Perfecting Polygonal Masonry: A New Explanation on the Ancient Engineers’ Construction Methods

Clay model demonstrating ancient stone wall construction. Many of these walls have been attributed to the Incan civilization in Peru and they have also found in places in Egypt, India and many other places. This is a demonstration of why I believe the stone nubs are there and their use. Also, I demonstrate how they could have achieved the precise tight joinery in the stonework
UPDATE July, ’24:
Thank you for all the comments. There are many great praises and critiques that I’d like to address.
1. Protrusions on Stones: Many have questioned why some protrusions were removed while others were not. There could be multiple reasons for this:
• Removing protrusions is time-consuming. In areas of the wall that are out of sight or covered, such as beneath a first-floor ceiling, the extra time and effort to remove them might not have been deemed necessary.
• They could have been used for a secondary purpose, such as hanging items or serving another function unrelated to their original use.
• It could also be that the civilization encountered some disaster or change in leadership during construction, which could’ve led to other priorities outside of completing some structures.
2. Natural Stone Fractures and Quarrying: A common comment relates to the ability to split off long layers of stone from a quarry. There are pictures and videos showing natural fractures in exposed rock outcrops (search on the internet: “Exposed Rock Outcrop Fracture”). Although such outcrops are not common today, I believe they were more prevalent in the past. Similar to other natural resources, the easily accessible ones were used first, much like early oil reserves compared to today’s deeper reserves that require more complex extraction methods like fracking. Another observation of mine is that this might be why they had to bring these stones from great distances. Early civilizations likely traveled long distances to find stone outcrops with favorable natural fractures.
3. Consistent Grain Pattern Through Each Stone: This could be the Achilles’ heel to this theory. However, if this technique works precisely, it may not be necessary to abut neighboring stones to their original placement. It could be that some of the stones we see are placed back in the order from where they fell naturally, but there could be others that were not in the original location or order to their adjacent stones. This could explain why some polygonal fittings are more precise than others.
Although I believe this theory is original, I’m not married to it and have no stake in it. I hope someone smarter than me can provide a better explanation. Like many of you, I don’t believe that these protrusions were used as props to hold the stones up while they were being chiseled, nor do I believe that it was some super-advanced technology.
It’s been a couple of years since I made this video, and I hope to create another soon to delve deeper into how I believe these stones were chiseled efficiently using dolomite stones with small crews of labor.

[@klubstompers]

This would be pretty easy to prove/disprove. Inspect the grain pattern of the stone, and see if it continues from one stone to the next in the same direction.

[@Fisch2k4]

It doesn't. The striations don't line up.

[@ottodidakt3069]

@@Fisch2k4 sources ?

[@UkuleleBobbyKemp]

@@ottodidakt3069 f

[@weisthor0815]

@@ottodidakt3069 Close up pictures, they´re out there

[@RKBaxter]

@@ottodidakt3069 His own brain.

[@StalkedByLosers]

Interesting but how do you propose they cut the back of the stones in one go in such a way that it would form a complete wall that they could push over? The quarry would also need to be of premium continuous solid stone in order to make walls like that, and there are a lot of walls like that. So it doesnt add up.

[@Brisius]

exactly that's exactly the hard part, doesn't make sense

[@StalkedByLosers]

​@Brisius and to add to that, we can easily test if they did use this method by analyzing the back of the stone. They should theoretically all have flat backs. When we do that, we discover that they are not flat in back. They are contoured and or staggard and still tightly fitting. Also some larger base stones are double sided with nubs on both sides and have wider bases which makes it impossible to knock over (in fact is the reason why they still stand). I don't want to discouraged ideas. I applaud the discussion, but this idea needs to go back to the drawing board.

[@PedroSantos-fw6gk]

Some 30,000 year old ancient lost technology to soften rocks

[@StalkedByLosers]

@Asparagus777-hw5ft link?

[@nickostrom2163]

​kzbin.info/www/bejne/lWakoZ-FeMqag6Mfeature=shared​@@StalkedByLosers Prob this link. Seems possible they could have used a combination of the clay method and the Incan method. Look up how modern granite is quarried today. When quarrying a solid 80ton slab of granite they will place a pile of rubble in the center of where the slab will drop so the weight of the falling rock will shatter the slab into pieces they can move easily. This is just a less complex version of what the clay guy is doing. Modern quarries don't use nubs because they care more about breaking the stone quickly than making precise bricks. They'll saw cut them later. More than likely the nubs were just used for lifting, but it seems possible that they could get more accurate walls from the jump by breaking them off the slab of granite this way then fine tuning using the plumbob/stick + chisel method while supporting the stones with timber. This can also explain the polygonal L shaped corner stones also. If you haven't watched it yet, I highly recommend the video I linked. The real shit I wanna know is how did they have tube drills and whatever made those scoop marks in the Egyptian quarries? 😆

[@Qingeaton]

I missed the part where you explained the cutting behind.

[@ninjaman58]

lol

[@thomasdyson8329]

Because it's been faked 😂

[@fabriziopassley]

I getcha

[@skepticalgenious]

Oh goodness, all the comments and likes missed the point on this thread. If you made a massive wall from concrete or geo polymer, you can use tools to make it look like its stones stacked onto each other. When it's actually only formed to appear that way.

[@bofpwet9500]

There was no cutting behind in his interpretation I believe, he said they would have use natural occuring faults and cracks, in wich I suppose they would have inserted wood and levers to make that layer tip...

[@johnwayne3085]

The fact that you believe stone tools were used on these unbelievably hard stones indicates to me that you need to do more research. This little exercise proved nothing. edit: You also said the tight fitting nature of the blocks was an accidental byproduct of the way the cut they stones. Cmon, man.

[@Kwalade]

You may be right. I’ll have to do a full size demo

[@tomten2539]

@@Kwalade One interesting obstacle You will then confront is to separate the entire block, with coppertools, from the mountain. Also note that the grid pattern is intentionally asymmetric, rather than repeated squares, in order to withstand earrthquakes. Nice try anyhow, and original thinking!

[@Rkekoke485]

😅​@@tomten2539

[@dangerouzdave1172]

What if, at one point in time and at the time of the building of theses walls, the material was soft and workable and due to some reason or event the building materials turned soild.

[@tomten2539]

@@dangerouzdave1172 Interesting idea! But, if so, wouldnt the mountains we see today have pancaked long ago? And wouldnt we find more luxury tyrannosaurussecure and elaborated hillside apartments all over?

[@timcyntensen2166]

So...why go through all that effort to break the stone apart into nicely fitting blocks, just to go through even more effort to put it all back together? What am I missing here?

[@Dutch1954]

It would be easier to move all the individual stone blocks, one by one, from the quarry to the building site rather than the much larger, heavier slab from which they all originate. Just my quick take on it. If this was the method, there still remains a host of other issues, not the least of which is there could be no guarantee that you could get clean breaks each and every time the slab is pushed over to break into the individual blocks. No way to know if or where there might exist natural faults and weaknesses in the rock, which would likely produce jagged and irregular breaks. Interesting video though.

[@eduardogardin879]

In order to make them easier to move

[@rjbarber487]

🤔

[@ScreamingEagleFTW]

thats a good point also.

[@ScreamingEagleFTW]

unless they mined the stones in a different place and then transported them to the place where they built the wall.

[@diveinnjim]

granite doesn't believe like that, you would have to cut halfway through the stone for this to work and it would only work on the stones that fell the furthest and no garrentee that would break along these lines. plus, the bottom 3 or 4 courses would remain intact.

[@ddoherty5956]

Even if the lower courses remained intact that would represent a massive efficiency saving.

[@Brisius]

but why are the walls and buildings where only 1-2% of the entire wall has those knobs? For example a wall of 300 stones with 1-2 stones that have knobs?

[@JasonSmith-we5ls]

I applaud the effort, and I appreciate anyone trying to apply logic to this illogical question. I see those sexy walls and I see the work of people that were absolute masters of their environment. Working stone was easy for them, 2k ton and bigger stones were moved hundreds of miles, they could do anything they wanted to do in stone. Regardless of its type or hardness. All that being said joints such as these have been found all over the world and most all of them share that bevel you pointed out, you hypothesize they’re hammer marks from a scoring process, that may be the case, but when you cut a stone and join it to another, the joint itself becomes weakest point in the stone, so erosive forces will act on the joint faster than the body of the stone. Obviously no one knows for sure, but ideas like this one will one day solve the puzzle 🙏

[@Stevie-J]

Love those sexy walls. Megalith fetish is heckin' valid 😍

[@chrismalcomson7640]

Certainly the best explanation of the knobs I've heard and why they're seen so widely around the world on this kind of masonary. Obviously you'd be hard pressed to use this construction technique on the larger walls but there's no reason why you couldn't use a combination of this technique where possible and cutting them in maually when you had no choice. Keeping it as simple as possible is the key.. Polygonal blocks obviously had to be cut in by hand and the irregular shapes on some walls suggests they cut them in individually.. I guess the techniques used would de dependent on the properties of the stone in the quarries. Not all stone will fracture in the way you like it to..

[@skepticalgenious]

I concur it's an excellent hypothesis or actually theory. The only thing I'm wondering like yourself, would be dynamics. Will it work if scaled up in size.

[@4sineweaver2]

I thought that reassembling the blocks at the job site was the simplest way to get a perfect fit but I couldn't figure out how the the process was started. You've even explained the nubs! Love it!

[@blaze1148]

...he doesn't explain anything.....the nubs are all offset which would make lifting with them difficult plus why aren't they on all the stones.

[@cenkaetaya]

Why would they not remove the nubs after if they were just for the breaking part?

[@CEng-ge6sw]

There is no need to remove them.

[@j.f.c]

Maybe it's an indication of the methods used to carve those particular stones while others were carved in a different way. Or maybe they just didn't get around to it.

[@cenkaetaya]

@@j.f.c I believe we even have examples of these nubs from like 6 to 800 years ago. There's got to be like some guy sitting in some village with no internet that knows exactly what they're for.

[@TheUngratefulAritistBastard]

I watched hundred of shows on this subject and this is the best attempt at explaining how it was done. I also worked at a granite rock quarry, I use to repel of the edge of the quarry by rope and used a feather and wedge tech to remove huge slaps. Then we would take the slab and make smaller stones, yes I use to make big rock into little rocks. Granite has a grain in the rock that is not easily seen, and you have to use your hand to feel grain. Once you get good at reading the grain with your hand, splitting rock block is easy. The nubs as explained by Daniel would act as a reverse feather and wedges in the splitting process. As for the back side of the rock (the big long and tall cut), that would be easy to cut using feather & wedge technique. I could use other granite stones that are wedge shaped for feathers and another stone for the wedge. So I think Danial is onto something.

[@ausgepicht]

LOL...I looked up Dunning-Kruger Effect on Google and it directed me to this video. Clay and granite! Virtually identical!!

[@yuotwob3091]

Sound theory, neatly demonstrated. I was thinking the patterns look like magnetic domain crystal structures, only on a much bigger scale. Given that you can magnetise iron by striking it sharply with a hammer, I was imagining a gang synchronously pounding away on a rocky protrusion to get it ringing. With some initial 'tuning', we could imagine that a pattern emerges, to the 'sighted', that could be scored into the rockface.

[@Mikheno]

How did they cut the slab in the first place?

[@johngriffiths118]

Drill and wet wedges I would guess

[@Mikheno]

@@johngriffiths118 There should be some drill marks on the blocks where the slabs were cut. They didn't make a huge effort to get rid of the nubs but the block face is cleared of any drilling activity. Also, scibing a line in the rock doesn't assure thats where it will crack when it falls. Internal faults will crack out regardless of what you scribed on the outside. Shouldn't there be some rocks scattered about that cracked other than planned? What we need to find is a "Rosetta Block" with all the drilling/cutting markings still in place. Nice theory here but not sure I'm all in yet.

[@eduardogardin879]

They used naturally occurring faults

[@Greenr0]

If they could haul and put the entire stone wall in place, why would they bother to create all of the protrusions? Also, who would want to risk their lives (we are talking about Hercules strength here) to push hundreds of tons and over 30 feet tall walls down, only to pick up and fit broken pieces one by one, each weight several tons. Watching how we try to explain ancient building techniques is like watching a person who know only up to algebra try to explain Fourier's Theorem.

[@edwardedward8139]

I've watched the fourier's theorem people try to erect an obelisk. Their common sense dropped off a cliff once out in the real world. They did eventually figure it out though and accomplish the task. It's not that difficult to push over hundreds of tons' using leverage and gravity. But you do have to be smarter than the rock.

[@awtawt2087]

I like the use of lateral thinking in an attempt to explain this phenomenon with a fairly straight forward and simplistic explanation, which I feel is going to provide the answer eventually, however I think this idea doesn't seem practical. It means a tremendous amount of work preparing the stone grooves and knobs to start with and then slicing right down the backside to release the slab from the bedrock.

[@Kwalade]

It is still a tremendous amount of work but not near the amount of work it would be to shape each individual stone. The backside, I think they may have used a natural break break in the quarry. It’s all conjecture but in the right conditions just maybe

[@carlsmith8593]

Quarrymen are remarkably efficient at breaking rough stone blocks from the living rock. They make a row of holes, and jack the rock away. You don't get a flat edge, but it'd be close enough for this guy's theory to be plausible.

[@edwardedward8139]

Perhaps they chisel out the base so that they can then start to work the slab free from the face of the rock. And then there is the issue of the more primitive work in some places being the newer work. And the native people in some places say they didn't build it. Educated people disregard what native people say about their own history when that history contradicts accepted theories about ancient monoliths. That's ok though because they celebrate their culture so they can feel like they are good people even though they think those people are ignorant.

[@SensiProductionzBlindDogVideos]

Ancient concrete or electrical current makes more sense to me, and would be more practical. I’ve read that the acid from mines was mixed with powdered rock, then molded, and when hit with electrical current, it reacted with the rock and solidified it back to its almost natural state. Minus the vitrification on the outer core, that shows a tremendous heat had been applied

[@SensiProductionzBlindDogVideos]

@@carlsmith8593it wouldn’t break in one solid piece as explained if it was hammered from the backside with holes. The vibrations would break it before it fell.

[@glass1258]

They used woven sacks filled them with dry cement like geopolymer added water to set it. Those bumps are at where the woven sacks gave way before setting into stone .

[@wompbozer3939]

If they actually gave way, you would see a deflated block that is all wrinkled up, and the majority of the block would be protruding from beyond the faces of all the other blocks. Instead, the faces are more or less flush with one another and the only thing that sticks out is the nub.

[@Dave1502]

If the nubs were purely functional, why leave them on the blocks? They could have easily chiselled them off.

[@philippriestman8516]

The walls weren’t finished

[@ColbyNeumeister]

How do you explain polygonal fitting around corners? What about places like Ollantaytambo and all the massive inner and outer corners? What about the flawless inner corners in Egypt that wrap around the stone? What about cutting and fitting the back of the casing stones on the pyramids in Egypt? I appreciate the effort but this obviously isn't it..

[@crashandburngaming5103]

Ya I was thinking that too. It’s incredible that they somehow did this. Even if it wasn’t the Mayan or Incas. Somebody did it, and not with stone tools lol. Fitting granite so that you can’t put a business card between them is pretty extraordinary.

[@j.f.c]

More than one tool in their toolbag, this probably worked well but wasn't the only method. Maybe the knobs are an indication of the methods used?

[@paulbird795]

Nope. They carved these in situ on the rock face, you can see the nubs still in place at quarries like Ollayantambo. When the stone was perfect, they snapped it off leaving nubs on the intended removal block, as well as corresponding nubs on the quarry walls - it is completely bizzare. The problem is we also have evidence of some sort of concrete at these sites, not only that we have evidence of the stones being exposed to extremely high heat and apparently glazed. There were multiple technologies at work here and it is totally baffling. The quarry marks at Ollayantambo show that the stones were extracted leaving very smooth walls, and this does indeed look like they were clay and cut out with a giant knife, which makes zero sense at all because that rock is not clay... it has veins of quartz running through it. Weird stuff!

[@jebbrown2847]

Title says Mayan walls yet he uses incan walls as an example.

[@j.f.c]

Yes, but I've heard that the incas may have inherited some of these structures as well. The original builders could predate builders before the Inca, who knows for sure?

[@leifotto4277]

Very cool! You explain the “pillowing” and the nubs and more. So one could confirm your method is correct if most of the stones share the same fine-grain striations of their neighboring stones - demonstrating that they had been one solid slab of rock that was fractured on the grooved dividing lines. Seems like that would be a fairly easy test to perform. I’d love to know! I do wonder about those multi-sided stones though - where they have like 9 sides that interlock perfectly with adjacent stones. Those intricate joins are not decorative, and would seem to be pointless, yet very difficult to produce.

[@Mr.Customize]

No matther how good of a stonemason you are you cannot control the breakage of the stones upon impact no matter how straight of a line you draw, contrary to what we see from the walls which are PERFECTLY straight. It is a nice theory tho.

[@eduardogardin879]

The stones on most walls are all different

[@ChristaFree]

Except there's metal pieces holding the individual stones together. There was an article written in the mid 1990s. A researcher went there and did testing. He found traces of chemicals found in mine water, in the cracks between the stones. When you add organic water and pyrite to mine water it makes it extremely more powerful, acidic. He said in his research paper that it could sixteen soften the stones enough to make them conform.

[@ensenadorjones4224]

I love this fresh idea. I read all of the comments and your follow up response to people. This makes sense to me and is possible in some circumstances. There were obviously rocks that didn’t break cleanly and had to be scrapped or reshaped and used elsewhere. I also believe that they used basic methods rather than fringe ideas that many people seem to subscribe to. They had a labor class often obligated to work for the ruling class. They had thousands of years of experimental practice on stone passed down until they became proficient, no, highly advanced at shaping and moving stone.

[@samheasmanwhite]

This is one of the best theories for the nubs that I have heard, although I think it would have been practiced differently: Carving an large wall off seems very impractical and from what I have seen such a deep single carving has only been done to quarry large megaliths that are kept as one piece, and using crack forming techniques is not an option across that big flat geometry. So I think this practice would have been used more to break up the large blocks that are obtained by the usual splitting-based quarrying. Nubs are often seen in pairs, and right on the edge of stones, so although they could have created a ridge as a stress line, two points would concentrate the stress more and make it easier to break from a shorter drop. This would also explain why so many stones have no nubs too, since during the break the nubs might only end up on one side, and there could also be extra unintentional breakages that leave nubless stones. I do seriously disagree with the idea that the stones were simply reassembled along crack lines, since although there could be some control over how the stones break, stone simply cannot be made to break perfectly into the shape of any blockwork I have seen without significant further reshaping of the mating surfaces.

[@brothermaleuspraetor9505]

Yeah, like the inverted 90 degree corners with protrusive angles and spurs, going AROUND THE CORNER, into the adjacent plane.. you can't 'break' that in one go. It's impossible. It had to be cut into shape, and cut to fit.

[@cadams1607]

Why keep the nubs if the rest of the stone can be leveled flush.

[@m.anthonyc.8761]

What's up with the sound?

[@gfelix3552]

Cuzco and other sites have differnet sized knobs some small some kinda of huge protruding out more. Some of them perfectly carved for some odd reason. But some are not. Hosntely i think they were mounting something on to them. This structures has something attached to them. Like a docking station. I just dont know for what exactly.

[@focusdecorating3637]

There was a purpose for these. Did the stones all have knobs on them so they could place a scaffold board across them so they could stand to work on the higher stones ? Then once finished they smoothed them all off except the final ones that are holding only a small bit of scaffold plank then, this bit cant be smoothed off because it would be too awkward as its the final bit they are standing on.

[@spsmith1965]

Best explanation I have seen. I think it makes a lot of sense. I would think that if this technique was used, there should periodic points on a long wall where the stones do not fit together as well along a roughly vertical seam. That would mark a place where they had to connect two segments that were made from the same rock face in subsequent cuts. I would also expect that if this theory is correct, there should be natural seams in the rock that continue through multiple blocks, since the blocks started as a single slab.

[@Kwalade]

I wonder that as well, about the seam where they would have connected two segments together. As far as natural seams, I wonder that too. I will have to visit one of the sites and get specific footage and also test this theory myself. Some of my ideas seem correct but they may not be or maybe only partially correct. I’m excited to try them out. Thank you for the compliment

[@danstory4286]

In a lot of other examples, there is no interrelated consistency between blocks and there is also evidence of some chemical process used in the fitting method, as if the stones were burned together. If this is the case, the knobs would come in handy for chocks during this process to eliminate slippage and dressing them later ran the risk of cracking or otherwise damaging the treated stone. Just a thought.

[@spiet7380]

Gregg Braden talked about how the limestone block on the Egyptian pyramids was tested in the 80's and they found hair and insects inside. The natural layers that should have been found like in natural limestone weren't found. The tests proved that they mined the limestone some 500 miles away from the limestone quarries but that it was now a homogeneous mixture without the natural layers. I believe the ancients understood how to crush limestone and granite and then turn it into a liquid or a sorta concrete mixture to make those massive blocks.

[@ferventheat]

It's definitely a theory that should be tried out to see what happens on real rocks, how easy and reliable it is. It Ddoes make a lot of sense why the blocks are beveled and irregular shaped. I only question why , if the joints follow natural cracks or weaknesses, that firstly the akers knew all of them and secondly why the weaknesses are straight. That part doesn't make obvious sense, but there could be good reasons for it.

[@jrknox2424]

I wanna see it done lol. People have tried everything I'm sure including this. Rubbish.

[@28704joe]

Your theory would then have the grain perfectly matched between all stones , which is not the case of the real stones out there.

[@sharkozym]

Great thesis, however we are talking about some stones that way 60-100 tons??! This would only be possible with small scale building which is plausible. I highly doubt that this was their method of constructing for these megaliths!

[@focusdecorating3637]

All these explanations fall down in the end because of the fact of heavy these stones where. Even if they only had to moved the rocks 100meters, it would have been a collossal effort, never mind when you hear of stories of rocks coming from areas many miles away, with mountains inbetween the target destination.

[@BadlandBrawl-h3z]

Basic quarrying with nubs. I like it. The ancients had copper/bronze bore hole saws and copper/bronze wedges so this is plausible. Large quarries still do it like this albeit with modern tools (and no nubs)

[@luclachapelle3499]

Nice try ! We are all looking for the way they used Has anybody made the demonstration that all of the adjacent rocks all have the same grain and magnetic direction ?

[@diaroneal6969]

Interesting thought process and thank you for sharing Probably the best explanation of nubs to date however like many comment here cutting the back wall would be interesting and let’s not forget they have saw marks signs in some of these south American queries just like in Egypt So question I have is why were some nuns left and others fully removed ?

[@MatthieuSCHREK]

I like listening to this kind of inovative ideas. It just broadens my mind. Good job, sir. However, I don't think all the tightly fitted blocks were originaly one somewhere. Do they ? Furthermore, when we think of the most heavy pieces, it just does't seem feasible. But well... what do I know ?

[@brothermaleuspraetor9505]

They were made to fit together perfectly so that Earthquakes wouldn't destroy them. These walls have withstood everything the earth has thrown at them. Some have broken away in places, but what has stayed intact hasn't budged at all, for thousands of years... How did they split the ENTIRE face of the ENTIRE wall in one plane? How did they then, make this tens-of-thousands of tonnes of rock-slab fall so neatly? We can't even credibly figure out how they moved these pieces individually, so how on Earth can you suggest they moved the entire vertical slab, cut, somehow to exact thickness evenly across the entire length? It's a cool idea, but I don't see how this is possible. There is a 5 degree vertical incline to these walls, HOWEVER.. the lateral splits between the courses of stones are level. Also, the locations of many of these sites does not feature natural rock formations from which to carve walls out of. This directly prevents your theory from being possible, dead in the water. I'm sorry to say. Take the pyramids of Giza, where is the mountain that they carved the walls of the pyramid from? Where is the rest of the cliff face that they carved the walls of the Peruvian city from? These blocks had to be transported into situation, from where they were quarried from. Why are there saw marks and drill-holes? Why is there clear evidence of chemical, or thermal melting of the rock? These builders KNEW how Earthquakes and other destructive, climatic effects have on construction. They also had a deep connection with their astrological and mathematical knowledge of Earth, viewed from space, which they incorporated into their construction. Why? How?

[@focusdecorating3637]

Well said ! It all points to a civilization much more advanced than our own, its the most obvious explanation. Not just a bit more advanced either, wayyy more advanced. Is it also a coincidence we see so much carving/artwork done focused on things outside our earth also ? Looks to me like a species that worships stars etc was actually spending time there ? Is our arrogance really that out of line that we just dismiss an ancient species that is far far far superior to us in many ways could not have been far superior in space travel ? Apparently so !

[@Denver_Risley]

I gotta say, that's not too bad. No lasers, no aliens, no stone-melting algae, no sonic levitation. Finally. Very nicely done.

[@RustyPlug]

lol I agree

[@hrantgeorge2444]

Stone tools with absolutely no chips on the edges, even from transport?. Did you locate the quarry that sourced the blocks? This in no way explains the tight precise joints in polygonal stone blocks. Now to explain the precision cutting at Puma Punku.

[@chevyyyyyyy]

His table top demonstration presupposes a giant who sculpts into the facia of a mountain made of supple stone, then has a gigantic saw to cut away the frontal layer, then topples it, and reassembles it.

[@jessicarae1982]

Well how do you explain where some stones blocks of different kind. that are next to each other. Like jaguar. And others.

[@KelvieCarlile-cf8em]

But most of the walls are completely different on the back side clearly much different sized and shaped rocks with backfill. Only the front sides fit together neatly and clearly all completely different sizes and shapes of stone . Your explanation would not account for any of them with the exception of sections of the city wall you've shown. So they clearly could not have done it this way but at least you're trying and it'll take more minds doing the same to arrive at any thing close to an answer. Well unless A.I. gets involved in our quest for answers.

[@paulroberts7429]

I disagree the nub's were for rope's and pulley's then cut off and smoothed, the nub's on smaller block's were originally from larger block's aiding transportation, maybe once used for attaching wooden contraption's for defensive purpose's like archer's nest's, Great demo thanks.

[@JeremyStringham]

Way too many holes in this theory.

[@drfrank777]

Nah, SO many problems with this explanation. Not buying it.

[@fryloc359]

What problems do you see with this method?

[@jrknox2424]

So many problems, your clay wasn't even fit as tight as these giant stones, they aren't all straight, and they don't just fit perfectly together they are out of our understanding fit together, they aren't all straight, and they are deep and somehow fit curving back the stones and can't fit a human hair in between the ones that are still intact. You aren't taking into account the utter precision. The weight, they supposedly didn't even have the wheel. And the nubs, they are so random not just in Peru but Egypt and a few other places. I'm sorry, I appreciate the fact that you have an opinion, but to say they accidentally made perfect earthquake proof walls we can't do today. Rubbish.

[@ColbyNeumeister]

Yea, this misses the mark for sure.. anyone who actually goes deep on this topic will see how flawed this explanation is..

[@shidoin5398]

The rock joints fit perfectly. Not just broken seams and edges

[@williamchamberlain2263]

​@@shidoin5398does the grain and the crystal boundaries align though? With this you start with one wall sized megalith, so all of the rocks' internal features and textures should align for every rock to all its neighbours

[@buckotte1414]

Very nice !! does a similiar stone GRAIN cross these fractured borders ? Very nice theory !!

[@amend5269]

I think they softened the stone then scored it.

[@Kommander_Rahnn]

Softened it how?

[@tekannon7803]

Excellent analysis. I am a sculptor and what troubles me is that one would never leave the nubs on the finished stone wall. Never. Esthetically, it ruins the beautiful stone work. It would be the easiest thing in the world to remove them when the wall was finished or when the stone was placed and set in the wall and yet, there they are for all to see. It makes no sense that they would leave evidence of a purported way of producing the walls. Fine craftsmen like fine artists guard their secrets have great pride in their work in our time and I am sure in those times. You do not show your secrets i.e., your way of solving technical problems.

[@edwardedward8139]

People pay good money to buy furniture that has been purposely gashed with chisels and beaten with chains, painted, partially sanded, painted with a different color on some parts, and sanded again partway. Distressed they call it instead of beat up junk. They then put their wallet back in the pocket of their designer stone-washed jeans that have big tears and holes in them, and they load their "nice piece" into their sport utility vehicle, which is still ok as long as it's either manufactured by a country opposed to our foreign policy, AND has upholstery sustainably sourced, "humanely" if it's leather, or is a hybrid made by communists with batteries made with U.S. tax payer funded factory equipment bought and sold by the obama administration to China for pennies on the dollar, AFTER the political donors on the board of directors were paid for a factory that never produced a single battery before it was dismantled and shipped over to Chiiiinah. The children in africa that help mine the raw materials are ok because their small size means they have a low carbon footprint. My point being, the people who ordered those walls to be built could have been way more convoluted in their ways than anyone today. Never underestimate the ability of people to come together for great things while at other times coming together for stupid things.

[@ddoherty5956]

On a long term project I don't think you would waste that effort /time during the construction and perhaps like Hershey's chocolate people just got used to it over time or a change in leadership) politics meant there were more important priorities? These must have been multi generation projects.

[@Kwalade]

UPDATE July, ’24: Thank you for all the comments. There are many great praises and critiques that I’d like to address. 1. Protrusions on Stones: Many have questioned why some protrusions were removed while others were not. There could be multiple reasons for this: • Removing protrusions is time-consuming. In areas of the wall that are out of sight or covered, such as beneath a first-floor ceiling, the extra time and effort to remove them might not have been deemed necessary. • They could have been used for a secondary purpose, such as hanging items or serving another function unrelated to their original use. • It could also be that the civilization encountered some disaster or change in leadership during construction, which could’ve led to other priorities outside of completing some structures. 2. Natural Stone Fractures and Quarrying: A common comment relates to the ability to split off long layers of stone from a quarry. There are pictures and videos showing natural fractures in exposed rock outcrops (search on the internet: “Exposed Rock Outcrop Fracture”). Although such outcrops are not common today, I believe they were more prevalent in the past. Similar to other natural resources, the easily accessible ones were used first, much like early oil reserves compared to today’s deeper reserves that require more complex extraction methods like fracking. Another observation of mine is that this might be why they had to bring these stones from great distances. Early civilizations likely traveled long distances to find stone outcrops with favorable natural fractures. 3. Consistent Grain Pattern Through Each Stone: This could be the Achilles’ heel to this theory. However, if this technique works precisely, it may not be necessary to abut neighboring stones to their original placement. It could be that some of the stones we see are placed back in the order from where they fell naturally, but there could be others that were not in the original location or order to their adjacent stones. This could explain why some polygonal fittings are more precise than others. Although I believe this theory is original, I’m not married to it and have no stake in it. I hope someone smarter than me can provide a better explanation. Like many of you, I don’t believe that these protrusions were used as props to hold the stones up while they were being chiseled, nor do I believe that it was some super-advanced technology. It’s been a couple of years since I made this video, and I hope to create another soon to delve deeper into how I believe these stones were chiseled efficiently using dolomite stones with small crews of labor.

[@thiagoribeiro021]

nice try but it didn't happen like that lol your theory has more holes than swiss cheese

[@bofpwet9500]

This is one of the very too much rare few rational explanations I have ever seen about this topic and I believe it's indeed original as well as possible, I admire your thinking and I thanks your confidence to generously share it with everybody.

[@christophersims357]

It’s a good idea. I can see it. How did they “just pick the stones up” ? 😅

[@albundy3696]

but no one show how to soften granite then get back to hard again .

[@danbiss87]

Maybe it wasn't as hard at the time (we don't know how old it is), then maybe a cataclysmic event happened like an astroid that hardened it. Who knows, we don't know anything. Everything is speculation.

[@ICU10]

So, they cut the rock with a butter knife?.

[@focusdecorating3637]

Not even as strong as that is it lol

[@CoffeeFiend1]

@@focusdecorating3637 This is a recurrent trend in a lot of these 'debunking videos' they'll use materials/substrates with completely different properties because it's just "easier to show the principle" except the principle literally isn't the principle anymore when you change the parameters that drastically. If it's something like "we're going to show you the visual distinction between high and low relief" you can demonstrate that on marble, granite, clay, tofu, mushy banana, it literally doesn't matter, it doesn't affect the principle. But a lot of the time they're trying to debunk things that are very complicated and changing the parameters heavily makes it an entirely different principle. A classic of recent years has been reproducing granite precision vases to a thousandth of an inch by doing them in marble, with a mix of old and modern tools with inconsistent and disparate precision uniformity relative to the thing they're debunking. "Oh but it looks really nice" well great but the entire thing is irrelevant.

[@focusdecorating3637]

@@CoffeeFiend1 Well said ! There has defo been absolutely tons of lost knowledge over the years. How did the knowledge get lost ? Humans (places like The Vatican) suppressed it, or famine, disease or natural disasters (The Younger Dryas Flood) simply caused it to get lost as the people who knew about it died and did not pass the much guarded information on. And believe me it was much guarded information, what humans would give to find the answers to a lot of these old mysteries, right now in the supposed `age of information`.

[@carlospinheirotorres9499]

Aside from Davidovits' theory, this the one I find to be the most interesting. I side with the geopolymer explanation, but I reckon you have come up with a very insightful observation of the monoliths. I really think you have thought out an extremely interesting method that if not the one actually used, one that can actually be. Thank you for sharing this ❤

[@lindenhoch8396]

There is probably some truth in your described method, and it's fresh to see that new ways of thinking pop up about this, because it's so puzzling and interesting and frustrating at the same time that we don't know a definitive answer! But in my opinion, the method wouldn't be feasible on a larger/taller wall section, I don't believe it would break up into all the carved pieces. Perhaps the top rows would, but at the bottom I doubt the stone would achieve enough momentum and force that it would separate at all. But still, a refreshing view to a complex question, kudos!

[@stevemayer1396]

Hi, Your experiment could have been interesting, starting with a soft material, because that is the state of the materials they used. But it is of course not clay, but a concrete based on quicklime (calcium oxide, CaO), mixed hot in mortar with sand or hard stone powder, and perhaps other oxides. The usefulness of "nubs" makes no sense in your hypothesis, and you don't know how to explain why some remained and others disappeared. A young German chemist produced a much more realistic reconstruction video, KZbin channel: "agni terra", name of the video: "Polygonalmauerwerk errichtet aus Mörtel? Erste Rekonstruktion mit Kletterschalung und 2-K-Geopolymer"

[@caseyalexander1705]

The simplest explanation is usually right. Yes, this culture at that point in time had a technological ability to soften stone. Not a big deal.

[@focusdecorating3637]

It can be done, volcanos produce molten lava (stone) at the end of the day

[@kkonvicka25]

Thanks for an imaginative and interesting take on how the Incas did this. The more I read, the more I think that either: 1) a civilization long ago was far more advanced in masonry than we are now, or 2) it must’ve been ET and his little green men. I can’t think of any other reasons. Maybe ancient ancestors were really smart. But if they were so brilliant making magnificent structures, why don’t we find other remarkable achievements? Could they have been idiot savants, possessing an extraordinary talent in a narrow subject but otherwise were just regular guys? How DUMB can we be, if we can’t even agree on their construction techniques?

[@focusdecorating3637]

We are 100% dumber than them. 100% I say

[@davidboyd-lz7qq]

I built a small wall out of a bag of frozen beef cuts covered them in corn flower then a spice powder mix and packed them tight .The impressive wall set overnight and so i thought about the giants in bible "Genesis" and how maybe they used a similar technique using a mineral powder on wall . I then decided to make a vindaloo curry and home made chapattis

[@adammillwardart7831]

Check out Wally Wallington's stone moving techniques. Once the rocks are broken as you're showing, using his techniques, the knobs could make it easier to move the individual pieces.

[@NatoWarPigs]

yes , nice thinking ! outside of the box and very plausible .

[@randytucker3083]

There is a video of a desert hiker explorer in the US where he found naturally occurring almost perfect shaped blocks. If in any place where these naturally occur, then helping them give this shape makes sense for rocks in lots of places.

[@davidwardlaw4865]

the height of some off the walls would have shattered some of the stones . and how did the pick them up to place them when some weigh many tons myself i think they had mastered the art of concrete in large bags

[@ddoherty5956]

Perhaps they were just really good and really dedicated.

[@dsharpness]

Yes!

[@lawerancelanham]

At first, I admit... I was thinking what is this guy thinking? But...I just watched something. kzbin.info/www/bejne/e2bTi2qrh5upbsU This man uses pebbles and leverage to move huge things. What I'm suggesting is, the knobs were for that purpose. The ability to gain access to apply leverage to such huge stones. What makes me wonder though is... are there nubs on the hidden sides of the stones where there aren't nubs? Also... now explain the nubs at Petra and the like. 😮

[@jamesstoute7297]

They didn't use clay, so what type of tools did they use ?

[@bjsw1949]

Nice try, Daniel, but how did they make the wall fall forwards? How did they slice that whole length and height of wall with using only stone tools, and so perfectly smooth and even. You at least tried to find an answer, and someone like you will someday find the secret into how they made this type of wall.

[@teachoc9482]

That is totally the best explanation I've ever seen. Great job figuring it out!!!

[@j.f.c]

This seems somewhat plausible. Some of the walls that have smaller gap filler stones could be the result of this method not working perfectly and producing breaks where they didn't intend. I could also see this method being alongside other methods. The knobs could be an indication that this method was used for thise particular stones, no knobs meant they were carved differently. I think this method could be used at a less wide scale as well. Now I'm wondering if the nubs could produce a concoidal fracture? This would allow the break to be cupped allowing the stones to nest inside each other

[@lander1591]

The nubs are what holds the stone to the quarry wall while they finnish the back face of the block.. the nubs are then cut to release the block from the quarry wall.. like the sprew from a plastic model kit.

[@WahrheitMachtFrei.]

You can see from partially dismantled walls at Cuzco that the stones abut each other with perfectly adjoined faces which are smooth and often curved, and also often with compound curves. Obviously a broken stone would not form such surfaces. A broken stone *would* fit back together perfectly but the surfaces would not be smooth.

[@0ptimal]

Its like every possible explanation for these only gets you so far. I think our brains aren't currently equipped to see the truth of these. We are working w limited hardware in knowledge and perspective

[@focusdecorating3637]

We have defo devolved as a species, especially the last 20 years with smartphones doing everything for us (in the Western world). If you stop using faculties yourself you can lose the ability to do something, for example reading an actual physical map. Up until not so long ago this is what humans used to navigate Earth, but if you handed a physical map to 99.999% of humans now they would look look at you like you where a nut case. The same goes for playing vinyl records on a turntable, most would have no clue and again this has only taken a very short space of time for us to mostly lose this knowledge because we dont do it. Some do, but most do not. There has defo been some knowledge lost here, not just a bit of knowledge, but a whole heap of it.

[@ChrstphreCampbell]

Curious theory, that could easily be verified by finding threads that continued from adjacent stones, but they’re often very different from stone to stone ?

[@jimbailey6499]

But how did they get the entire face to fall away like you did?

[@MildaGoesWild]

Dude, have you not seen the stones going round corners and joining in all intricate ways. Not to mention Puma Punku...

[@seanveach950]

Love the thought and guesses, but I think this one needs a lot more study into what is actually found at megalithic sites around the world. To many other clues that don't fit something this simplistic.

[@catgray1]

My husband's theory for the beveled edges of the stone is because with sharp edges, the stone facing would be prone to chipping when installing the stones.

[@chriscampbell4857]

So to avoid the edges getting chipped off, they chipped the edges off... got it.

[@catgray1]

@chriscampbell4857 🤦‍♀️ it's a similar concept when making ceramic tile. The edges are roundEd, or slightly bevelled, to lessen the chance of chipping, and means you don't have to be as precise during installation. It's also a decorative feature. Take tempered glass, for example. The edges are slightly bevelled because if they don't, and the edge gets hit, the tempered glass will shatter.

[@alanbrown4446]

Well done. Very compelling.

[@begonnne]

I seriously doubt that stone would crack so precisely, because when it impacted the ground the upper part would be moving much faster that the lower. And you fail to even mention how they could split-off an entire rock face from the parent rock.

[@BohumirZamecnik]

But then how'd you connect adjacent groups?

[@djdilemma1000]

This is really a good theory. I wonder why the chisel work they must have done has left mostly smooth and natural looking surfaces but didnt bother removing the nubs

[@frankdillon6127]

so there were huge granite slabs with fake score marks. why go to the trouble. is it for decoration?

[@Kommander_Rahnn]

You're confused. That's not what he demonstrated.

[@philippriestman8516]

Would be good to go to the quarries and see the size of slabs felled. There would be lots of clues and evidence for or against your thesis. Also there must be geologists or quarrymen who know how the grain of different rocks run, like those guys who split massive rocks of many tone by hand with hammers and wedges. I’m a great believer that big building tasks always use the simplest most practical methods, I learned that from the builders I’ve worked with. Really enjoyed your video.

[@JeremyFisher711]

love this take

[@1roOt]

I always thought that the nubs give the stones some sort of rigidity. for whatever reason. maybe they hit the nubs real hard with a giant hammer to break the stone. maybe they even used heat from a fire to create tension in the stone before hitting it

[@richardsharpe6113]

I think you are on to something. Have you tried your techniques on, say, 10 1-ton basalt or limestone blocks? Let us know how it went.

[@Kommander_Rahnn]

"Oh ok hold on a minute while I run to the store to pick up a bunch of 10 ton blocks just to satisfy your idiotic demand"

[@taciodasilva8291]

Very good and really possible.

[@jackspratt44]

I myself have a knobby protrusion

[@marcwilson1052]

One way to confirm this would be of we could match each stone location with an overall grain pattern, assuming that there is one...

[@generaleerichards6172]

I wonder if all the stones have a random nub? This way they could be used to lock into a corresponding notch on an ajoining stone. This would avoid the use of metal clamps which inevitably disintergrate over time. The nubs that we see were just not required and these incredible builders left them on show for all to see.

[@TheHelloNewman]

I think it would be like shaving something like Devils Tower or the Devils Fence Posts or Giants Causway down in layers, marking where the sides touch on the blocks. Take that horizontal layer and upright it and roll it out keeping marks aligned. There are many places world wide where these columns exist.

[@denisejones8778]

what would they use to "plane" that much stone and why go thru the trouble of chiseling then breaking it up just to put it back like it was?

[@Qingeaton]

They would move it and put it back together there. In order for it to break cleanly, it needs the deep bevels to focus the energy correctly. Then, it could be a status symbol that the surface be brought back to square and flush, everyone knowing how long it takes.

[@UniverseSinking2011]

The video title says Mayan walls, then you go straight to Peru? Huh? This explanation seems improbable. How would tipping over an entire massive wall be done so that it breaks free of a matrix with a uniform thickness? You are right though that you can score stones and break them pretty cleanly along the score lines -- but a whole wall 20-30 feet more more high and even longer width?

[@focusdecorating3637]

Yeah zero explanation about this impossible (by modern day standards) undertaking. Even just tipping of an entire wall seems impossible....never mind the fact it could have come from miles away first. Its just so far fetched an idea when you think about it ? The upper limit of a human just merely deadlifting a bar with weights on roughly 1-2feet off the ground is around 500kg.....we are talking about stones here weighing considerably more than that.

[@robertqueberg4612]

This another example of discussion and thought leading to solutions. I have doubts about this idea being the total answer. Your thoughts would require a partial disassembly of the blocks from the wall. Has anyone done this, to examine the joint faces for fracture lines? There is a slight possibility that the walls are a solid boulder with decorative grooves cut into the first inch or two to simulate a block wall. This could have been done as a thousand year joke on us. Seeing the joint faces is the only way to produce a workable answer. I do not have any other answers, just a few thoughts about the mechanics of splitting large stone slabs in a technologically primitive society.

[@press1776]

Well there are many videos of people splitting huge boulders and facings off of sides of rocks with near perfect straight lines... so I absolutely believe you are correct..

[@jgarbo3541]

So why don't all the blocks have nubs? Also the rear of the smooth blocks are very rough, cavities filled with rubble, and doesn't explain irregular shaped blocks.

[@wompbozer3939]

Perhaps the backside of the blocks were irregularly shaped due to a preexisting vertical fault line, which was exploited in order to quarry the stones in the first place.

[@jeffreybail353]

we only see the fassade, so you just wet cement and stamp the pattern on when dry it looks like blocks from this perspective

[@LeeHill66]

I'm not buying that one. You demonstrated on straight horizontal line. What about the one that fit together perfectly like a jiz-saw puzzle ?

[@blakewhittington4336]

When you fell it?

[@wesleyallan7436]

Yeah next tell what are black holes and how you got there to check them out!

[@liam1428]

Nice work. Thanks for the content.

[@MrWeebable]

The constant retouching of the stone shapes shows how impractical soft stones are. Moreover, if the stones were that soft, the relative positions of the stones don't really matter. Additionally, many polygonal walls show the lower stones to have the concave corners, meaning the top stones would have had harder bottoms than the tops of the lower stones. Equally soft stones result in voronoi patterns, without concave corners. The polygonal walls are NOT voronoi diagrams.