The Stargate Conspiracy (53 page)

At Giza in Egypt the pyramids stood unmoved and unmarked by the coming of the year 2000, as enigmatic and imposing as ever. The Great Pyramid (now open again to the public
¹
) remained without its long-lost capstone, still innocent of any replacement. Significantly, the ceremony in which the temporary gilded capstone that was to have been lowered into position by an Egyptian Army helicopter as the clock struck midnight - while Jean-Michel Jarre’s music
²
welled up from the plateau and a giant eye of Horus was lasered onto the third pyramid
³
- was abandoned at the last minute. But as with everything connected with modern Egypt, there was more to this than meets the eye.

The months following the publication of this book in July 1999 saw a flurry of activity concerning Giza. Two major books on the politics and behind-the-scenes machinations appeared:
Giza: The Truth
by Ian Lawton and Chris Ogilvie-Herald examines the claims and counter-claims of the main players from an independent perspective, while the other book,
Secret Chamber,
was actually by one of those involved, Robert Bauval. There was also the by-now famous BBC television documentary, the two-part
Horizon
programme on Atlantis, the second of which was devoted to a searing critique of Graham Hancock’s theories.
⁴

This centred on his - and Bauval’s - 10,500 BCE theory, presenting the same arguments against it (to the stirring background music from the movie Stargate, for some reason) as we detailed in this book. In fact, the whole 10,500 BCE business is now reeling from an onslaught from several quarters: Lawton and Ogilvie-Herald attack the astronomical aspects of Bauval and Gilbert’s Orion/Giza correlation theory,
⁵
as does the South African astronomer Professor Anthony Fairall.
⁶
(Although, as we pointed out, the original objections were actually raised by Robin J. Cook, who provided the diagrams for
The Orion Mystery,
back in 1996.) Even the author David Rohl - a qualified Egyptologist who, because of his willingness to challenge orthodoxy, is now largely seen as part of the alternative camp - fired a broadside in a page-long article in the
Daily Express,
attacking Hancock and Bauval for persisting in their claims about the magic date of 10,500 BCE despite the mounting evidence against it. However, as Rohl points out, Hancock and Bauval have vested interests in engendering excitement about imminent discoveries at Giza. He writes the following:

However, he goes on to say that ‘... the portents are not good for the would-be messiahs of Egyptology. Since excitement peaked in the mid-Nineties, there has been a growing disillusionment.’
⁷

We left the story with the weird kiss-and-make-up scenario in which the three major factions involved in the Giza controversy - the Alternative Egypt trio of Hancock, Bauval and John Anthony West; the seekers after Edgar Cayce’s Hall of Records, namely the Schor Foundation and ARE; and the Egyptian archaeological authorities represented by Dr. Zahi Hawass - had apparently reached what Bauval calls an ‘entente cordiale’. There was the promise of exciting events such as the capstone ceremony and the ‘message to the planet’ by Bauval’s Magic 12’, and even that Gantenbrink’s Chamber was to be opened on Millennium night. However, something seems to have put a serious spanner in the works. None of this was to happen.

Bauval’s own version of events at Giza,
Secret Chamber: The Quest for the Hall of Records,
came out in November 1999, which - as might be expected - is well worth reading. It pours scorn on the conspiracies outlined in
The Stargate Conspiracy
- which we admit we find somewhat puzzling because
Secret Chamber
not only covers much of the same ground but actually backs it up, reaching very similar conclusions about the way events at Giza have been manipulated by those with secret, esoteric agendas.

After making much of the entente cordiale and denying the existence of any conspiracies or covert agendas, Bauval has now returned to his original position, arguing that there
are
hidden undercurrents and subtexts, particularly those of Zahi Hawass and the Schor Foundation/ARE. And not surprisingly - at least as far as we are concerned - the agendas he cites tally almost exactly with the ones that feature so prominently in this book.

The overall thesis of
Secret Chamber
is that ancient Egyptian legends - or perhaps memories - of the existence of a hidden repository of the wisdom of the Pyramid Age entered into Hermetic lore, and from there found their way into the beliefs of Rosicrucianism and Freemasonry. After Napoleon’s expedition of 1798 effectively opened Egypt up to European exploitation, Freemasons and other esotericists were able to search for the fabled repository.

On this we are largely agreed. However, there is one major point on which we fail to see eye to eye. While presenting - in our view - a convincing case for those groups’ covert manipulation of the potent symbolism of Giza, Bauval still insists that the Pyramids and Sphinx will - quite literally and in the very near future - somehow trigger a spiritual transformation of the world. He says regarding this:

Apart from his belief in the transcendental triggering of Giza — on which we remain unconvinced - this seems to us to reinforce our conclusions!

For Bauval, the focus of this ‘hijacking’ was to be the Millennium night ceremony in which a helicopter was to lower a gilded capstone onto the top of the Great Pyramid, which - as we saw in Chapter 7 - would have been replete with very specific Masonic symbolism. Together with the eye of Horus projected onto the side of the pyramid this would have completed the symbolism of the Great Seal of the United States, allegedly ushering in a new era when American Freemasonry would become the dominant force in the world.

Significantly, Edgar Cayce also predicted the advent of such an American Masonic Golden Age. Some have associated this with another of his ‘readings’ describing a gold capstone on the Great Pyramid, which he linked with the discovery of the fabled Hall of Records.
⁹
It is not too hard to see where the mooted Millennium night ceremony had its origins.

Robert Bauval writes,

In his view, the potency of the ceremony would be increased by the fact that, as seen from Giza, Sirius would be culminating at midnight.
¹¹

However, this carefully laid plan failed utterly. Although there were throngs of merry-makers on the Giza plateau at midnight, the capstone ceremony did not happen, having been called off just a matter of days before the celebrations. Cinderella did not go to the ball - ironically, as things turned out, partly because of Bauval’s book. The Egyptian press had picked up the allegations of Masonic involvement, which led to an outcry that in turn put pressure on the Egyptian government to cancel the ceremony.
¹²
Freemasonry has been banned in Egypt since 1964 because of a perceived link between the Brotherhood and Zionism - and the very idea of a Masonic ritual taking place in the heart of Egypt is highly inflammatory, to say the least. (The real irony is that the ceremony would never have happened anyway: at midnight the Giza plateau was shrouded in thick fog - perhaps the guardians of the ancient Egyptian mysteries were determined not to be mocked ... )

It seems strange to us that in spite of warning the world about the hijacking of the symbolism of Giza - specifically the capstone ceremony - Bauval himself issued statements on the Internet urging the Egyptian Government to reconsider. He
wanted
the ceremony to go ahead, warning the Egyptians that ‘the eyes of the world are watching’.
¹³

Also according to
Secret Chamber,
at the stroke of midnight Gantenbrink’s chamber was to be opened amid great fanfare and ceremony before the world’s media.
¹⁴
This, too, failed to materialise, although the authorities still promise to open the chamber sometime in the year 2000. We can only wait and see, although we may well have a long wait.

We note with disappointment that the much-hyped ‘Message to the Planet’, due to be relayed to the world by the Magic 12 - Bauval, Graham Hancock, Robert Temple and others - from in front of the Sphinx also never happened, like the ‘Hermetic Journey’ that was to occur at places of power throughout 1999. Why these events, so emphatically built up in the preceding months, never materialised, is unknown. Moreover, the famous entente cordiale - brokered by Bauval himself - is now in tatters, thanks to the criticisms in
Secret Chamber.
¹⁵

Both Bauval’s book and Lawton and Ogilvie-Herald’s
Giza: The Truth
(published in August 1999) add considerably to the detail of the strange goings-on at Giza. Most of their discoveries reinforce what we outlined in Chapter 2 of this book.

Bauval presents evidence to show that the SRI International team led by Dr Lambert Dolphin that carried out explorations at Giza in the 1970s was specifically looking for the Hall of Records - something that has always been downplayed. Bauval also demonstrates that the links between the SRI team and the ARE were far stronger than either party has subsequently admitted.
¹⁶
Bauval has also confirmed the long-standing association between Dolphin and Dr James Hurtak, citing a 1992 letter in which the former describes Hurtak as ‘my friend and colleague of many years’.
¹⁷

New information arising from
Secret Chamber
and
Giza: The Truth
has highlighted other aspects of the many disputes connected with modern Giza. Dr Zahi Hawass has denied ARE’s claims that they were responsible for his Egyptological education
¹⁸
- although it hardly matters because his continuing close ties with that organisation are not exactly secret.

In
Giza: The Truth
Lawton and Ogilvie-Herald add more detail on the dispute between film-maker Boris Said and Dr Joseph Schor, from testimony supplied by Schor himself and his long-term partner in ventures at Giza, Dr Joseph Jahoda, effectively calling some of Said’s claims into question and making certain allegations about his conduct. In particular, Schor claims that Said leaked material covered by confidentiality agreements (the test footage showing Zahi Hawass in the tunnel in the Sphinx’s rump) to, among others, Robert Bauval.
¹⁹

Another point of contention concerns the cancellation of the Schor Foundation/Florida State University’s licence to work at Giza in 1996. We have seen that Hancock and Bauval claim the credit for that, and according to Boris Said, Schor had withheld this information from him and continued the search for the Hall of Records using his commercial filming permit. Schor and Jahoda hotly dispute both claims - in fact, they say that they
never
received any official notification from Zahi Hawass or the Egyptian authorities cancelling the original licence.
²⁰
In view of the acrimonious nature of the dispute between Said and Schor, the former’s allegations that we quote in Chapter 2 should be set against Schor’s version as given in
Giza: The Truth.
If nothing else, the whole business demonstrates how difficult it is to get to the bottom of what is actually going on at Giza.

Another surprise development, in August 1999, was Dr Hawass’s formal approval of a new licence for the Schor Foundation/FSU team to work at Giza - which specifically stated that permission was given for them to
search for the Hall
of
Records.
²¹
This is the first time that such an astonishing objective has been cited on an official permit.

In
Secret Chamber,
Bauval disputes Gantenbrink’s claims (also published in
Giza: The Truth)
that he had released details of his discovery to the media against his wishes. If anything, Gantenbrink was even more strident on this subject to Lawton and Ogilvie-Herald
²²

However, in
Secret Chamber,
Bauval reproduces correspondence between himself and Gantenbrink showing that the latter
had
given him permission to publicise his discovery and that he was kept fully informed of Bauval’s negotiations with the British press, resulting in the front-page story in the
Independent
on 16 April 1993. Matters came to a head when Gantenbrink sued the BBC for using video footage of the ‘door’ in the documentary ‘The Great Pyramid: Gateway to the Stars’ (based on the work of Bauval and Adrian Gilbert). The matter was finally settled out of court after - according to Bauval - the BBC lawyers were able to show that, as Gantenbrink and his film team did not have a permit for commercial filming in the Great Pyramid, the copyright for the footage was actually held by the Egyptian Supreme Council for Antiquities.
²³