Recently I posted an article discussing how the ancients moved massive stones over great distances, Moving Megaliths. In this post I mentioned the Roman temple complex at Baalbek, named after the gods worshipped by the ancient Phoenicians but then known as Heliopolis (City of the Sun), high above the Beqaa plain in Lebannon, which appears to have been constructed upon the base of an ancient temple site. Legend records the ancient temple as the construction of Cain before the Deluge and then rebuilt by a race of giants under the command of Nimrod after the flood. Incorporated into the foundations of this ancient temple are three massive stones estimated to weigh 800 tons each known as the Trilithons. The Trilithons were raised 20 feet to sit in the third course of the temple foundations, beneath these 24 blocks of 300 tons make up a lower course. The Trilithons have been so accurately placed it is not possible to push a knife blade between them. These massive blocks are generally considered the largest stones moved by man in a construction, unmatched in antiquity or modern times.
Less than a mile from the ancient temple complex at Baalbek, is an even larger quarried block known as the Stone of the Pregnant Woman, (or Stone of the South), still attached to the bedrock. Measuring 71 feet long, 14 feet high, and 13 feet wide it is estimated to weigh at least 1000 tons. A second ancient monolith was discovered in the same quarry in the 1990s, its weight estimated at 1,242 tons. Although these two massive stones did not leave the quarry the original intention clearly appears to have been to use them in the ancient temple at Baalbek and therefore can justifiably be considered the largest stones worked by man.
However, the title of the world's largest megaliths ever discovered may belong not to Baalbek but a set of "tombstones" located on the Kora River in Kazakhstan. The Kora river gorge is probably one of the most scenic in the region of Semirechye (Land of Seven Rivers). The river rises high in the mountain ranges of the Jungar Alatau. The rivers Kora, Chizhe and Tekeli come together to form the river Karatal, which flows into Lake Balkhash, one of the largest lakes in Asia.
The Jungar Alatau is a range of mountains between the Altai and the principal massifs of the Tien Shan, marking the deserted mountain borderlands of Kazakhstan and China. The lowland between the Jungar Alatau and the Tarbagatai mountains forms a natural gap known as 'The Jungar Gate,' the favoured route of Genghis Khan and his forces on their journey west, the most important crossroads of the ancient routes on the Eurasian continent.
Known as the Tombs of the Genii, five massive standing stones were discovered by the Kora River in 1860 by Thomas Witlam Atkinson. The largest recorded of this megalithic group measuring 76 feet high by 24 feet wide by 19 feet deep. Modern estimates to the weight of this massive megalith provide figures between 3,000 and 4,000 tons. Atkinson reported a sixth even larger stone lying recumbent, half buried in the ground. The massive stones are recorded in Atkinson's 1861 book Travels In The Regions Of The Upper And Lower Amoor.
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| Sketch from Atkinson's book |
The following is an excerpt from Chapter VI: The Kora and Traditions:
"Having travelled onward several miles, I arrived at a part of the valley where the Kora makes a bend toward the cliffs on the north, leaving a space of about 200 yards in width, between the base of the rocks and the river. As I approached this spot, I was almost induced to believe that the works of the Giants were before me, for five enormous stones were standing isolated and on end, the first sight of which gave me the idea that their disposition was not accidental, and that a master mind had superintended the erection, the group being in perfect keeping with the scene around. One of these blocks would have made a tower large enough for a church, its height being 76 feet above the ground, and it measured 24 feet on one side and 19 feet on the other. It stood 73 paces from the base of the cliffs, and was about 8 feet out of the perpendicular, inclining towards the river. The remaining four blocks varied from 45 to 50 feet in height, one being 15 feet square and the rest somewhat less. Two of these stood upright, the others were leaning in different directions, one of them so far that it had nearly lost its equilibrium. A sixth mass of still larger dimensions was lying half buried in the ground; on this, some young picta trees had taken root and were growing luxuriantly.” [1]
An account of these massive stones was later reported in an article in 1876 for the ‘Journal of Transactions’ by John Eliot Howard, [2] using Atkinson as its source who appears to be the only person to report the monoliths from a first hand account.
Fact or fable?
Books on strange and unexplained phenomena cover topics from the Loch Ness Monster to Ancient Nuclear Warfare, yet accounts of the Tombs of the Genii are surprisingly absent from their pages. Indeed, I could only find one brief reference to these massive stones. [3] Atkinson is our sole source. The terrain of Kazakhstan varies from flatlands, steppes, rock-canyons, hills, deltas, glaciers and snow-capped mountains to deserts; it is absolutely vast, the world's largest landlocked country, covering an area of 2,727,300 square kilometres (1,053,000 sq miles) – an area larger than Western Europe.
If these stones actually exist, is it possible that these huge megaliths can go undetected in this age of modern technology?
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Notes:
1. Thomas Witlam Atkinson, Travels In The Regions Of The Upper And Lower Amoor, Hurst And Blackett, 1861, pp.117-119.
2. John Eliot Howard, The Early Dawn of Civilization, Victoria Institute, Journal of the Transactions, 9:239, 1876.
3. David Hatcher Childress, Technology of the Gods: The Incredible Sciences of the Ancients, Adventures Unlimited Press, 2000, p.116.
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