named Peter Zuuring, who suggested that a date of early 1997 was more feasible, as $10 million had to be raised for the project, and it was to be promoted via a live opening on TV. He said, 'I'm working with a private guy who is a personal friend of Hawass, and we are absolutely going to drum this thing to death. Whatever the event we are going to stage, it will be televised live.'
THE TUNNELS UNDER THE SPHINX
Following the eviction from Giza by Dr. Zahi Hawass of John Anthony West and his colleagues (including geologist Robert Schoch, and the seismologist Thomas Dobecki, who identified a large rectangular chamber concealed in the bedrock 20 feet below the front paws of the Sphinx), and the subsequent re-application by Mr West in co-operation with the prestigious Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research Laboratory, (which was turned down), a one-year license was granted at the end of March 1996 to a new team that claimed academic sponsorship from Florida State University (and reportedly involved the participation of four geologists from that University).
The team was largely financed by Dr. Joseph Schor, an American multi-millionaire and life-member of the Association for Research and Enlightenment (ARE). This association, based in Virginia Beach in the US, is a multi-million-dollar organisation that exists to promulgate the teachings of the American psychic Edgar Cayce. Prominent among Cayce's pronouncements were many statements to the effect that the Sphinx had been built in 10,500 BC by the survivors of Atlantis who had concealed beneath it a "Hall of Records" containing all the wisdom of their lost civilisation and the true history of the human race. Cayce prophesied that the "Hall of Records" would be rediscovered and opened between 1996 and 1998. He connected the opening with the second coming of Christ and asserted that the contents of the Hall would not be shared with the general public until many years after it had first been entered by "three who would make of the perfect way of life."
Cayce's prophecies had been mentioned in the NBC television film by Boris Said called "The Mystery of the Sphinx" about the work of John Anthony West, which had incensed Dr. Hawass whose official line was that he was opposed to the notion of the Sphinx being far older than the ancient Egyptian civilisation that historians claim built it. How ironic then, that Hawass should appear in a promotional video, "Secret Chamber" also made by Boris Said in Nov/Dec 1995, and financed by Joseph Schor (to the tune of $100,000). In the video Dr. Hawass talks of opening the tunnels under the Sphinx and mentions the Cayce prophecy. That he should also grant a license to a team financed by Dr. Schor makes the irony all the greater. Dr. Hawass also stated his wish 'to further delineate that civilisation'.
On 11 April 1996, when Hancock & Bauval informed Joseph Schor that they intended to write about these matters in the London "Daily Mail", he threatened them with a libel action and stated, 'We do not work for the Edgar Cayce group... The major purpose of the Schor Foundation and the Florida State University is to aid in the preservation and restoration of the Pyramids and Sphinx. In addition we are surveying the underground of the Giza Plateau to find faults and chasms that might collapse. This will increase the safety of the Plateau because chasms and faults can be collapsed or roped off for the protection of tourists and Plateau personnel.'
On 14 April 1996, in the "Egyptian Gazette", Dr. Zahi Hawass gave a rather different account, mentioning hidden tunnels around the Pyramids and the Sphinx. He made no mention of public safety but hinted that excavation of the tunnels would reveal many clues regarding the establishment of the Giza pyramids.
In July 1966, after worldwide protest over the activities of the Schor Foundation and Florida State University at the Sphinx, Dr. Hawass claimed on South Africa radio that he had halted the project: 'I found that their work is not following the correct steps... I wrote a letter to them saying that they cannot do work again because they are not really following the correct work.'
The same month, however, rumours began to circulate that the team had identified nine further tunnels or chambers under the Giza Plateau. In all of them, apparently, their remote-sensing equipment had identified objects made of metal.
In early Autumn a conference took place in Delaware (US) in which both Graham & Robert took part. During their stay they both appeared on the Art Bell radio show in a four-hour live debate with Richard Hoagland, the author of several books on the Martian anomolies (see section on Mars later), who also attended conferences with Graham & Robert in London and Leeds earlier in the year. In the radio interview Hoagland claimed that he met Schor for a five-hour talk AFTER Hawass's cancellation of the license. Schor assured him that the explorations under the Sphinx were still going ahead. This was confirmed in a fax received by Hoagland in September from Boris Said, inviting him to be present at the opening of chambers beneath the Sphinx in the last week of October/first week of November 1996. For this radio debate Dr. Schor gave Hoagland carte blanche to talk of Schor's interest in the Cayce prophecies, even though this went against his earlier threats to sue Hancock & Bauval for saying exactly the same thing.
On this same show, both Graham & Robert appealed for an independent international investigation to sort out the controversies surrounding the work done on the Sphinx. They suggested UNESCO could undertake this, as it had previously declared the Sphinx and the Pyramids a world heritage site.
Between 22 and 26 November 1996, Robert Bauval & John Anthony West hosted a conference at Giza in the Mena House Hotel organised by "Amateur Astronomy and Earth Sciences Magazine" (AA & ES).
During this conference numerous attempts were made to see the new head of the Supreme Council at Giza, Dr. Ali Hassan. Finally on 3 December, John Anthony West managed to meet Dr. Hassan, and documents and videos concerning the controversy at Giza were handed to the latter. Dr. Hassan was totally unfamiliar and unaware of the involvement of the Edgar Cayce Foundation and its members at Giza since the late 1970s, and he said that no license to undertake digging under the Sphinx, or of opening the door in the Pyramid would be implemented before he verified the situation left to him by his predecessor, Dr. Nur-El Din.
Both Robert Bauval & John Anthony West plan to meet with Dr. Hassan again to further discuss this matter.
LIFE ON MARS?, A FORTHCOMING BOOK AND THE MANCHESTER MARS CONFERENCE
Following the announcement of possible signs of life found in a Martian meteorite last summer, Bauval & Hancock wrote a series of exclusive articles for the "Daily Mail" newspaper in London.
In their research they had stumbled across a tangled web of clues, connections and overlapping interests to suggest that American scientists with links to NASA may have quietly involved themselves, since at least the 1970s in covert 'expeditions' to unveil the secrets of the Great Pyramids and the Great Sphinx of Giza. The story, oddly enough, appears to be running in parallel with research stemming from the existence of curious pyramidal structures (and a gigantic Sphinx-like 'face') that were photographed on Mars by spacecraft during the 1970s. They are intrigued by the apparent correspondence between what has been found on Mars and the sites at Giza, and at the connections between the personnel in the Sphinx project and those involved in the Mars project.
NASA's official view is that these structures on Mars are merely 'tricks of light', but in 1975 one Dr. James Hurtak, a graduate in remote-sensing technology (and an acquaintance of Mark Lehner's), one of the earliest researchers to show interest in these 'pyramids', predicted that further finds of similar structures, including a Sphinx-like monument, would be made on Mars, and that these structures would be linked to the Giza monuments in a great cosmic blueprint.
In 1976 NASA's second Mars probe, 'Viking 1', entered orbit around the red planet and took photographs of its surface, which later showed the 'face' and a five-sided structure now called the 'D&M Pyramid' in the region known as 'Cydonia'.
It was recently reported to Graham & Robert that team members of the Schor-funded Florida State University project at the Sphinx granted by the Egyptian Antiquities Organisation last March, had consulted with Dr. James Hurtak and Richard Hoagland, former NASA consultant and founder of the Independent Mars Project.
Moreover, Dr. Farouk El Baz, chosen to lead a team to open the secret door in the southern shaft of the Queen's chamber of the Great Pyramid, is a NASA consultant, was the man who chose the landing spot for the Apollo 11 Moon landing, and has been involved for many years with studies of geological formations on the Moon and Mars.
On 7 December 1996 at the Manchester Conference Centre, Robert Bauval took part in a conference on "The Mars Enigma". Other speakers included Ananda Sirisena, who has found a possible second 'face' in the Cydonia region of Mars, and who spoke on the geometrical arrangements of the 'mounds', and Mark J. Carlotto, who also appeared with Graham & Robert at a Zurich conference last February.
Mark has contributed much to the Mars debate, with his expertise on computer image-enhancem,ent and 3D computer modelling, which have refined the 'Viking' photographs so that they can be accurately depicted and measured. He is very much interested in possible astronomical alignments of features on Mars, that correlate to Graham & Robert's archaeo-astronomical discoveries at Giza.
