Theories that seem crazy about the hidden knowledge of the pyramids or the disappearance of a civilization before ours: on social networks or in certain documentaries (poke Netflix), false information can also be pricked with archeology. For the European Archeology Days which take place from June 16 to 18, 2023, 20 minutes deciphers the success of these “contemporary myths”, as perceived by anthropologist Jean-Loïc Le Quellec, director of research emeritus at the Institute of African Worlds (CNRS).
- The story of a civilization that would have existed before ours
A cataclysm before the Ice Age would have wiped out an advanced civilization thousands of years ago. This thesis, which no archaeological evidence supports, was told by the British writer Graham Hancock in At the dawn of our history on Netflix, to the chagrin of archaeologists who denounced “disinformation”.
This account of the vanished civilization is “the one that works the most”, believes Jean-Loïc Le Quellec, author of Martians in the Sahara, two centuries of archaeological fake news (Editions of the Detour). “It is the story around Atlantis and the variants that can be attached to it, he continues, that is to say that we were preceded by a great civilization which sank, which was infinitely superior to ours and which has bequeathed us practically nothing, so much so that archaeologists do not notice it. One of the first books to take up this myth of Atlantis and of a civilization that disappeared after a deluge was published in the 1880s by the American writer Ignatius Donnelly.
Two great pseudo-archaeological stories come together in this field: that of advanced civilization and that of extraterrestrials, emphasizes, for his part, Alexis Seydoux, historian and archaeologist, specialist in the ancient and medieval worlds and member of the association for the fight against disinformation in history, art history and archeology (ALDHHA). “The one on advanced civilization is based on catastrophism, on the idea that the Earth experienced major catastrophes and that the ancient civilization was destroyed by a cataclysm, the flood, etc., he explains. The second is [l’auteur] Erich von Däniken, who set it up in the 1960s and 1970s, is the idea that extraterrestrials have transformed humans, cloned and modified them. It’s more recent and it comes at a time when we’re starting to think about space. »
- ” A romantic archeology » against the scientific method
Why such a success ? For Alexis Seydoux, these stories, a “great classic” allow to give “a simple and global explanation to legitimate questions of history”. Jean-Loïc Le Quellec analyzes it as part of “contemporary myths”, that is to say a story that we tell ourselves to give meaning.
“Despite the many refutations, these stories spread and are always the same, there is rarely new fake news. Why does it work? The only reason is that it plays the role of a contemporary myth, underlines the anthropologist. These are stories that use elements of archaeology, which have no claim to demonstration, but to give a reason for things. »
This is what he calls “romantic archaeology”: the interpretation pre-exists any search for facts (eg: an advanced civilization has disappeared) and “romantic archaeologists” will seek the “proofs” of their thesis. It is the opposite of the approach of the archaeologist, who from a meticulous work of collecting data, facts, will proceed by demonstration to affirm a thesis, which will be debated by other researchers and will be able to allow ( or not) to obtain a historical consensus according to the state of knowledge.
- The Egyptian pyramids, a monument of fascination since the 19th century
The perfect example of this discrepancy are the pyramids. They have fed the imagination since the wave of Egyptomania in the 19th century, precisely linked to archaeological discoveries. It was also at this time that many fake objects circulated, which prompted archaeologists to develop techniques, a scientific method to counter these fakes.
So what allows Egyptologists to say with certainty that the pyramids are tombs? “First of all, we found the remains of mummies there,” explains historian Alexis Seydoux. Texts in these pyramids explain that we are dealing with Books of the Dead, how the deceased will have to go through the trials to obtain the afterlife, there are also a large number of archaeological structures around the pyramids which are linked at the funeral. Finally, texts outside the pyramids explain that they serve the deceased. »
The main dispute rests on the idea that the pyramids are not tombs, but something else. Alexis Seydoux distinguishes three pseudo-archaeological stories: that of another civilization which would have built these pyramids, “because it is so complicated to do that it is necessarily another civilization which made it, whereas it is technically very simple, but it requires financial means,” he notes. The Revelation of the Pyramids, a documentary released in 2010, popularized this theory, among others, in France. False information still relayed in 2019 by the youtubeur Squeezie and that we had analyzed.
The second story focuses on the knowledge hidden in the pyramids. “There is a lot of numerology there: in the pyramid would hide marvelous numbers, pi, the golden ratio, the dimensions of the Earth. We are in a risky correlation, ”continues the historian. Finally, advanced technologies would also be found in the pyramids. “It would be a power plant, an antenna to call extraterrestrials, there are also theories related to future knowledge, the pyramid would be a book that allows us to understand the future. None of them holds, all are linked to very illusory and very risky interpretations of knowledge”, he underlines.
For example, on electricity, which came back to the fore with Master Gims, this hypothesis is based on a book by Gruais and Mouny, published in 1992. “These two pseudo-researchers indicated that the shape of the ankh (the Egyptian cross of life) looked like a kind of diode, so it’s a diode, it doesn’t hold on to much, ”points out Alexis Seydoux. This is what he calls an anachronistic veneer, linked to our lifestyles. “People apply today’s knowledge to these societies of the past: today, we go into space, so we think that the monuments of the past are used to go into space. »
In this, the fantasies around the pyramids say more about our societies than about the Egyptians of Antiquity. “We are the ones who have a fascination for the pyramids, and Egypt in particular, laughs Jean-Loïc Le Quellec. If I want to defend the idea of a great civilization, endowed with electricity, well before we thought it was possible, Egypt is a very good candidate! The pyramids are the emblem of a great civilization in our way of seeing the world. “It is difficult to imagine a great civilization that does not leave large stone monuments, analyzes the anthropologist, it shows how we see ourselves, when one might think that a very great civilization leaves monuments. culture, oral tradition, poetry…”