Entrance Passages in the Pyramids of Gizeh. 483 



Minoris, could by no possibility have been seen at any time 

 in the twenty-four hours through the gallery in the Great 

 Pyramid, on account of the precession of the equinoxes, which 

 at that time would have displaced every star in the heavens, 

 from its then apparent position on the sphere, by no less a 

 quantity than 55° 45' of longitude, and would have changed 

 all the relations of the constellations to the diurnal sphere. 



The supposed date of the pyramid, 2123 years B.C., added 

 to our present date, 1839, form 3962 years (say 4000), and the 

 effect of the precession on the longitudes of the stars in that 

 interval having been to increase them all by the above-named 

 quantity, it will follow that the pole of the heavens at the 

 erection of the pyramid must have stood very near to the star 

 a Draconis, that is, 2° 51' 15" from it to the westward, as we 

 should now call it ; a, Draconis was therefore at that time the 

 polar star ; and as it is comparatively insignificant, and only 

 of the third magnitude, if so much*, it can scarcely be sup- 

 posed that it could have been seen in the daytime even in the 

 climate of Gizeh, or even from so dark a recess as the inclined 

 entrance of the Great Pyramid. A latitude, however, of 30°, 

 and a polar distance of the star in question of 2° 51' 15", would 

 bring it at its lower culmination to an altitude of 27° 91', and 

 therefore it would have been directly in view of an observer 

 stationed in the descending passage ; the opening of which, as 

 seen from a point sixty-three feet within, would, by calcula- 

 tion, subtend an angle of 7° 7', and even from the bottom, 

 near the sepulchral chamber, would still appear of at least 2° 

 in breadth. In short, speaking as in ordinary parlance, the 

 passage may be said to have been directly pointed at a Dra- 

 conis at its inferior culmination, at which moment its altitude 

 above the horizon of Gizeh (lat. 30°) would have been 27° 9', 

 refraction being neglected as too trifling (about 2') to affect 

 the question. The present polar star, a, Ursae Minoris, was at 

 that epoch 23° more or less in arc from the then pole of the 

 heavens, and of course, at its lower culmination, it was only 

 7° above the horizon of Gizeh. No other astronomical rela- 

 tion can be drawn from the table containing the angles and 

 dimensions of the passages, for although they all point within 

 five degrees of the pole of the heavens, they differ too much 

 and too irregularly to admit of any conclusions. 



The exterior angles of the buildings are remarkably uni- 

 form, but the angle 52° is not connected with any astronomi- 

 cal fact, and was probably adopted for architectural reasons. 



• In the Catalogue of the Astronomical Society, the magnitude of « Dra- 

 conis is stated as intermediate between the third and fourth. It is certainly 

 inferior to the third ; and it is to be observed, that there is not any larger 

 star near it, which could at that epoch have been preferred as a pole star. 



2 I 2 



