one of history's most perplexing mysteries rises from the Sahara in Egypt. Its stone eyes peer out of an almost human face, surveying a land of ancient tombs and endless sand. Now, what we're talking about for the people that are uninformed is the idea that some of the structures in ancient Egypt are far older than conventional wisdom. For millennia, it has weathered the ravages of time and witnessed the rise and fall of civilizations. Yet, after all these hundreds of years, the Great Sphinx of Giza remains an enigma. Conventional modern-day archaeology, modern-day Egyptologists, they would like us to believe that all this spawned from a very specific time period. Just when we believe we are about to solve its eternal riddles, the Sphinx reveals another layer of secrecy. One of the biggest mysteries in ancient Egypt that swirls around this famous structure is when was it built. People like John Anthony West and yourself and some other folks like Graham Hancock are proposing that it's entirely possible that there

were many different eras of construction in Egypt, and that there are some structures that are far, far older than we think. For years, Egyptologists and archaeologists have thought the Great Sphinx of Giza to be about 4500 years old. However, some recent studies have suggested that the Sphinx was much older than mainstream archaeologists and Egyptologists claim it to be today. On Crunch, let us see what Joe Rogan and Robert Schoch have to say about the age of this colossal figure. [Music] Foreign debate between mainstream Egyptologists and a more recent wave of independent thinkers over the age of the Sphinx spans thousands of years. The latter contend that the imposing limestone statue is much older than archaeologists and Egyptologists claim it to be. But you always have to follow the evidence wherever it goes, and that's always been my royal thumb, that not everything is always the way people say it is, even if they're quote authorities. Mainstream archaeologists determine the Sphinx to have been built between

2558 and 2532 BCE. But in the early 1990s, an American writer and independent Egyptologist, John Anthony West, posed the question of erosion that launched the Sphinx controversy. While reading the works of R.A. Schwaller de Lubicz, who was an early Egyptologist and mathematician, West found references to water erosion on the Sphinx and was intrigued. He rocked the scientific community with his claim that the Sphinx was actually carved 10,000 years earlier, before Egypt was a desert. West argued that academia had overlooked an important detail: the body of the sculpture bore distinct markings of water erosion. After his assessment of the Sphinx's age, West found fellow scientists who shared his observation about uncovering an entirely different history than was commonly accepted. Honestly, when I first went to Egypt with John Anthony West in 1990, I thought before I got off the plane that this would be a simple open-and-shut case. I would prove him wrong. West's search led him to Robert Schoch, a geology professor at Boston University, willing to pursue an

open-minded, out-of-the-box investigation into the origins, not only of the Sphinx but the entire region, as well as its implications for the origin of the human species in Gaia's original series. Ancient civilizations. Shark explained his first encounter with the figure in 1990, at which time he immediately noticed there was a disconnect between the statue's academically accepted date of origin and the truth staring him in the face. I had no doubt at the time that my colleagues in Egyptology must know what they're talking about, and all of that changed literally within 30, without exaggerating, 30 to 120 seconds of first scene. Upon careful inspection, Shock realized the Sphinx survived intensely wet weather conditions that stand in stark contrast to the now hyper-arid conditions of the Sahara Desert. Shock also noticed refacing work that had been form-fitted to the eroded blocks behind it. It is thought that the blocks used for this refacing are from the Old Kingdom, but why would such work be necessary in less than 500 years old?

Egyptologists in the late 19th and early 20th century had actually suggested that just the way it looks, the feel of the Sphinx, not based on hard evidence, really, that maybe it was older than the pyramids. Some scholars have suggested that the original limestone used to build the Sphinx deteriorated quite rapidly, but if that was the case, and assuming an even rate of deterioration throughout the ages, the Sphinx should have disappeared approximately five centuries ago. Other scholars believe that New Kingdom workers used blocks from the causeway to Kafra's Pyramid, which would be Old Kingdom blocks, to reface the Sphinx. However, there is no way to verify this belief. It is generally accepted that the Sphinx was buried in sand from approximately 2150 to 1400 BC. It was then uncovered and repaired. From the various repairs done at different periods of history, it appears that weathering caused little erosion between 1400 BC and the present, but the restoration work dating from 1400 BC is quite substantial. If the

Sphinx was built in 2500 BC and spent most of the following millennium under the sand. How did it erode so much? Furthermore, if the Sphinx and the tombs around it in the valley are made of the same rock and all date to the same period, shouldn't the erosion on the tombs be similar to the erosion on the Sphinx? Yet, the tombs around the Sphinx show only the mild wind-blown sand weathering one would expect in Old Kingdom monuments. [Music] According to research of Manicheff and Parkamenco, large bodies of water have partially flooded the Sphinx, creating wave cut-out hollows on its vertical walls. It's a Sphinx enclosure where you see the rolling undulating profile, the erosional features here. You see it in that picture, the vertical fissures. One erosion mark in particular appears in a large hollow of the Sphinx and corresponds to the water level of the early Pleistocene age. From such evidence, geologists concluded the statue was already standing on the Giza Plateau by

that time astoundingly they also made the claim the Sphinx could be up to 800,000 years old when the Mediterranean Sea extended all the way south into Egypt and onto the Giza Plateau. This would explain the statue's distinct marks of erosion caused by seawater lapping up against it over thousands of years. But Andrew Collins suggests that while this rock formation may have been kissed by the Mediterranean Sea, the actual statue may have been carved out of it at a much later date. In short, the rock is ancient, but the statue is relatively less so. They say, Couldn't it be rising Nile floods? No, geologically that would give a very different signature on the rocks, not floods coming up from the bottom. It's actually precipitation and rainfall runoff. Seismic measurements were done on the grounds of the Sphinx enclosure, pointing to a difference in the weathering of the rock under the Sphinx. The west side of the enclosure shows less weathering than the other three sides. The north, east, and south sides show 50 to 100 more.

weathering. If we assume that the West Side dates to Kafra's time and the weathering rate of the rock is linear, then Sphinx would date to 5000 BC at the earliest. If the weathering pattern is non-linear, the Sphinx could be much older. In 1991, Professor Shock scientifically dated the Sphinx to thousands of years prior to the time of the Egyptian pharaohs, having been constructed at the end of the last Ice Age. Ice Age end at 9700 BC. Just to put in perspective for people, this places the statue at a time when the Saharan region was much more humid, lush with plant and animal life, subject to persistent rainfall. And despite constant criticism from mainstream archaeologists, he's held his ground, showing seismic data of the region which suggests the Sphinx origin may be more accurately placed around 10,000 BCE. [Music] The theory of the Sphinx being 12,000 years old has drawn ardent criticism from leading Egyptologists. Peter Green from the University of Texas previously

Drew attention to what he considered to be numerous problems with West's work. This includes unconscious prejudices, wildly speculative ideas, and lack of scientific evidence, as well as a tendency towards conspiracy theories. In lieu of Orthodox Egyptology, researcher Graham Hancock believes conflict with this idea on the Sphinx's age, noting the statue appears to have been exposed to about a thousand years of heavy rainfall. Because there was no rainfall in that area during the time of the Pharaohs or for thousands of years prior, Hancock says he believes the Sphinx needs to be placed more than 12,500 years ago. Egyptian-born writer and engineer Robert Bouval famously argued that there are no inscriptions on the Sphinx, either carved on a wall or a stela, or written on the throngs of papyrus that associates the statue tube with the time period of the Pharaohs of ancient Egypt as we know them. Traditional Egyptologists reject these views, maybe because the idea that the Sphinx was built earlier than 7000.

BC would upset our understanding of ancient civilization, as there is no evidence of an Egyptian civilization this old. What are your thoughts on this? Leave us a comment below. If you liked the video, give it a thumbs up. As always, thanks for watching Crunch History. Subscribe to our channel to crunch more such amazing videos. [Music]

Joe Rogan Reacts to Secrets of Egypts Great Sphinx

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