“No, Egyptian Artifacts Have Never Been Found in the Grand Canyon”
On April 5, 1909, a newspaper called Arizona Gazette published a front-page article in its evening edition. the story, “Explorations in the Grand Canyon”, was filled with wild claims that the remains of an Egyptian civilization had been discovered in a massive cave in the cliffs of the Grand Canyon.
Perched 2,000 feet above the Colorado River, the rooms of this “subterranean citadel” were littered with artifacts, hieroglyphs and even mummified remains, possibly of Egyptian origin.
There’s just one catch: it’s the story unequivocally false.
Yet, despite being more than 100 years old, the tales spawned by the hoax article continue to circulate today. (In recent years they have been given new life on social media) The Smithsonian Institution, which supposedly sponsored the expedition, has even been inundated with inquiries about it over the years – despite the fact that the investigation in question never happened.
The Origins of the Egyptian Cave Myth of the Grand Canyon
You don’t have to spend much time on Google to see how pervasive the urban legend of the Grand Canyon has become.
It has been discussed in countless blog articles and several books promoted by the History Channel show America Revealed and emerged as an intriguing possibility The Joe Rogan Experience podcast. But where does all this speculation come from?
When the seeds of history were first planted in Arizona Gazette more than a century ago, an article written by an anonymous author claimed that Smithsonian-funded researcher GE Kinkaid – under the guidance of a professor named SA Jordan – had made a historic discovery.
“[It was] not only the oldest archaeological discovery in the United States,” the article said, “but one of the most valuable in the world.”
The legend of the cracks in the cave
The holes in Arizona Gazette article appears as soon as you consider its basic premise: For one thing, there is no record of the existence of either Kincaid or Jordan. ( Newspaper (had previously reported on an earlier part of Kincaid’s “adventure” in March of that year, but made no mention of Egyptian artifacts or the cave itself.)
Egyptian Cave Grand Canyon Scam
Indeed, in 2000 a representative of the Smithsonian Institution, not the Institute, as inaccurately stated in Newspaper article — answers one of these queries in an exchange of emailsconfirming his position that the story was in fact a hoax.
“The Smithsonian Department of Anthropology searched its files without finding any mention of Professor Jordan, Kincaid, or a lost Egyptian civilization in Arizona,” the representative wrote. “Yet the story keeps repeating itself in books and articles.”
Haley Johnson, president of the Grand Canyon Historical Society, also spoke about the inconsistencies in the original article. “The images themselves are obvious fakes,” she says.
In 2009 article in The old pioneer, magazine published by the Grand Canyon Historical Society, author Dan Lago researched more than a dozen newspapers from the time—and found that most ignored Newspaper the story in its entirety, with only one newspaper reprinting it without comment.
Fake articles
The only paper which I did comment — the Coconino Sun in Flagstaff, Arizona – pointed to the likely culprit behind the hoax story: Joe Mulhatton, a traveling salesman who became famous in the 1870s and 1880s for tricking newspapers into publishing false articles.
“Joe Mulhatton is known in every city in the United States and has probably caused more trouble in newspaper offices than any other man in the country.” New York Times wrote in 1891. “His wild stories, written in the most plausible style, have more than once provoked special correspondents […] to rush from coast to coast to investigate some wondrous event that happened only in the imagination of the great liar.
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How has the scam been kept alive for so long?
Whether or not Mulhattan was the mastermind behind the original article, in 1909 American newspaper readers (and even editors) would not have batted an eye at the revelation that Newspaper published a fake story.
Yellow journalism
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, yellow journalism was widespread; the controversial style of newspaper reporting presented hyperbolic, sensational stories as objective fact, often as a way to win readers and increase circulation.
“I and many others who live and work in Grand Canyon National Park tend to agree that someone needs something attention-grabbing to get printed, and a local miscreant may have turned an old story into some sort of ‘local erudition’ to attract readers,” Johnson says. “It probably worked very well for newspaper.’
even still Newspaper the story quickly faded into obscurity after its initial introduction. But it was revived decades later in 1962 when it was introduced in Cavalcade in Arizona, a book collection of newspaper clippings from early Arizona history.
Pseudoscience
Then, in 1992, it was again rescued from the historical dump when it was included in The cities of North and Central America, in which author — and a proponent of pseudoscience — David Hatcher Childress has personally investigated the alleged occult origins of various archaeological sites in America, including the Egyptian Grand Canyon Cave.
Moreover, according to Childress, the fact that the Smithsonian has failed to confirm the existence of either Jordan or Kincaid is evidence that the organization has engaged in a conspiracy to suppress the truth. From there, other theories – including some that expand Smithsonian cover-up angle — blossomed and spread across the Internet.
Debunking the Egyptian story about the Grand Canyon cave
Although it attracts the attention of occult enthusiasts and internet conspiracy theorists alike, it is not difficult to spot other lies and logical inconsistencies in the story of the Egyptian cave.
For starters, Johnson says, the remote nature of the Grand Canyon would make it incredibly difficult to access without technical equipment or ladders.
“Not to mention that it would be impossible to retrieve all these supposed ‘artifacts’ in such a remote and inaccessible cave without a helicopter,” she adds. “Even a helicopter could not reach many of the Grand Canyon’s caves directly because of the nature of the impassable rock.”
Furthermore, history itself contributes to the erasure of the indigenous people of North America who have lived in the region for thousands of years—in this case, 11 tribes with historical ties to the resources and lands found in Grand Canyon National Park.
“If there was some massive influx of Egyptian rulers and workers, wouldn’t the native tribes understand?” Johnson says. “Wouldn’t their oral histories, pictographs, and petroglyph panels dotting the landscape like freckles depict this kind of world-changing event?”
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The connection between the Grand Canyon and Ancient Egypt
Yet, perhaps surprisingly, there is one verifiable link between the Grand Canyon and the ancient Egyptians: the names of some of its geological landmarks, which have received titles such as the Temple of Isis, in reference to the Egyptian goddess of healing and magicor temple of Horus named after Egyptian sky god with falcon head.
Other pantheons also crop up in the Grand Canyon monuments, such as the Temple of Apollo, named after the Roman god of light; there are even peaks named after figures from the Arthurian legend, such as Guinevere’s Castle and Galahad Point. Many of the canyon’s landmarks, Johnson says, were named after a 19th-century geologist Clarence Duttonwho conducted a detailed geological survey of the area in 1882.
“[Dutton] believed that the canyon was such an important and impressive feature that the names of its features should reflect all world cultures and religions,” Johnson says. “He and his successors chose to name the many landmarks in the Grand Canyon after mythologies and legends from around the world.”
Read more: The 6 most iconic artifacts from the ancient world