Egyptian Stone Cutting Tools

Ancient egyptian stone drilling.

Egyptian stone cutting tools.

It was very likely copper since bronze tools were not in use until the middle kingdom ca. Reproduction ancient egyptian stone mason s tools used for carving demonstrations. For the time being the balance of evidence seems to suggest the mainstream view that primitive metal and wooden tools used by common stone masons were sufficient for cutting through granite. As neither copper nor bronze is sufficiently hard to cut such stones as basalt diorite granite quartzite and schist.

In basic terms any tool should have a greater hardness than the material being cut or shaped. The pink granite of which the unfinished obelisk is composed has a mohs hardness that sits between the scale of 6 and 7 the maximum being diamond at 10 and thus is more or less the same hardness as dolerite making the latter a poor material for shaping the former. These joints with an area. Although the idea was first raised by petrie.

Filmed in the egyptian museum of antiquities this granite box shows strong evidence for a lost high technology in ancient egypt. Franz löhner doesn t allege that the ancient egyptians already knew the difficult and elaborate procedure of making wrought iron but that they acquired the valuable iron by trading. Franz löhner thinks that only forged iron chisels can cut through the hard granite.