02x07 - Giza Pyramids

[bunniefuu]

[theme music playing]

Hey, everybody!

Let's G-O go!

♪ With ABC, --, and Do-Re-Mi ♪

♪ There's endless people and places to see ♪

♪ From the classroom they can search and explore ♪

♪ With every adventure you learn more ♪

♪ They visit countries near and far ♪

♪ They love to learn wherever they are ♪

♪ They see the world in a brand-new way ♪

♪ They make great new friends every day ♪

♪ ABC, --, and Do-Re-Mi ♪

♪ Come along and you will see ♪

♪ The more they travel, the more you know ♪

♪ Get ready, let's G-O go! ♪

What are you doing, --?

I'm trying to solve a mystery.

-Oh, boy! -We love mysteries!

But I haven't solved anything yet.

Maybe we need our thinking caps.

-[grunts] Click! -Click!

-Click! -Ready for the mystery, --!

Okay, it starts with a building,

but not just any building.

This was the tallest building in the world

for thousands of years.

Thousands of years?

It was made of large stone blocks that looked like that.

Part of the mystery is how the workers

moved those huge stone blocks

when each one weighed about as much as a car.

How would you have done that?

[ABC] How about a crane?

I'd place the stone block

on the back of a large truck.

[horn blares]

There's only one problem: What if you needed

more than two million of those blocks, and--

[laughs] We'd just need more of everything, right, Do-Re-Mi?

-But-- -Yeah!

More cranes! More trucks!

And maybe add some helicopters!

[ABC] Nice thinking!

There's one more little problem.

It isn't anything we can't solve!

[--] What if I told you that you couldn't use cranes,

or trucks, or any other modern equipment

because they didn't exist.

[Do-Re-Mi] No modern equipment?

[all] This is a mystery!

A mystery that's almost , years old,

and tomorrow we're going to learn

how some scientists believe it was done.

Tomorrow? I can't wait until tomorrow!

Me either!

We know what that means!

[all] Let's search it!

Okay. Tallest ancient building...

[-- gasps] Look! The Great Pyramid of Giza.

[ABC] It's in E-G-Y-P-T Egypt.

And the country of Egypt is in the continent of Africa.

Oh, and the Great Pyramid of Giza

is believed to be almost , years old!

That's gotta be it!

Let's G-O go!

Look there! That must be the Great Pyramid of Giza!

[all] Whoa!

Ready to learn some more? It's time to go explore!

[cell phone rings]

Wow!

I'm Sara.

[all] Hi, Sara.

And this is my grandfather.

His students call him Professor Abid.

He has spent most of his life

studying the ancient people of Egypt

and how they lived.

Hello, Professor Abid!

You must be an archeologist.

It's nice to meet you.

[Professor Abid] It's nice to meet you three as well.

What brings you to Giza?

[ABC] We've come to learn

how the Great Pyramid might've been built.

Ooh, that's one of the great mysteries of all time.

No one really knows for sure how they did it.

That's what our teacher says.

And did your teacher tell you what a theory is?

Oh! Oh! I know!

A theory is an idea that hasn't been proven.

-Very good, --. -[-- giggles]

If you'd like, Sara and I can show you an experiment

to test a theory about how the blocks were cut.

Yes! An experiment!

[Professor Abid] Look how tall it is.

[--] Mm-hmm... Here's a fun fact.

The Great Pyramid of Giza

was more than feet tall.

Sara, while I get ready for our experiment,

why don't you take our friends to see the Sphinx.


Ooh, that sounds F-U-N fun!

What's a Sphinx?

Isn't that the statue that was built next to the Great Pyramid?

Yes! And I have a special friend that can take us there.

[excited reactions]

[camel brays]

[chuckles] What's our camel's name?

Her name is Cleopatra.

She takes me everywhere around here.

Hi, Cleopatra!

Look at your long eyelashes. You are so cute!

Camels have bushy eyebrows and really long eyelashes

to protect their eyes from blowing sand.

Blowing sand?

[wind whooshes]

Got it!

If the wind starts blowing hard enough,

it can pick up the sand off the ground

and blow it right at you.

That's called a sandstorm.

Sandstorm?

[chuckles] I think I'll stay right up here next to you.

[chuckles]

This is the Great Sphinx.

It's so big!

This wasn't built with blocks like the pyramids.

The Great Sphinx was carved from a mound of natural rock

and is feet tall.

[Sara] And it's not only really tall,

it's almost , years old!

[Do-Re-Mi] It looks like the head of a person

with the body of a lion.

Do-Re-Mi-Fa-Sol-La-Ti-Whoa!

Sandstorm!

-[--] Look at that! -[ABC] Look how big!

Let's go, let's go!

We have to get to the Great Pyramid.

[ABC] Run, Cleopatra, run!

It's getting closer.

[Sara] We have to get inside!

[--] The sandstorm's going to catch us

in three... two... one!

[sighs] We made it!

But what about Cleopatra?

Don't worry, she'll be fine.

Besides her bushy eyebrows and really long eyelashes,

camels can close their nostrils and lips really tight

to keep the sand out.

Welcome, guests!

Hi, Omar! These are my friends

ABC, --, and Do-Re-Mi.

Hello, friends of Sara. I am Omar.

Hi, Omar. Do you live here?

[laughs] In the Great Pyramid?

No. I'm a tour guide.

This is the room where some archeologists

think Khufu was buried.

-What? -Buried?

Pyramids are places where people were buried?

Well, archeologists never found any pharaohs' bodies

in the pyramids of Giza,

but they did find them in several other pyramids.

So, most archeologists think that's why

all of these pyramids were built.

And when the pharaohs d*ed,

their bodies were prepared so that they would last

a long, long time.

That's called mummification,

and the bodies are called mummies.

Ohh, mummies! [laughing]

[mumbling and growling]

[-- giggles]

Oh, it's almost time for our experiment!

I think the sandstorm should have passed by now.

Thanks, Omar,

for showing us inside the Great Pyramid!

My pleasure.

Ooh! Back to Cleopatra!

So, scientists have a theory

about how the ancient Egyptians cut a giant stone block

with the tools they had , years ago.

But how do you know what tools they had?

Good question, Do-Re-Mi.

The ancient Egyptians sometimes decorated their tombs,

and some of those pictures show workers

using simple tools like mallets,

chisels, drills, and saws...

Based on the pictures found in the pyramids,

we know that they used saws

made of a metal called copper.

But first they had to move the stones

to where they wanted to build the pyramids.

Other experiments have shown that the giant blocks

could have gotten to Giza by being dragged on sledges

and put on giant rafts on the Nile River.

Our experiment will show how men with a copper saw

can cut through a block of stone.

Wow, I can't wait to see this!

The saws from that time don't seem strong enough

to cut through these rocks.


But some people discovered that if you

throw sand onto the boulder,

the sand will help the saw cut through the stone.

So, let's begin.

It turns out that sand has lots of tiny sharp crystals in it.

As the saw moves back and forth,

the crystals get pushed into the rock

and help cut through it.

[ABC gasps]

Ooh! It's working!

[excited shouts]

Wait a minute.

There's still one part of the mystery

we haven't figured out yet.

What's that?

Once the ancient Egyptians cut the stones,

how did they lift them up to the top part of the pyramids?

Good question!

Well, some archeologists believe the ancient Egyptians

built ramps all around the pyramid

and pulled the blocks up on the ramps--

although no one knows for sure.

This is so amazing!

Thank you for everything you showed us today.

You're welcome to come back and visit.

Any time.

-[camel brays] -What was that?

[giggles] It was Cleopatra.

It sounds like she wants to say goodbye.

[mice] Goodbye, Cleopatra!

-Thank you! -Bye!

-Buh-bye! -[Sara] Bye!

[brays]

[ABC] Now it's time to sing along.