This mystical prehistoric artifact – presumably part of an unknown mechanism – was discovered by Egyptologist Walter Bryan in the tomb of an ancient Egyptian official Sabu (3100-3000 BC), which is located near the village of Sakkara.
Sabu was the son of Pharaoh Anedjib (this is the fifth ruler of the first dynasty of ancient Egypt), he ruled the city or province, which was supposedly called the “Star of the Horus family”.
The burial chamber in which the mysterious artifact was found was filled with various vessels, stone knives, arrows, several copper tools and fragments of bowls from slate.
The diameter of the Sabu disk is approximately 61 cm in diameter, one centimeter thick, 10.6 centimeters in the center. It is made of a very fragile material, which requires great skill, which even today is only available to units.
Computer reconstruction of the Sabu disk
This amazing discovery raises a number of important questions that can turn our view of history:
What was the purpose of the Sabu disk?
Scientists believe that a mysterious object can hardly be a wheel, since the wheel appeared in Egypt around 1500 BC, during the reign of the 18th dynasty.
But if the Sabu’s wheel really turned out to be a wheel, it would mean that the wheel appeared in Egypt no later than 3000 BC, and therefore Egyptologists would have to rewrite some historical books.
If the disc is not a Sabu wheel and not a variation on the theme of the wheel, then what?
Some scientists suggest that the difficult work on such a fragile material greatly narrows its possibilities, and offers a version of ritual or some other religious use.
Other experts believe that the disc could be a foot of an oil lamp. Critics of this version are convinced that the existence of a three-bladed ritual lamp is unlikely, and that the very shape of the blades of the disc indicates rather its functional purpose, rather than the decorative one.
Could the ancient Egyptian technologies be superior to modern ones?
According to one version, we are faced with an artifact of an unknown highly developed ancient technology. Egyptologist Cyril Aldred believes that regardless of the purpose of this particular object, its form clearly indicates that it is a copy of another – a metal object that is much older than found.
Why 5 thousand years ago, the ancient Egyptians needed to create an object with such a complex structure?
How could a civilization whose masters used to work on a chisel stone work could develop a technique that allowed them to cut out such complex shapes on such a fragile material?
And why did the ancient Egyptians waste time and develop the skill to create such objects, if they did not perform some important, specific function?
Obviously, the disc of Sabu played 5000 years ago some unknown important role. Egyptologists have proposed several theories explaining its purpose, but so far no one theory is able to explain its complex structure.
While the puzzle remains unsolved.
