TITLE:
Archaeoastronomical Study of the Main Pyramids of Giza, Egypt: Possible Correlations with the Stars?
AUTHORS:
Vincenzo Orofino, Paolo Bernardini
KEYWORDS:
Egypt, Old Kingdom, Pyramids, Archaeoastronomy, Statistics
JOURNAL NAME:
Archaeological Discovery,
Vol.4 No.1,
November
24,
2015
ABSTRACT: Since long time various qualitative speculations have been proposed about the link between the three major Giza pyramids and the stars. In particular, according to a popular and controversial hypothesis (the so-called Orion Correlation Theory), a perfect coincidence would exist between the mutual positions of the three stars of the Orion Belt and those of the main Giza pyramids. In the present paper, this apparent coincidence has been subjected to some statistical verifications, in order to assess the probability that the correlation between stars and pyramids, both in relative position and in luminosity/height, can be merely due to the case. These statistical analyses have been performed by means of Monte Carlo simulations and have been coupled with previous astronomical/astrophysical tests of the presumed correlation, finding that the coincidence does not seem to be fortuitous and that it is compatible with the naked-eye astrometry and photometry of the Orion Belt stars. On the contrary, unlike what stated by another popular and controversial theory (the so-called Cygnus-Giza Correlation), we have found no coincidence between the mutual positions of the three pyramids and those of the three stars of the short arm of the asterism of Northern Cross, in the Cygnus constellation.