IN APRIL 1820, a French engineer blasted the roof from an ancient temple at Dendera in Egypt and sailed it back to Paris. The blocks carried a bas-relief of a mysterious zodiac which ignited intense controversy in France, where scholars were keen to show the superiority of mathematical analysis over religious teaching. They claimed its constellations depicted the sky at the time it was carved and (wrongly) claimed it as proof the Egyptians had sophisticated astronomical knowledge as far back as 15,000 BC, in opposition to the Church’s doctrine that the Earth was only 6000 years old.
The authors…
