Newfound tomb reveals ancient Egyptians had ‘extensive knowledge of the solar cycle’

Researchers discovered that a tomb in Egypt is precisely aligned to the winter solstice, revealing that ancient Egyptian architects were “enormously sophisticated” and held “extensive knowledge of the solar cycle,” they said.

The tomb is located in the necropolis of Qubbet el-Hawa, which sits on the bank of the Nile River about 500 miles south of Cairo, according to a news release from EurekAlert and research published in the journal of Mediterranean Archaeology and Archaeometry. It is one of the most “remarkable” tombs of the one hundred or so burial complexes in the area.

The tomb’s entrance is exactly oriented to the winter solstice sunrise, which presently occurs on Dec. 21, so that the sun’s rays land on a section intended to house a statue of a governor of Elephantine, an ancient city on an island in the Nile River. It is likely that a funeral ritual related to the sun took place at the tomb, researchers said.

The winter solstice was noteworthy for the ancient Egyptians because it marked the shortest day of the year, signifying “the beginning of the sunlight victory over darkness,” researchers said, adding that the sun symbolized rebirth for the early civilization.

Using only a three-foot pole, a square and several robes, ancient architects were able to “perfectly” calculate the necessary orientation of the tomb, researchers said.

Researchers were able to determine the astronomical significance of the tomb, which was excavated between 2008 and 2018, after the time period when it was constructed was recently identified.

The time period, around 1830 B.C., was incorporated into a software called Dialux Evo that recreated the exact position of the sun during that period, researchers said.

“This study demonstrates that Egyptians were capable of calculating the position of the sun and the orientation of its rays to design their monuments,” one researcher stated in the release.

Additionally, the tomb “can be considered the oldest private funeral project in which a perfect intersolstice alignment is achieved, showing the presence of individuals with enormously sophisticated religious and technical training in provincial courts such as Elephantine,” researchers wrote in the study.

This story was originally published December 13, 2022 at 1:42 PM with the headline "Newfound tomb reveals ancient Egyptians had ‘extensive knowledge of the solar cycle’."