Original subtitles

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except a cathedral and its caves

it's not the same thing it's less

complicated to make the cathedral than that

it's made in granite it's

still one of the hardest materials for

me it's not a great precision

it is of an extreme precision one can

remake a cathedral with 300

well motivated stonemasons but

Barabar it is currently to the

extent

of impossible welcome to the heart of

ancient India in a forgotten chapter of its

story that could well change

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history ને

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of all the countries we have had the

chance to visit one is probably

the one that has impressed us the most

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these street children to

these incessant horn concerts on

its saturated roads India is an

unclassifiable land and visiting it a unique

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world technological leader and the

most populated country in the world with more

than one billion 300 million inhabitants

bridge in the meantime ancient and modern

between science and spirituality one of the

bearers of a rich history in

which the Vedas at the heart of the

Hindu tradition constitute a true

literary and

spiritual treasure these old writings written in

Sanskrit ancient and sacred language of

India are composed of rituals of hymns

of prayers and

philosophical knowledge which have considerably

influenced

Indian thought the most famous are

probably the bagavajita and the

Mahabarata some have believed to see the

portrait of a fantastic

and technological indancienne but these stories like

all these founders peoples of the world

are considered mythological and

as a reflection of the fertile imagination

of ancient authors how could it

be otherwise science and technology

advanced in the distant past are according to

our history rigorously

impossible before these founding stories

we were prehistoric humans

simple primitives like we

would have been for nearly 220,000 years

living simply from hunting and

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gathering, well anchored in our

history, the sense of progress starts from

the wheel a few thousand

years ago to end up in

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smartphone the first and only

human industrial revolution took

place in Europe a little less than centuries ago

otherwise we

would obviously have found traces

of industry but India like all

other countries have not nothing left like that

at least that's what we

always believe according to our history the

rooms of Barabar and Nagar juni

would be simple shelters offered

2300 years ago by kings to a sect of

mendicants so that they could protect themselves from the

rain during the monsoon the case is as good as

closed because

unlike other

archaeological sites in the region they

are neither grandiose nor richly decorated

and this is perhaps the reason

why they are so little known even to

the

Indians but it is the tree that makes the forest

because when we investigate them in

depth they turn out to be so

exceptional that they could

constitute the marks of a past of

humanity very different from that which

history

reports to us because We have

no records regarding the design,

manufacture or function of these

chambers. because they are unique

until proven otherwise such

feats have never been reproduced

neither in India nor anywhere else in the world we

cannot launch into a job like

that overnight saying but

hey we're going to do it a cave is not

possible it is not a trial run

because the oldest inscriptions

speak of donation and not of

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manufacture because they were

made with a precision worthy of the

modern industrial world it is an

amazing precision, go and type in

millimeters, we're going to do that on the

examination, we're going to do that on the

surveillance of works of art, we have difficulty

imagining on such volumes it's

ultra precise because their shape only

reveals their real complexity with

3D scans, in fact we do not follow

a perfect shape but we follow a

distribution, a perfect symmetrical volume

whether we are on the right, whether we are on the left,

at the top or at the bottom because their

design involves

mathematical knowledge far beyond that

attributed to the Indancienne it is necessary

to master number P with many

decimals after the

comma and because it plays with

sound frequencies like no other

place in the world and that is perhaps

where the real key to their mystery lies

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it was in January 2017 that we visited them

for the first

time registered as a UNESCO World Heritage Site,

the rooms are spread

over the archaeological sites of Barabar

and Nagar

Juni, about forty kilometers from

Bodgaa, a city famous for Buddhism

because it is where Buddha is said to have experienced his

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enlightenment. After about an hour and

a half drive, we reach the

Barabar site by a long staircase that

leads us to what geologists call a

whale's back,

an immense granite core about a

hundred meters

long with three chambers inside. have

been dug and cut for convenience

we have kept for the rooms

the names used in our

previous film but it is not certain

that it is

original the first on arriving on the

site is Karan Chopard the entrance is a

passage of form trapezoidal plus large

at the base at the top which penetrates directly

into the rock we see

inscriptions engraved in this pass

which opens onto a rectangular room

at its base whose walls are very

slightly

inclined across the width a bench

attached to the Rock has been

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cut despite some imperfections

it is so polished that it

almost appears metallic to the

camera the vault seems cylindrical

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let's now move on to the other side

of this whale's back

here is the entrance to the

souama room different from the previous one because

it first has a recess

that the stonemasons call a

first bare in which the passage is

cut also engraved with an inscription it

leads to a rectangular room

overlooked by a cylindrical vault and

smooth and shiny walls

also slightly inclined in

this wall we can see an unfinished niche

and not

from the period the wall facing

it has a curved shape and is topped

with a portion of a dome which has made it

look like a

mushroom in the center of this wall a

passage leads to a dome with a ceiling

in the shape of half-sphere

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about thirty meters from sudama

still carved from the same whale's back

is the Lomas Richi room

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it is the only one to have a

nicely decorated and very circular Porsche often

the first photo we see when

we do research on this

site unlike the two previous ones

the frame of the entrance is curved it

is pierced by a trapezoidal passage which

does not have

an inscription this unfinished room

seems to be a copy of sudama unless

that it is a

failed attempt three of the walls appear

almost finished while the rest of

the room is still in the structural

work the passage which leads to the dô is

almost finished but the dô is

far from it we observe everywhere

anarchic traces of pickaxe a tool used to

rough out the shape by removing

large portions of

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material from this whale's back a

path leads to the last isolated chamber

of the vasopria screw which is also

unfinished

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it differs completely from the others by

its entrance c is a kind of vestibule

almost finished because its walls are polished

but not the floor

an inscription is engraved on the

right wall a trapezoidal passage opens

onto a room not advanced enough to

deduce the final shape probably

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circular at 1 km 6 as the crow flies bird of the

Barabar site is that of Nagar

juni a natural stack of hundreds

of rocks formed over millions

of years that we call a granitic chao

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on this side at the end of a

fairly steep staircase the gopica room

was carved into a massive rock

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a trapezoidal passage without a

frame resembling that of Karan

Chopar leads to a large oval-shaped room

its inclined walls are

again smooth as glass and its

harmonious vault a long crack the

crosses in all its

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length on the other side of this

granite ch at the end of a long path we

arrive at the vapiaka room

it has an entrance similar to

that of sudama made of a

rectangular frame followed by a

trapezoidal passage in which inscriptions

are engraved on

either side facing south, it is the

brightest of all its equally

inclined walls are topped by a cylindrical vault

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in the rock just next to the

entrance passage of vadatia is a little

enclosed by trapezoidal sections of the same

type as that of kanchopar and gopik it

leads us to a completely

curved room in the harmonious shape of a slipper

whose walls are again

completely smooth

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which gives us a total of these

completed rooms C and two unfinished ones which

would have been offered around 2300

years ago or at least 300 before our era

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we were very surprised by their

smooth and flat walls like

marble slabs so smooth and polished that one

is reflected in them almost as if in a mirror,

even though they were cut

from granite, one of the most

hard you are probably no more

familiar with this stonemason jargon

than we were when we started our

research so let's first explain

what a dressed surface is it is a

BR surface that has been struck to

make it roughly

flat there is a big difference

between a smooth surface and a

flat surface smooth is when it is soft to the

touch it has been sanded and polished

whereas flat means it is

totally

flat that maybe smooth but not

necessarily flat and it may be flat but

not necessarily

smooth but in Barabar and Nagar juni it is

both smooth and flat which is

apparently a configuration that in

rock art that is to say to say to cut

inside the

rock to talk about it is one thing but

to measure the surfaces is another and

for that we use among other

tools a

roughness meter but those who do

not know us must certainly

wonder what this device is what

we do with and who we

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are we are a team passionate

about the study of ancient archaeological sites

to which we have already devoted

several films with a different perspective,

more technical

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than historical because when the writings

are silent the buildings speak their

design and their construction

testify to the scientific and

technical level of their authors and tell

their relationship to the

world through their astonishing complexity the

rooms of Barabar and Nagar Juni are

a real enigma of which you will

soon take the full measure

confronted with an enigma without an

apparent solution the French philosopher and mathematician

René Descartes recommended to get

rid of these preconceptions and prejudices,

that is to say everything we think we know

about a subject in order to wipe the slate clean and

start from

scratch [Music] when faced with this kind of surface, we

therefore do not prohibit ourselves from thinking

beyond the worker in light clothing

equipped with the simple hammer chisel which

marks the representations of the past and

capable of feats which defy our

modern reason and if our history had

forgotten like the mechanism of anticity

for example presented in our

previous film disappeared for 2000 years before

that a copy of it is found at the bottom

of the sea, a mechanism that calls into

question everything we thought we knew about the

scientific and technical level of the

ancient Greeks. The worst part is that, not

content with having forgotten it, history did

not take seriously the authors he

mentioned but let's get back to our

roughness meter this device allows us to

measure the roughness of a surface or

the differences between these reliefs to the micron

or micrometer i.e. to the thousandth of a

millimeter to explain how it

works we called on

Michel Ttin, an engineer from the manufacturer of

our device, the 210 is therefore composed

of a body, a stylus with a skate to

take roughness on a flat surface,

we measure what we call roughness,

it is a measurement of the surface condition of a

product the RZ is a type of measurement the

smaller its value the smoother and more

flawless the surface

granite is composed of felpat

and Mik quartz quartz being the most hard and

most difficult to make flat and

polish measure accuracy of the surface

on the hardest mineral allows to

determine the overall precision and therefore

to determine the quality of the whole

work in 2017 during our

first visit the geologist Eric

Gontier had passed the roughness meter in

Barabar and Nagar juni and here is what that

we had obtained

to appreciate these results we

need a point of comparison we

asked Michel to pass the

roughness meter on what we call a

marble although it is a slab of

industrially polished granite we are going to take

a measurement on a marble therefore manufactured

by an industrial process so it will

be rectified and therefore it is granite we

will launch our measurement quite

simply we can at the same time see the

value of RZ of

9,492 these marbles are made by

machines in fact and we see

that on

vertical caves made by hand with

values ​​we will say of RZ 9 times less

imposing it is rather it is rather

incredible anyway to continue

in the comparisons this

marble slab was polished in this way with

this

machine and when we pass the

roughness meter over it here is what we

obtain

and on the glass of a

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window we redid about 80

measurements at Bar à bar in April

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2023 here is the best obtained in

souama a room which at least 2300 years old,

barely more than the glass

of a window and almost 20 times more

precise than that of this gran poli plate

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industrially it is absolutely

absolutely

incredible we believe that it was made with a

laser, not tired of that It is done by

hand in the face of such walls one cannot

in fact help but think of the use

of powerful machinery which would

considerably simplify the question

but at this stage of the investigation small

imperfections seem to point towards

the The use of human-guided tools

at an astonishing level of precision

must be

admitted that the result of

9.492 does not mean that we would

today be incapable of polishing granite

as precisely as with a bar. bar but

simply that This is more

than enough to check the conformity of

certain

industrial parts. It is the level of care

given to the walls of these rooms, the

quasi-vertical walls, as

Michel Ttin points out, because it is not

at all the same thing to polish

surfaces in the sense of gravity than

vertically or worse in the vaults

but to better appreciate the

exceptional nature of the work carried out in

Barabar let's visit the site of his

Bandar on this site we find two

rooms which have been dated from

inscription around the 3rd 4th

century AD or more than 600 years after

Barabar the entrance passage of the

first is of trapezoidal section it

resembles that of karanchopar of

gopik and

vadatia this room is today

surmounted by a concrete structure

probably for the strengthen because on the

right the vault of a second room has

been completely broken leaving the volume

open to the sky the first room has a

window but given the state

the second is in we do not know if it also has one

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we can see one there sculptures as well

that inscriptions on which

the dating of the

site is based, but humans have the unfortunate

habit of replacing the name of their

predecessors with their own, this dating

is contested by an Indologist,

that is to say an archaeologist dedicated to

India

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they were cut from

metamorphosed schist, a rock that is a priori less

hard than granite but also less

homogeneous, which explains why some

parts are more polished than

others, but the vague resemblance with

Barabar and Nagar Juni ends

there. walls are neither completely

flat nor completely polished not inclined the

ground is not horizontal and far from

being so in short the work has little to

do with this site would have

been carried out more than 600 years after

that of Barabar and Nagar

June the sense of progress as we

know it takes a big hit but

how can we explain this very simply

by the fact that techniques can

quickly be lost because of invasion,

war, epidemic or change of

power, which is why no

room cut will never equal again

that of Barabar and Nagar juni no

room no there is a last one

that we took a little time to

do in order to avoid one or more

lost days because in India

distances are not measured in

kilometers but in duration of

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route about 70 km from Barabar

cut inside a

totally isolated rock to which

a modern construction has been attached is the

room of

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sitamarie very small about 5 m by

3.50 its shape to be a cross

between that of vapiaka and that of

vadatika as it is used

religiously nowadays it

was difficult for us to investigate it more

deeply the surfaces have been well

degraded and do not appear in

polymirror as in Barabar because they

are covered with sui what by the way is

not seen either in Barabar or in Nagarjuni

it is devoid of inscription and

nobody knows if it was part

of the lot of rooms of Barabar and Nagar

juni nor if it was made before or

after it is difficult to find

detailed information about it and

especially true because this is how

the archaeologist Percy Brown represented it

in his

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book article then taken up by

other books and blogs to finally

be integrated into a Wikipedia page in

which we even go so far as to speculate on

the influence of its ribbed vault on

later constructions. On-site studies are

essential; they sometimes allow for

important insights,

such as that of the Indologist Harry Falk, the

undisputed specialist in life of king

Ashoka according to us the author of the most

important works on the chambers of

Barabar and

Nagarjun here is what he wrote about them

in his book one of the most

complete to

date only the combination of devotion of

belief in the realization of

the impossible of fanaticism of indifference

at the expense of a sense of aesthetics

of a love of technical perfection and

a desire for recognition by

future generations would lead someone

to initiate such a work this

combination does not have equal in the

ancient IND before anything else let's make a

brief history of the discovery of its

rooms

1785 John Herbert Harrington discovers

four of the rooms abandoned for

centuries Karan chopar sudama Lomas

Richier and gopika no one knows anymore

who has them realized neither when nor

why 1811 Francis Bucanan finds a

new room at Barabar vis vasoprix

and two others at nagarjuni vapiaka and

vadatika 1837 James prinp figures at

nagarjuni inscriptions in Brami a

language used more than 2000 years ago

which teach us that vapiyaka

vadatika and gopika were offered by

king dasarata to the agivikas sect

so that he could protect himself from the rain

1847 markam Kito discovers on the facade

of karanchopar an inscription in bramy

almost erased and

illegible 1861 Alexander keningham

attributes the rooms of Barabar to the king

Ashoka supposed to be the father or the

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dasarata 1925 eugenne hulch deciphers

the inscription discovered by Kito and

concludes that all the rooms of

Barabar like that of Nagar Juni are

also shelters against the

rain the case of these enigmatic

rooms is finally

solved but in 1997 Harry Falk disputes

hulch's translation if the chambers

of Barabar were indeed offered by

King Ahoka no function is

mentioned this is where the

research was in 2017 when we

discovered them 3rd king of the Moria dynasty

founded by his grandfather King

Chandragupta will therefore be the

sponsor of his

rooms in the 8th year of his reign,

wishing to annex the feudal and

pacifist state of Kalinga Asoka will lead

India into the deadliest war

in its history which will more than 100,000

dead and more than 1,500 prisoners

filled with terrible regrets Ashoka will

convert to Buddhism and will go

into retreat for a year in a

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monastery he would have reigned for about 28 years

and would therefore have bequeathed the rooms of

Barabar to the sect of the agivicas composed

of Mendian who lived almost

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ASA ched ind fromay and Bambo to stone

country Augustus changedome from a wood

town to stonewn there is nothing that

you can can point out and say this stone

technology was there

and he of techny not

with the pillars of achoka of about

thirty tons each these rooms

would therefore constitute the first

works Moria of stone whose one of the

main characteristics is the

polyoria let us now talk about the

dating of the rooms which is based on

the engraved inscriptions if we go by the

one attributed to Choka the first

would be those of bar to

Bar among ell sudama would have been the

first bequeathed by Ashoka we find a

dedication which was translated thus

this cave called nigroda was

bequeathed to the agivik by king priadarsine

when he was OIN for his 12th year of

reign priadarsine relates to Ashoka

the word agjivik has been scratched out and no

function is

indicated it is also in the 12th year of

Ashoka's reign that the vis

vasopri room would have been

bequeathed here again the term agivica has was

scratched no function is indicated and

it is dedicated while

unfinished then 7 years later Karan

Chopard would have been bequeathed to the agivik

following eugenne hulch the inscription has

long been interpreted like this

in my 19th year of reign me the

priadarcine king offers this cave of the

very pleasant mountain kalalatica to

serve as shelter during the rainy season

but after having cleaned it

harifalk proposed a new reading

when the king

was for his 19th year of reign he

went to JAL and this cave named supr

was bequeathed

to the more mention of shelter so that

it would not contain any dedication

of the periodoka because that it would be

unfinished but its vasopria screw which is

also not finished and yet

dedicated the rooms of Nagar juni would have

been bequeathed by the successor

of Ashoka dasarata son or Grandson

of Ashoka as soon as he would have gone up on the

throne a first inscription says this

cave called vapiaka was bequeathed to the

respectable agivik as a residence for

the rainy season for as

long as the moon and the sun

last by dasarata loved by the gods as soon

as he was installed as king

same text on vadatia and gopik only the

name of the rooms

changed his arrival on the throne is

that they were already realized

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which implies that all the rooms

of Barabar and Nagar juni would therefore have

been produced in 28 years or the

total duration of the reign

of Ashoka important fact none of these

inscriptions neither at Barabar nor at Nagar

juni mention the manufacture but

only donations

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other later inscriptions

show that some did not hesitate to

have their name engraved without

being the authors of these rooms as in

Barabar on the porch of the Omas Richichi

in the 5th century of our era, approximately

700 years after Hashoka, then on the

walls of the passages of entrance to other

rooms

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we would finally find a mention of the

donation of the rooms of Barabar by

hashoka in the 27th year of his reign but

the indologist Jul bloc remains cautious if

the donations of cave to the agivica are

indeed

his part superior devoid

of inscription of one of these

spectacular broken pillars was

transported to bgaa

this sudden character of the pillars like

the rooms has something to intrigue because

it seems to spring out of a sudden

important point of the affair we do not find

anywhere what we call the childhood

of art is the places where

workers are trained to

acquire the knowledge and

exceptional mastery necessary to create

the rooms if they are indeed the

first of their kind in India where do

the

skills come from in the face of this crucial problem

of the absence of childhood in art

perhaps seeking a totally

Indian origin for knowledge and techniques

the Indologist Gupta rejected the

inscriptions of his Bandar to push back

its dating a century before Barabar in

Mo- 400 BCE and thus

make it the missing link between the

natural caves and the chambers of

Barabar by showing in passing that an

inscription can therefore be called into

question interesting fact to read from the

pen of an

indologist to explain the

technical miracle of Barabar two answers the

first supernatural comes from

sitamari or a poujari a priest

still officiating today Harry Falk

had met his predecessor during

his first visit in 1993

the second historical is that the

skills required their

realization will come from the Persians and

their tomb aken which would explain

why Barabar and nagaruni are united in

India but the rare photos available

because their entry is strictly

prohibited that it is not at all the

same quality of

work nor for the vaults nor for

walls which do not have a

flat and

polished surface and no

inclined advantage is it possible to achieve

such results overnight without

ever having done it

before but on these questions of

stone cutting like the

companion points out Bernard well the archaeologist

can very well for the TA of Pierre the

TA of Pierre has the last word in this

because he knows very well it is

limited let us now approach the most

important the function of these rooms

the

caves so they have a to stay theain

start pouring down in the monsoon there

is no good reason to produce such caves

only as r

SHS for my taste these caves are Royal

caves

this Brilliance is Royal it is so has

nothing to do with the life of an

ordinary Astic be he Buddhist or alica

or

whatever whoever sees these caves will

think of the royal family and of the

um personality of Asoka who was able to

have such

if they were indeed made during the

reign of Oka therefore in less than 30 years

they will therefore have immediately been there

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[Music]

well let's recap these rooms

would be with the pillars the first

Moria works of Pierre polily they

would have been carried out over a period

of approximately 28 years

they are the first of their kind and the

knowledge could have been imported

the shelter function does not would not

necessarily be their

primary function all the inscriptions could

have been engraved well after the

creation of these rooms and do

not constitute irrefutable proof of

dating and function and finally the

synthesis of all the previous works does

not bring us any certainty

[Music]

let us specify that the presence of in this

film does not imply that he espouses our

hypotheses we sincerely thank him

for having played the

difficult role of spokesperson for an

archaeological community not expressing itself

here with one voice this which he sums up

with humor

[Music]

but nothing abnormal, all

these researchers were missing information that the

technology of their time could not

provide them and it is exactly at this

moment that our team enters the

scene of this session From January 2017

we had Tested measure rooms

telemetry measures the distance but it did

not work because of the

inclined walls the laser impacted lower in

front and made precise measurements

impossible it is for this reason that

we asked the

artgphique et patrimoine company or AGP founded

by a former stonemason son and

grandson of a stonemason

3D scanning the rooms of Barabar and

Nagar

juni each was scanned in the state

with at least 2300 years of wear

dust wasp nests and

concretions limestone on certain

walls due to water infiltration

as well as all the damage caused

over

time. We will need entire days

on site at a rate of 3 to 6 scanning sessions

per room, each defined

by approximately 100 to 300 million points

or one point every millimeter with

an absolute precision of approximately plus or

minus 2.5 mm this imprecision causes

the volumes to vary proportionally which has

much less impact on the angles AGP

then assembled all the PO clouds

for each room these point clouds

represent the rooms in three

dimensions without any

optical distortion one could believe that in fact

it is a geometric 3D modeling

that we have done we are going to scan in three

dimensions like an MRI

the existing once we have it in three

dimensions we cut it into slices like an

MRI to understand to

interpret these are therefore not

reconstructions in computer-generated images

but exact representations of the

shapes which is more easily appreciated

with scans unfinished rooms

Lomas Richi and vis vasoprix it is

unfinished or modified we do not know we see

immediately that the capture is

real and on all the others it is the

same thing it is not because we have

the impression of see something

perfectly geometric that it's a

hoax no it's reality and that it was

captured by the metrological device

during the wrapping of the previous film AGP

had provided us with some plates

announcing to us that the rooms were

all symmetrical in their

symmetrical length if you do not have jumped at

the mention of this word it is because

you do not yet know exactly what

it implies symmetrical it

means that we can cut the room in

two lengthwise and

each part is superimposed exactly on

the other the left half on the

right half and vice versa if you do it at

home it is not certain that the

part is symmetrical because the

precision tolerance in

modern constructions varies by a few centimeters

but to quantify these symmetries we

needed the ratio of 'detailed analysis

of the

scans is a file of approximately 40

pages of plates of figures and

observations of which we will provide you with

some

aspects in the preamble AGP warns of

noise due to the highly reflective surface

which makes the measurement slightly blurry there

has a mirror effect on it and mirror effect

it will reflect the laser and therefore it

gives this measurement noise there STRs

also appear in various places

but it does not exist in reality

precisely it is the measurement noise that we

here we see the impression that the

markings here are very deep while

we are talking about 5

de000 we will break down the volumes

in this way large walls wall

birth line of the vaults and

obviously vault on this section of the scan

on the ground the exterior line has a certain

thickness because the wall is not

perfectly vertical the difference

of apelom that we a là Parah it is this

thickness that we find there and we

see it directly with the 32nd dimension

to familiarize you with their language

on this board AGP informs us of a

trace on the ground with almost no

deformation which means we can say

that at 0.100°gr we are

perfect which is what is relative

perfection and when it is a question

of symmetry as for example here with

gopica where 62% of the 350 million

points are found at the same place at more

or less 2.5 mm on complex shapes

like that yes we are perfectly

symmetrical yes no there is no

discussion there it is it is

symmetrical here is the essential of this

report room number 1 vapiaka This scan

is defined by 132 million of

precisely centered entry passage points

on the short side rectangle on the ground with

virtually no deformation perfect right angle

to within a die of a degree small

wall inclined at

88.5° variation of 8th of a degree over the entire

length large wall at 87 °r variation

of 1st

degree vault formed by a perfectly centered arc of a circle

ground and line of first

perfectly horizontal longitudinal symmetry

you to cut in the direction of the

length right part superimposed on

left part and vice versa 69.7% of the

points to the same place at plus or minus

2.5 mm transverse symmetry in the

width direction 75.1% of the points at

plus or minus 2.5

mm room number 2 Caran chopar cloud

composed of 132 million points

entrance passage placed at the intersection

of a square built on the small

side rectangle on almost

perfect ground small wall inclined at

89° large wall inclined at

87.3° vault formed by association of

three Arcs of

centered circles perfectly

horizontal ground longitudinal symmetry 77.6%

of points in the same

place if transverse symmetry 67.8% of

points in the same

place room number 3 vadatica cloud

composed of 110 million points

entrance passage centered on the short

side of the 5° accesses gr relative to the

perpendicular no line of sight

fully curved section chamber

formed by square plus

semicircle anglosol of the

side wall 8

5.5° angle of inclination of the

curved wall of the bottom

83.7° angle of inclination of the small side

88.5° vault composed of three arcs of a

circle centered perfectly

horizontal ground symmetry 57.7% of the points in

the same

place room number 4 gopica cloud

composed of 305 milli of the

entrance passage is placed at the intersection of a

circle built on the short side angle

of inclination of the large walls

87° floor and line of sight precisely

horizontal the shape of the room is

very slightly oval the large walls

are very slightly curved less than

6 cm on the entire length on the ground these

are portions of a circle with a radius of 120 m

vault composed of three portions of ridge

mixed apart from the ground and the sides of the

entrance passages this room is

entirely composed of

curves longitudinal symmetry 62% of the

points in the same place room number 5

sama cloud composed of 232 million

points this room has two

rooms first perpendicular entrance passage

placed at 15 of the

length of the long side

[Music]

second perpendicular entrance passage

and

centered the curved wall of room 1

follows precisely the internal wall of

room 2 large side wall inclined at

87.1

[Music]

small side wall inclined at

89°g the wall of room 2 is inclined

at

86.7° the vault of the room composed of a

cylinder of constant radius well centered on

the longitudinal axis

horizontal ground symmetry 61.1% of the points in

the same

[Music]

place thanks to this report we

now know the constraints

given to the stone cutters

before he starts the work form

precise dimension and angle what is

called the specifications and in this

case it is properly

edifying first these five rooms are

symmetrical

the slightest variation in the shape of one

side will be find in mirror of

the other then the position of the

entrance passages responds to a particular geometric logic

[Music]

finally the forms are more

complex than they appear the

large walls of vapiaka and

karanchopar are inclined according to

angles different and all mirrored

the vaults of vapiaka and sudama are

portions of cylinder the shape of

vadatia is composed of several

mixed spheres the large walls of gopika are

very slightly curved in addition to being

inclined the vault of kanchopar is

composed of three portions of cylinder

the gopica vault is composed of three

portions

[Music]

of ogive a surveyor and

topographer engineer made a second report

from the raw data of the scan and

he extended the work of agp and has

preview of new elements we start from

this cutting of portions of cloud we

break them down I take only the points

measured by the scanner only them and

then I ask the software to come and

do the calculation of the best

sphere or spheres which will come and approach the 'set

of these points we do the same thing

in relation to our point cloud which

is on the other side but which is comp

for us it is as if they were two

completely independent clouds in

space so we relaunch a new

calculation and that's what's going to become

interesting is that when we take these

point clouds which are

positioned in different places we're

going to obtain similar information

on both sides on the right and on the left

in other words these two ends of the

vault are exact portions of

sphere which are in symmetry with

their center aligned 3956

3953 it is perhaps numerically

different values ​​but in terms of

result and in terms of measurement and in

terms of certainty of measurement or

measurement uncertainty we can very

well these two figures continue

inaccuracies of the noise of the scan 3953 =

3956 in reality these are not

exactly portions of a sphere it is

still a little more complex than that it is that

here the deviations

of of of size he compared to the

geometric shape of originally it is

symmetrical it is that we made the same

mistake on each side and we made the

same mistake following the same model so

ah it is not an error it is to say the

precision of realization the vault is

therefore made of merged portions

of ogive and sphere all in

mirror he then proceeded in the same

way with vadatica the software

produced a perfect sphere in blue on

this image what we can look at is

the distribution of points by in relation to

a sphere and here we have a diffusion of

colors which is truly remarkable

that we find in a symmetrical

and homogeneous manner on each side which

means that effectively we do not follow

a perfect shape but we follow a

distribution of a symmetrical volume perfect

whether we are on the right or on the left

at the top or at the bottom The directors of

this room therefore did not wish to

obtain a perfect portion of a sphere

but this specific shape since it

is

symmetrical. Here, to finish, is an

extract from a third report produced

by a stonemason companion

specializing in three-

dimensional geometry. A simple observation. made in

gopica as a reminder the standard today

for the flatness of a paving the

level a 2 m rule must not

show a difference

in alignment greater than 2 mm or one

in 1000 on a plan here we have a

for 100000 in a three-

dimensional space what can

I say believe that it is made to look

pretty and to please myself I do not believe it for

a second when we put so much

energy into developing that it is because

there is a reason I don't know the

reason for arriving at a level of

symmetry and

stone cutting finish like that is that we

are at the level of excellence

in mastery of the

profession and so there we are at the SOMUM of this

which can be done at that time from the

plans of the surveys of the figures but more

concretely what does it mean

is it so complicated to make

such rooms which better than the

stonemasons who have been

doing it for centuries and this thesis could

enlighten us our investigation has been in

Brittany Country granite in Nantes and then in

Paris where we met

stonemasons who agreed to

look into the case of these

rooms Eric Bernard companion and

architect with over 40 years

of experience Olivier Lavigne

architect's assistant and then companion for 30

years old who studied ancient stone cutting,

particularly in Egypt for 25 years Franck

Petit, former stone cutter Mathieu

ENAF, stone cutter turned

fitter who currently manages

masonry and stone cutting sites

in a

heritage restoration company Louis-Joseph Lamborau fils

grandson and great grandson of a

stonemason who worked for over

30 years on the restoration of

Parisian historic monuments and who

now manages his own

stone house manufacturing company Joël

Kerervé, a granite cutter

for over 30 years. 40 years old and Christophe

Kinny, a granite cutter for

28

years, we showed them the rooms

and the AGP report is requested to

start by rating the work on a

scale of 1 to 10, one being the

easiest and 10 the most difficult, we are at

9 and a half on the difficulty of

work

10 10 or even 12 10 even 20 Ah well

it's simple I'll put 12 for

provocation I'd say 12 it's to at

least place the thing the object in the

of a are reality what you need to know is that you have

already hit rocks in granite

to know what the complexity

of that is and in fact the geometry for that reason

that people who have not practiced this type of

game cannot realize before

AGP we could let yourself be won over a little

by the romanticism but the side a

little yes we are men of profession we are not

afraid of anything there the specifications

are to demanding what there you have to

understand it then we can very well

execute a room like that with a

more or less polish less finished which would please

the eye but we would not satisfy the

specifications which are there that is clear

curves of 120 m in diameter

on 13 m long we will execute it

but well after if you put the Scade

and if you put GP on our work

we risk passing for

[Music]

before arriving at the softened

or polished form there are lots of stages and each

stage brings its share of errors and its share

of imprecision so if at the end we arrive

at that it is because the stages are

still well mastered it is not only the

work of the mast which is mastered there is

also the geometry which is mastered

because that means that we start

by making the door to access the

rooms and we already know exactly what we are

going to do if we had arranged

strips of things like that it would have

allowed to divide the work and then to

hide possible

imperfections there the fact from

geometric perfection there is no

forgiveness there no mistake possible

what to dig inside a rock

and make how to say have a rendering

like that I I do not know at all

how they did it either they

spent centuries polishing I do not know

with lots of little arms that never

stopped honestly I have no

explanation it's made of granite

it's still one of the

hardest materials but today I'm

almost certain that we wouldn't get there we

could perhaps currently achieve

this requirement by making

block apparatus and so on and

so on, on the other hand, doing it in excavation

like that,

no, there is no, I don't see any

possibility currently and even with

tools mechanically it

would be to arrive at such a result it

remains complicated even so nowadays

we would not be more precise with

much more developed means because in

fact we are dealing with a

rustic size so we could not put

all the installations there which

will allow us to have something

even more precise,

so we couldn't do better to make

a bar-type room with

tools manuals you must first rough out

the general shape with picks then

work with different

increasingly fine scissors and then solder

with a paste and a support that you rub

and start again as many times as

necessary and finally

polish at the polishing stage the shape is

already completely finished it is

absolutely necessary that the PARM is straightened and

perfect before even starting to

rub to achieve this

polymirror the polishing itself it will

be uniform so it will remove the

same thicknesses everywhere so the defect

will be visible there we see clearly that the

will is there is a

geometric shape which is defined and therefore it

is out of the question to exceed these

limits so it is necessary to get

closer to them so there is everything polishing

which will also take a little material

so to arrive exactly on that

it means that we have understood and we

know how thick we are going to polish

what is interesting with polishing

in the case of these caves is that it

shows again there also the level

of execution because polishing of the

vaults of the intradoses of vaults it is it is

hell there there is also still

a demonstration of a mastery which which

which is extraordinary as much it is

manageable on workshop surfaces on

a table and so on but there on a

regulated surface clean without any tool strokes

ready to be polished that too is it here

it is blue frond it is completely

unique is it really possible to

embark on such projects without ever

having done it before it is not the work

of a beginner neither of a qualified nor

of a highly qualified it is of a

qualified than hyper qualified that we do

not know today it is wanted what

yes yes it is wanted it is 'is planned and there

is no there is no possible error

we cannot there we can we cannot

change along the way what there is

an extraordinary geometric mastery

and a mastery of the material which

is everything also extraordinary there it

means that there are years and years

of learning before that that's why

we can't to embark on a job

like that overnight and say,

well, let's make a cave, it's

not possible, we wouldn't have such a high quality or

such a successful finish, if it was a

trial run there would be a few

small errors, there would be small

adjustments and we would see the evolution

through the caves whereas here we can

clearly see that well roughly they

all have the same level of finish and

so on which in terms of the

qualification of the workers so it does

n't come from nowhere part when we see the

result we have the impression that

it was worked by one

hand because it is so regular,

it is so perfect that we do

not have the impression that there was

quantities of people to work

on on this site there the place vibrates

like something which has which which

results from a work of common effort of

group cohesion which is implacable

what everything is done so that

human relations uh professional rap we can

see very well that in the experience of the

site I have witnessed a multitude of

conflicts, that's it and for very

good reasons less complicated than that so

there in my opinion they have reached a

degree of understanding which is quite quite

disturbing also there the human commitment

is relatively enormous what the

report has among other things revealed the

symmetries of the rooms what nobody

before these scans had not seen obtaining

symmetrical forms can it be

accidental it can not be chance

clearly it is it is really calculated

it is really it is done on purpose what

nothing is done at random everything has a reason

it seems to me Obviously chance is excluded

from the matter we are obliged to start from

very precise reference points which will

be calculated at the start before

cutting that we cannot arrive and we say to

ourselves come on I will do it there no

before to do we know very well that

there is a minimum of repechmetric point

that we must do and

from that we will be able to define all

the rest so they are decided before that

means that this symmetry is

still imposed and it imposes a pure

rigor in the execution what the symmetry

is still pushed quite far

in the construction it's not at all

by chance, it's that it evolved at a

given moment, it was executed like that, that's what

we see today

from the measurements, if in addition we add

a symmetry to the volume, that's it multiply

by two the complexity yet another

additional constraint if we do not have

this constraint of

symmetry we move forward and then when

it is suitable to the eye there we stop

there we stop the costs what on the

other hand if there is a deschge notebook

so demanding that the

millimeter must be everywhere, so that

's a whole different story,

it's twice the work, 10 times

the work, doing the reversible copy-paste

of the two shapes and arriving at

this

error rate it's the same

I there there it's there it's it's the worst of

the worst of the result of this

digital work which

uh which carries all the elements of of of

destabilize a professional What do

you think about the precision of the realization

revealed by the scans and the

measurements arriving to be more precise than

that's going to be very complicated, very very

complicated, that is to say that we feel that they

went all the way given the

means of the time, I judge this

precision to be fissante, what, ah yes, yes, yes,

for me it's not great precision

is extremely precise it is

incredibly precise in such a material with

a polished finish the differences that

can be measured with

today's extremely sophisticated tools honestly

it is c This is the most impressive, the

most amazing thing, even for

much simpler things we are not as

precise, it is that in the field of

productive mechanics with volumes

1000 times smaller therefore much

easier

to master, so there I I don't know,

it's the most impressive part,

the precision for me, stone cutter,

go and type in millimeters, we're going to

do that on auscultation, we're going to

do that on the monitoring of

civil engineering works on the monitoring of

nuclear power station of of things of works

which which require to analyze

movements which are themselves to the millimeter

when we see the potential

deviations noted in the 3D scan where we speak of

a symmetry with deviations of 3,

4, 5 mm maximum, it is something that we

have had to hard to imagine on such volumes

yes it is ultra

precise what level of constraint

represents such excavation work

there is the darkness there is the

dust side if there are 20 craftsmen who

work in the same cave at after

2 hours everyone is dying of heat

in there so we're going to have to go

out at some point we're going to have to cool down

we're going to have to there's the problem of

light working 10 or 12 hours a day

in such

restricted spaces honestly I I don't see

how we could do that. The problem

is that for someone who has followed 10 years

of training to reach the top of

their profession, it would be a shame

to waste it after 5 years with

silicosis because he works in a

cave we haven't changed in 3000 years or in

4000 years we are the same eh there are

specifications of deadlines and and

it's like today it's like

today we have we have a project to

do a meter of work a master of work

and then well we have to

go for it the question that burns our

lips how long to make

one we can imagine everything in fact but

that would be pure speculation

now if we imagine

manual work I imagine it just me

working on very long times and

with infinite patience what to

arrive at this result this mirror what

those which are complex 10 years is a

minimum after that it will also depend on

the tools which they have of their

skills the more competent they are the more

they will be able to gain perhaps in

speed anyway in exercises

like that it is not the time that counts

and well if precisely the chronology

deduced from the registrations leaves little

time for realization for these SEP

rooms 28 years for sudama the most

complex of all it would even be a

question of 12 years no no no it's not

possible it's not

feasible 12 years

but these completion times

come from the donation dates provided by

the engraved inscriptions there is there is

a gap between the inscriptions the

rooms they have not been made at the

same time it is obvious there is a

gap which is which is not which gives me

the evidence that it was done well after

finally in any case it is not the same

time comparing the cave and then

the inscription there is still a small

gap between the two, well it is

readable

but it is not of the same level, the

engraving was carried out in a

very summary manner which has nothing to do with

the quality of the work is it is

punched what we could say that there

they needed to put a

message the person did not master the

engraving and he came to make a deed of

ownership it is not because it is

registered that It must be from that

time that the king could have

said, well, I would like to having my

name there on this thing which is which already

exists the connection it is not

necessarily the most obvious eh

he is he is in power at such a

date and then he gives the cave 12 years

later but we do not say that he had

his caves made and that he had them

built we can very well

imagine this famous king who

got his hands on the caves and then

had them engraved well I offer them

here it is is all but it is not

necessarily him who had them made what

nothing proves that it is him who had them

made we can indeed wonder

if those who had it engraved that they

were shelters against the rain

had really awareness of the work

that their realization required

as well as all their

major technical constraints useless for simple

shelters and therefore that at that time we

could have already forgotten their function

why these forms why this

perfect symmetry why go on a

polymirror if it's just a shelter from

the monsoon it just needs a

cave it hurts the heart we have

the impression that the building has lost

its sacred dimension uh if it is

dedicated and then given up to serve as

a shelter uh against the monsoon uh I find it

hard to believe that this was its

original purpose visibly when the king gives it

is that there is no more use

for it that is why he gives it so in

fact there we risk being on

earlier things eh earlier by how much

after well there there are only

archaeological dig nearby which

would allow us to put a few

things in place, that's the problem

with writing, eh, is that writing

is propaganda, eh, so to

show off we're going to put texts

everywhere huh we're going to talk in this case

DRAM 162 huh who put his name everywhere

even when it's not him who did it

[Music]

when I see the work of these

rooms I am amazed stupefied

admiring speechless disconcerted I I

am I am lost I I say to myself how

could it have been done just this set of

rooms it's it's something

fantastic it's it's it's

fantastic as much in terms of

geometry as in terms of finish and and of

work accomplished which I have turned

the thing over in all directions I

am disarmed it is the first time that

in a professional capacity I have been

destabilized to this point

[Music]

there you go for fear of seeing their

conception of the past shaken up some will

probably say that our ancestors were

capable of great things that we

moderns have lost but if it were

simple these rooms would not be the

only ones because the building sites that followed

in India although grandiose have

little to

[Music]

see the Ajanta site is a group of

Buddhist caves dug into a

long horseshoe-shaped basalt cliff

whose

construction began around the 2nd

century BCE, about a century

after Barabar was abandoned and

forgotten for centuries. rediscovered in

1819 by British soldiers This site,

now classified as a UNESCO World Heritage Site,

is considered one of the

greatest architectural treasures of

India. The term cave is quite

reductive; they are in reality temples

and prayer rooms famous for

their magnificent sculpture. and their

wall paintings which reflect the

teachings of Buddha

their realization required considerable means

[Music]

some of them

would have been used as a shelter during

the rainy season from where

perhaps comes the inspiration for the inscriptions

of the rooms from Nagar

juni we remain very impressed by

the immense amount of work that must have gone

into the creation of this site spread

over more than 6

centuries. What you see was carved

and not assembled and everything was

meticulously thought out and

organized. but although this site is

truly spectacular the work is

not similar to that of Barabar and

Nagar Juni when the walls are not

left raw they are covered with

statues and sculpted bas-relief the

angles are poorly defined and the floors not

really

plans but there may still be More

spectacular than this site is the

Laora complex also located in the state of

Maharashtra Elora is a set of 34

rooms cut into the rock between the

6th and 10th century or 12th according to

sources over a total distance of almost

2

km here again the term cave is neither

very representative nor very rewarding

because the rooms are sometimes immense and

on several levels

[Music]

12 of them are Buddhist 17

Hindu and 5

[Music]

Jain as in agenta each one is an

architectural masterpiece with

multiple sculptures and bas-reliefs

covering the walls

[Music]

the most famous construction of this

complex is called cave number 16

although it is a temple and not just

any temple all the rock has been

sculpted to resemble the montkelche

the legendary residence of

Shiva this temple features galleries

columns sanctuary and

intricate carvings on multiple

levels keep in mind it was

carved entirely from a single block

no statues or elements were

added everything was thought out layer by

layer staircase column level and

[Music]

statue considered the largest

monolithic structure in the world its volume

is estimated at twice that of the partenon

in

[Music]

Greece but as remarkable and gigantic

as it is the work accomplished only

pleases the eye as the

companions say and the precision does not go

beyond that because when we take out a simple

rangefinder we quickly realize that no

column foot is precisely aligned

with its

neighbor but why should it be that is

precisely the

question with Barabar and Nagar juni we

are faced with two

major questions how was it achieved to this

level of precision and

[Music]

why there is a great dissonance

between the discourse of the

stonemasons and what could be said about the

way in which these rooms were

made, notably by the Indologist

Huntington following his rigorous

observation work in the Omas Richi. This

room is crucial in

understanding this affair and we

will consider it. from the investigator's point of

view

let's see everything first the

opinions of some and others through

time for Cunningham and fet the Porsche

would be a late addition that would come

after the Moria dynasty an inscription

of Ashoka could have existed and have been

erased at the time of the realization of the

Porsche for Ferguson the Porsche and the

room would have been done at the same

time for Stern and oboyer the Porsche

would be a late addition about 200 years

after the rooms were done for

Huntington Lomas richishi would be the

last of Barabar after sudama Karan

shopar and visvazopri and the work

would have been stopped at the death of Ashoka

due to lack of funding for him the Porsche

and the room would have been made at the

same

time for Gupta it would have nothing to

do with Ashoka and dasarata

because it has no inspection 2

because 'it would be the only one of all the

Moria rooms not to have an

original form because it is unfinished and

because its Porsche would be of

Buddhist style they think that it would have been

carved well after Barabar and Nagar juni

and finally Harry Falk went back to the life

of Huntington and Ferguson for him the

Porsche and the room would have been

made at the same time and the Porsche

would not be

Buddhist in the face of these divergent opinions

we are not more advanced this

is however an important point because

it is from this room that

the tools and

methods for the realization of all

the

rooms were deduced let us turn to the field

the omas richichie is the The only one to have

a Porsche and a curved exterior frame,

she is the only one not to have

an original shape, either she is the

first of all and therefore a copy,

or it is the

opposite, the major difference between

the two geometries being the position of the

entrance passage

[Music]

it surprises with its polished walls while

the rest is still in the rough

[Music]

works the state of progress of the work

in this cave is surprising

surprising it is necessary to carry out all the

roughing work before 'start

polishing this polishing of the walls

is a aberration well there we see it well

but the operating mode is not coherent

what it started everywhere and it

ended nowhere it's the same I have

difficulty in understanding it doesn't make the thing

impossible it makes the thing more

complicated we finish everything in the form and

then we will polybillant all of a sudden

these are key stages of the

production chain we cannot finish one and

then start another no no it is

all at the same time that it must be done

there it is it is incomprehensible it is

it is not logical we do not do

finishing touches until we have mastered the

RES we have the impression that they had to

exploit a room that had been

done and then which had not been

finished but those who saw it finished they

did not they did not understand or I do

not know honestly I do not know but in any

case it is not the logic of the rest of

the rooms

[Music]

the Indian stonemasons

traditionally start with the

ceiling, but here it is

the opposite in the sudama dô in

playing with light we observe the

spectra of two circles better visible

on the scans we go here a first circle

and then we see a second

inside there and when we look at

the centers of each of these circles they

are all exactly aligned which

suggests the use of a

mechanical device to cut the

technical dome that is not seen at

all in the dome of the Omas

Richi the pickaxe strokes also go

too close to the final shape of the vault

which risks generate if we dig

too much of the negatives of removal of the holes

that we observe on

site and finally on the external wall

of this room clues reinforce

the impression of being faced with two

periods of size and

different techniques these grooves circled by red

on this

image well known to the cutters of these

grooves are the marks of the sharpening

of the chisel blades which are rubbed against

the

[Music]

granite we observe a little on

the outside of sudama but curiously

neither on the external wall of karanchopar

nor on vis vasopri and not more

outside gopika of vadatia and

vapiaka showing that the

stonemasons did not proceed

in this way why then on the facade of

sunama most probably because of

this niche added and not finished the

difficulty is the lack of

archaeological documentation in relation

to all this because there we feel that there

are gaps we feel that the

inscriptions a bit like the Porsche

at the entrance I have doubts about whether

it is really contemporary with the

digging

caves so the inscription of the

king well in fact it corresponds to the

same date as the realization of that there

is nothing to prove it but uh there are

times you have to know how to say that you don't

know

[ Music]

not to compare these observations

we suggested to Eric Bernard to

visit it like the geologist Éric Gontier

before him he first noted the

difference in quality of execution between

the Porsche and the interior of the rooms

completed there is nothing of dressed it is

it is really to give the form the

form was requested the guy is executed

in the emergency the edges here you have

in

addition a relatively well regulated curve

which a jardaugive and you have no

bottom edge cut correctly then

on the other hand it is polite it is out of the

question to imagine that the team that

even started the work inside

it and could be

related to this execution which

is completely completely

anachronistic we can clearly see that the team has

lost the geometry it is that it was

attacked everywhere, uh, we looked for

points more or less and in the end

it was abandoned because

the team could not complete the

work that had been done elsewhere, anyway

Obviously a detail that we had

not paid attention to caught his attention

the small wall at the bottom is

partially polished while the

upper part is not yet dressed the

resumption of work will generate what the

tailors call a specter that

is to say -say an imprint which will then

be seen with the light it is physical

in the

stone perceives it because the account

takes up a surface it always leaves

traces we do not observe on the small

walls of the other rooms which

means that they were not made in

this way

same thing with the unfinished floor which

would have forced to take up the whole bottom

of the

polished walls let's summarize in this room

the cutting and polishing operations

take place in an illogical manner and the

tool strokes demonstrate a lack of

method and rigor the quality of the

Porsche's work is not the same as

that of the Inside the

rooms there is no

guide groove on the facades of the rooms

except for the floors which have

unfinished elements souama and Lomas

richishi if Lomas richishi is the

first of the rooms and if the Porsche

was made at the same time as long as

the interior this therefore means that it

is part of the architectural principle of

construction in this case why do souama

and karanchopar right next door and finished

not have a

Porsche but if as

some indologists think the Porsche was

added after that should then be on

site it turns out that this is the case it is

very easy for any

professional to come and put their hand here we can

clearly see that the surface that you

have here is

practically let's say to the touch it is

identical to the other rooms it is with

the precision and when you slide

on a shape of edge which is by

there the tailor of Pier who took over in

this surface and who executed the

Porsche s found himself cutting with

certain clumsiness we see well that there

is an inconsistency of control and there

therefore we find it here and all that so

you see this part there is

hollow or poorly polished or poorly cut and then

when we take the Porsche here

again there are hollows but enormous on

a surface 40 cm there is a hollow

practically practically 1 cm you

take any stone that comes

here look at the the the the surface and

so on without having the

geometric knowledge and it tells you there is a

problem there is a invoice problem between

this part there and the rest it's

it's all quite obvious

here are those who The people who carved this Porsche

obviously had in mind to make

or finish the interior. The

tool marks that we see today

therefore come from this same team and

cannot enlighten us on the way

in which the work was carried out. other rooms

either this Porsche dates from Ashoka or it

was added much later but if it dates from

the Ashoka period then the other

rooms are older and were already

finished long ago at the time of

their donation to the Agica which

would explain that At that

time, their real

function had already been forgotten, because given the

complexity of the work that these

rooms represent, how can they be considered simple

shelters, unless they have

inherited them and are unaware of the work that they

really do?

[Music]

represented a month after our visit to

Barabar we went back to see ec

Bernard what poses the most problem

in this case is above all the

client the one who imagined the

volume and then who says to himself well here I am

demanding that and I will find the team

that will produce it for me right now

in the labs of research and the

execution labs it requires a

colossal amount of work to put these demands in phase

there there it was done it was

done without any interiority the

geometry requirement has a reason a reason

because really we don't have reference to

us Westerners of an example of this type

there monolithic and and cut like that of

a single j what in addition in cavity where

was his reflection on the tools and

methods let's say the roughing it is done

very quickly I mean someone

vigorous here finally in shape and then

with a technique we can we can

do a big job after it is this

finishing approach because in addition we

are in the dark with candles

with systems of 'lighting

completely so there after there is a

timing that we do not control at all

so I looked I looked for the

errors obviously on site I saw the

flashes I saw I saw the spectra of

size that stand out so there it reassured me a

little finally in a certain way

me say well here it is it is

colleagues of mine who did this there is

but all the same with what could we

compare the work of these chambers the

only element of reference with

archives is This base is in fact this

pedestal which was made to

receive the obelisk of Luxor therefore at

the Concorde and this element is the only

reference that we have on the

volume that is to say let's say 16 m³ so 40

tons of granite rock,

granite quite close to Barabar in addition

but obviously cut in a quarry, what

came out of a quarry and so on we know

very well that at that time in 1836

they were still on forms

of forms of technique who were who

came from the dawn of time since

we were on site we decided

to pass the roughness meter on this

perfectly

documented base first Z of 60 microns 2nd 47

and 3rd 25 far from the values ​​recorded

in Barabar and Nagar juni knowing that this

object was not polished vertically

but horizontally in the direction of

gravity which is absolutely not the

same work

a detail that will probably speak to the

engineers the difference in the angle

of inclination between the large and the

small

walls why this change of angle and

why

88.5°r 1 and a half degrees from the vertical which is

almost invisible to the naked eye

it is 10 times more difficult to

respect this angle than to staying on

a

vertical wall well controlled and so on

a detail which seems like nothing but which

must have had its importance since

it is one more constraint which is

repeated from one room to another and in

addition in

symmetry This suggests an

improvement in the shapes following a

process of experimenting with

different angles for a specific purpose but

speaking of the polish we notice

some chips in that of the

finished rooms like here in the bottom of the

wall of Karan Chopard we thought

that 'these were

later degradations but for him they were

weaknesses of the granite at the time of the

size the fact of passing to the polish without

having to try to hide that is to say to

hide the errors of the nature let's

say and we see well that it is the polish

came on an extremely

rigorous and defined form at the level of the

ribs and then there are holes and

things like that so we can clearly see

that this po is not at all aesthetic,

is not at all related to a

need, a need for visual comfort or

anything like that. This is completely

in my opinion to forget impolite

more technical than aesthetic

another stonemason had

confided to us that if these rooms made with

such precision and sobriety

were devoid of religious images or

of various motives this argued for

objects having a very

specific function on this subject the scans revealed

another curiosity discovered by the

researcher Quentin le plat while all

the entrance passages are at 90° or

almost the room of vadatica it has

it has a corridor which is slightly

off-centre, finally which is not at the same

max as the bedroom, it is the

entrance corridor here there that

when it is extended comes uh in

quotation marks to hit uh vapillaka at

90° and in addition to that the axis of these two

corridors and well it indicates the

north-south East West axes

these two caves for me they were

thought of together it's not

independent things that we did there is a

global thought for the for the for the

design it means that

they had methods of tracing

methods of reporting of interior

to exterior layout which allows them with

surveying systems that I do

not know to be able to report what is

inside perfectly to

the outside without any loss of

geometry geometry is a

constraint such that we cannot

integrate chance into it, that is

something extremely important,

that is that when we are faced with an

extremely controlled geometric volume,

there is an extremely complex thought behind it

or mastered we

are not in the in the little bit it is

quite that also that quite disturbing that

they managed to make a link between

two cavities we are small what we are here

I mean humanly we are faced with

a major geological element

what what can such a

particularity be useful which can only be discovered with

the help of 'a 3D scan why position

the corridor perpendicular to the long

side of the other room why this

additional constraint let's now consider the

geometry of these rooms using

measurements carried out on site harifalk

determined the value of the

measurement standard used that he called Yard Moria

or yarde de Barabar of about 85.5 cm

thanks to the qutin the dish did the same

work on its side and was able to refine

this value we observe that there is for

example a particular geometry which

emerges from it proportions so if I have

proportions of two units on the

width three on the length I will be

able to quite easily find a

common denominator and it turns out that

this common denominator comes back on

the C scans that I studied for an

unknown reason This standard varies very

precisely from one room to another within a

few millimeters close but on

average what I find is 85.4

it is the average value of a

theoretical Barabar Yard for example which was

used to size these rooms

because it is obvious that we used

a unit of measurement we saw to what extent

we positioned the entrance to the corridors we

saw the modular side so we

necessarily have a unit of measurement this standard

has in fact made it possible to understand the

geometry on the ground of these rooms here we

have a proportion ratio which is very

simple it is 2 thirds of for the width

TR for the length and we have the

proportions on the rooms and the one

next door and well it is exactly the same

it is proportions of by TR the

measurement which comes out of it is the same we are

in something which is clearly

calibrated according to

geometric and metrological criteria it is not

something which is obviously made

to

go and store flour or take shelter

when it rains what we feel that it It's

something much more thoughtful, we have

a ratio of 5 to 12 with Aran Chopard

and 3 by 7 with gopica

but let's now move on to the volume because

the scans gave them to us very

precisely which allowed him to

notice an extraordinary relationship

between vadatika and vapiaka they have

volumes which have whole number relationships

7 by 8 with a precision which

is really remarkable is in

proportion remember the cross products

of your childhood if the volume of

vadatica is worth 7 then that of vapiaka

is worth

8 same thing with sudama if the flight of the

great hall is worth 12 then the volume of the

dô is worth

5 a ratio of 12/5 already present in

the ground geometry of karanchopar whose

volume is linked with that of gopica

and well there we have an even simpler ratio

2 Ti if the volume of karanopar

is worth 2 then that of gopik is worth 3 and in

addition to that if I converted these two

caves into Yard of arabar or Moria

as we want the unit of measurement that I

deduced before and well I come across 200 and

300 cubic yards of Barabar 200 Yard CUB

and 300 Yard CUB 200 and 300 piles for

volumes in ratio of 2 by 3 which

also allows to deduce the value of the

Yard of bar to Bar from the

volumes the most skeptical will

perhaps argue chance in saying that these

are only two rooms out of 5 but

the volume ratios of 7/8 between

vadatika and vapiyaka and 5/12 between the

dô of sudama and its great hall shows

that the designers knew how to calculate

the dimensions of all these rooms

so that their volume is in relation

you are cting cave you have to

iteh that means you can and in cubical

whole numbers and this is

something unthought of nobody ever

thought of

something that you could prove and

everybody could go there nowadays with

our modern machines and and have the

machine find out the cubical content of

you remember how

complex the shapes of the rooms are to

know the volumes without going through

the scans it is necessary to break down each one into

volume assembly simple calculate

each portion of volume then

add them but the problem posed to the

designer of Barabar is inverse and

much more

complex it consists of determining

each of the dimensions of the rooms

length width height radius of the

curves etc. so that the

finished volumes make the expected numbers this

which, given the complexity of the geometries

of each of them, goes well beyond the

Pythagorean triangle. This not only

confirms the use of the Barabar Yard, it

confirms the fact that these

two rooms were sized with ratios of

volume in whole number and the precision

is according to the data we

have it is 1500 so it is

ultra precise I say we would have difficulty

doing better I do not see how we

could do better and necessarily You

have to master the number pi with

a lot of decimal places after the decimal point

because if you want to do calculations

with all the portions of cone,

cylinder, and sphere that there are, well, the

number pi must not be played with

approximate fractions what we

need to give a very very good

knowledge what the design and

dimensioning of these geometries

involve complex equations which

testify to a level Maé

of capacities supposed of the time

rooms were then realized without

any possible latitude anticipating what

each step of size removes of

matter to the final po as the

stone cutters told us ha and

strong we must therefore add to this

level of mathematical knowledge

mastery of realization which can

only be acquired following a long

period of learning the problem being

that we don't see it anywhere that's

why the scans change everything and

why we have to get away from the

preconceptions of history to understand these

rooms the shape of the entrances to the

rooms also raised

[Music]

questions for Elora and In Janta we

did not see a trapezoidal door because it is

not a typical Indian form.

In his work dedicated to Barabar,

taking up Huntington, the Indologist Gupta

evokes a similarity with the

Egyptian door frames,

also trapezoidal, which he

immediately dismisses. pattern that the datings

would not match but the dating of the

rooms is absolutely not

certain during the filming of our

previous film we had also seen

this type of trapezoidal entrance in Peru

on very precisely

made constructions like here at the corikancha of

cousco

irony of fate we find in Egypt

polished granite surfaces almost as

precisely as at Barabar in the

enigmatic vats of the cerapeum of Sakara

also dated from a

more than

doubtful inscription and if we were faced

with traces of the same

[Music]

builders because we made another

observation this time with the

most complex Souama room of all we

analyze the surveyor makes measurements he

makes measurements in the most

objective way possible with a device of which

he knows the

technical characteristics therefore in particular these famous

uncertainties and then at the end we will

come and see what we have measured

and what do we see when

we measure the object as we have assembled

it is indeed 11 m in length

for the room well after that it's 11 m 008

we can fall to 11 m

00 4 or fall to 11 m 11 for me

it will be the same 5 m 8 16 for the width

we have a sphere here which has a radius

of 3 m a center 1 m above above the ground we

have a cone here there a cone and then the

walls here of the vault which are exactly 2 m from the

vault here there we also arrive at a radius

of 3 m 03 and a C center of the

main cylinder at 1 M02 above above the ground so here is

11 m 6 m 2 m 1 M

we are only observing it is an

observation uh the most factual possible I

take a point uh I take several

of these points and this is what we

obtain so the observation indeed

it is that here we find

metric values ​​2 3 4 times that taken

but on volumes in 3D on a

regularity on a

total length on a punctual point that's it

quite remarkable things quite

interesting to note a simple observation

but which disturbs because the master having been

determined in France in

1795 it appears impossible that these

dimensions could have been thought and

measured in meters yet with sudama we

come across whole numbers only

in meters whereas in Barabar Yard this

is not the case it is true that we

quite often come across the master when we

measure it is very likely that the

designer thought things through with the

master and the Barabar Yard in mind In the

previous film we saw the

master at various major ancient sites

on the planet in Bolivia, Egypt,

France and now in Barabar, which

poses an obvious historical problem because

this knowledge of the master implies

on the one hand having measured the circumference

of the Earth. and on the other hand to have

divided it into 40 million as we have

done unless it is the reverse

it is rather we who have done like

them in Egypt the value of the

royal cubit used in the great pyramid

is linked to the master by means

of a 1 m diameter one whose

circumference is worth 6 times the Coué which

some have put down to the chance

of the choice of the master in

1795 but in Barabar it seems that there

is also a geometric link between

mtre and Yard if I say that the Yard of

Barabar is a circle of 1 Yard for

the diameter if I divide by 6 as I

did for the royal circle what

comes out is a cubit of 44.72 cm and

this cubit of 4472 if I make a

double of it

the diagonal is 1 m the design

of the bar rooms in Bar is

circles and right angles and

square figures what globally when

we design things we use

compasses and squares we are in a work

which uses this kind of geometry therefore

and well it is possible that effectively

we have deployed the two measures

in a single

room not only do the skills

come from somewhere but the

specifications of the rooms worthy

of the modern industrial world have an

objective reason and its rooms a

specific use but then

which one? it all depends on how

we

look at them if they had been made

by engineers of the future we would say

that there must be something

important to discover in their

functioning something that we do

not yet know but necessarily

important because future equals progress but

they come from the past and history

tells us that our ancestors were

necessarily less

technologically evolved what could it be

other than curious objects

intended for distant ancestors with

curious

[Music]

beliefs necessarily less evolved

let's take a little

[Music]

hindsight according to our current knowledge,

human beings such as you and I have existed

for at least 230,000 years 230,000 years

is an incredibly long period of time

we would have remained hunter gatherers

for around 220,000 years during

which time we would have traveled the

planet at foot to establish ourselves almost

everywhere and human civilization

would have started only a few

thousand years ago we thought for a long time

that it was about

6000 years ago then we discovered

gobelitp in Turkey which pushes back

this date 7000 years ago but there are

still many gray areas

about our

past like in Egypt where history no longer

even remembers how the

pyramids of Guisé were built,

barely a few millennia ago, not

much compared to the 230,000 years

of history of our humanity, the

Egyptians have nevertheless written a lot

in all sorts of fields but

apparently nothing on the realization of

these pharaonic construction sites nor on the

function of these buildings considered

today only as

funerary monuments, that is to say nothing has was

written or it was erased by their

successor because our history has always

been re-written in favor of the kings,

emperors and dictators who have

succeeded one another over the centuries and who,

by treating their predecessors

as Barbarians, have each time rewritten the

past for to give oneself a good role in the

present, there are many examples:

Neanderthal man, a kind of

ape-man rehabilitated by recent

discoveries, the Gauls, a crude

and barbaric people according to Roman propaganda

until recently, and finally the Greeks and

their prodigious knowledge and

unsuspected techniques which made it possible to realize

the mechanism

of anticity the story is therefore not

false it is just partial and blindly

dangerous concerning Barabar and Nagar

juni it has not much to

use us either no one is useful to

report to posterity how the

rooms were made or what

they were really used for either it

was lost or destroyed on the

inscriptions attributed to Shoka and

dasarata the name agjivika was scratched out

by their successor but fortunately not

completely why scratch out his

inscriptions if it is not to try to

make this mention disappear,

history also no

longer remembered Ashoka nicknamed achoka the Great,

he was however an important king,

founder of the history of India and

without lequ bha probably disappeared but

he has was forgotten for almost 2000 years

before being rediscovered barely

centuries ago thanks to these pili anything that is

not based on proof, therefore on an

indisputable fact, is not that one

more belief pursuing the reflection everything

that is not or has not been demonstrated

is therefore always subject to caution and

can potentially be called into

question

practicing the art of the table race of

Descartes consists in not rejecting a

hypothesis that we believe to be

impossible is difficult in reality because

we are all absolutely all

influenced by our beliefs which are not

limited to the

religious sphere, the belief for example that

although our human history may

contain some gaps or

gray areas nothing could

fundamentally call it into

question the belief that the direction of

progress runs from the wheel to the

smartphone and that it could not have been

otherwise the belief finally that the

rooms of Barabar and Nagar juni have

nothing to do teach us something useful to us, the

modern inventors of satellites and

artificial intelligence, these rooms appear

however totally anachronistic and

seem to have a more

technical than artistic or

religious purpose, to wipe the slate clean, it is accepted

to consider that our history could

have forgotten a part of our past

and try to consider these objects without

preconceived ideas

Today, as yesterday, no one is going to

go to such lengths to achieve

such precise results if there is

no goal that matches the efforts

made, which in this case are

colossal when we really

push the envelope. more

finely analyzed there is something else

that appears another philosophy therefore

another will for me it is quite

obvious it is obvious it is a

scientific object an object of measurement

so

exceptional

that the reason for these objects must have

a scientific utility that's it it

can only be that

[Music]

[Music]

so if in addition there is another measure

which is that of the sound that it is perhaps

what was looking for that can explain the

inclined par that can explain the vaults

the vaults on TR

arcs made with TR different rays the

polymirror which precisely favors the

propagation and the reverberation that

would allow to justify in fact the

form why why we went for

example to make polymirror in these

caves we could have stopped At the

previous stage we already had mastery of

geometry since the rooms are

carved from the mass, the vaults have

no structural utility and

the ceilings could have had

any shape

[Music]

when one enters these

dark rooms the interaction of sound with their

geometry jumps out at the ears and produces

impressive effects that are difficult to

reproduce with

microphones. The most remarkable thing about C chamber

is the resonance and

reverb as we have just

heard thanks to the voice of the

singer

Tritacina. The reverb time

corresponds as much as my lessons to

decrease. after the source is turned off

while the

acoustic resonances correspond to

specific frequencies for which

the sound is

amplified the low absorption rate of the

granite and the geometry of the walls

produce different effects between

low and high

frequencies but these effects in the

rooms are they

unintended consequences due to their geometry or

on the contrary intentional and controlled

from the

design since we

discovered them we carried out

experiments and

recordings in May 2017 in parallel with

the scans we recorded

explosions of calibrated balloons and

frequency variations across the

spectrum audible to humans to

enable acousticians to understand

the acoustics of

rooms [Music] we then had

this data analyzed but the

instruments used were not

precise enough so we returned on

site in March 2020 with a

very precise measurement protocol two sound level meters a

recorder and balloons

[Music]

we recorded a hundred

balloon explosions in the

rooms with our

[Music]

sound level meters we then had

all this data analyzed by

several

acousticians for the anecdote through

a study carried out by a

numerical calculation one of the reports concludes that a

source of emission of 74.9 Herz placed on the

ground in the center of the dô of sudama would produce

a sound which would be very amplified around

of her and the

walls it turns out that this is what

we had experienced by chance in

2020 by broadcasting a frequency of 75 Hz

with our speaker placed on the ground in the

center of the

dô Ren changed the frequency is

constant it's incredible

more there I think I killed the speaker

ah

well very concretely our speaker

literally

fried which happened again when

we went back in March 2023

to check some data and make

new recordings

[Music]

and here is what we found these

Rooms are a kind of textbook case

because they combine different

characteristics that are not

currently sought by

modern acousticians. First of all, they generate

unintelligibility of speech and

rapid fields that become inaudible

when you are more than 50 cm from the

source in other words they are not

made to listen to a sermon or to

speak in the middle and over there

and at the same time as it is very

slightly curved it is also very

slightly innate if you manage to hear

that

[Music]

it combines both reverberation and

resonance

[Music]

the reverberation times in the

low frequencies are very high for

comparison for Notre Dame de

Paris the reverberation in the low

frequencies lasts from 10 to 12 seconds

when in the do of souama it reaches

62 seconds and in vadatia 70

[Music]

seconds for about a hundred

years acousticians have been creating

reverberant rooms to measure

the absorption of an object, that is to say

the acoustic energy that it will keep

if the reverberation lasts up to 15

seconds it generally neutralizes

the effect of

[Music]

resonance or in Barabar and Nagarjuni the

resonances are also very marked

that is to say that we have a

very significant amplification of the sound for certain

frequencies which we therefore hear much

louder

these exceptional reverberation times

confirm the

intriguing nature of these rooms

according to the acousticians who confirmed

our intuition of a use of the

frequencies they are due to the low rate

of 'absorption of the granite but also to

the polishing of the inclination of the walls and to the

symmetries of the

volumes because the polishing of the surfaces

increases the reverberation of very

high frequencies the symmetries of the

volumes increase that of low

frequencies by the presence strong

resonances the inclination of the walls

neutralizes the floating decoration effect and

seems to play with the focalization,

that is to say the concentration of sounds

in particular places, which is

also the case with the vaults as

Olivier noted.

Lavigne some explorations show

an extremely interesting focal return

between 70 and 80 cm in height in gopica

where sensory perceptions

could be maximal in a

low position emission configuration but our research is still

ongoing although the intentionality

appears geometrically with

the ordination of volumes we have

not yet been able to determine

any acoustic intentionality in the

design of the

[Music]

rooms but that does not mean

that there is none because a detail has

caught the attention of the acousticians vapiaka

gopik and kan Chopard each resonates on

the natural frequency of 34.4 Hz

precisely noted from the

2020 balloon bursts in Souama 34.5 Hz with only 0.1

Hz

difference the temperature influences the

measurements and as we are not not

sure about that of sudama at the time of

our recordings we will therefore only

retain the first three vapiaka

gopika and

karanchopar taking into account the rarity of the

number of resonance frequencies

below 50 Hz for each of the

rooms and their large difference in

size and shape it is remarkable to

find this same natural frequency

common to three of them this

strongly suggests an

intentionality on the part of the

builders if this is the case this

adds yet another level of complexity

to their ability to calculate volumes

because that would mean that they would

therefore have been able to anticipate the

frequencies produced by the

geometries sound has always occupied a

central place in the

founding myths and sacred stories of the

multiple spiritual traditions of the

world one of the acousticians

pointed out that the effect of using

reverberant rooms on meditation

and spiritual fields is

well known but if the effect is known the

Barabar and Nagarjuni rooms

seem very much alone titanic construction sites

totally misunderstood by

generations following which relegated them

to simple shelters against the

rain while it nevertheless testifies

to a long process of research unless you

believe in miracles these rooms

cannot spring from nowhere and be

unique in the world there must be

others elsewhere

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if frequencies do play a role

in these rooms it remains more

to be felt rather than heard

could it be the implementation

of natural effects by the combination of

geometry and frequency in relation

to the body and perhaps

consciousness music can relax,

bring joy, provoke emotions or

put in step but sound waves

can also heal by impacting

specific places as

modern medical research explores through the

destruction of

tumors in the fields can also

induce altered states of consciousness

i.e. a different perception

of reality than our ancestors all

over the planet seemed to

know well if it is possible to induce

altered states of consciousness to the sound

of a drum in a forest what

could be the impact of these

complex geometries on this phenomenon

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why did our distant ancestors one day

build these

unequalled masterpieces why such

complex and

symmetrical geometric shapes why C holds loads

worthy of today's industry

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why such precision

visible only by our

modern technology how did -they were able to realize his

rooms with this exceptional

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mastery where do they come from what are

they used for what was their

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science after these years of exploration

and reflection it seems obvious to us

that this colossal work had a

precise and important goal so important that it

pushed its builders to accomplish

the impossible to overcome time to

realize its rooms so foreign by

their con

that futuristic by their

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aspect too simple in appearance too

complex in reality they embody

according to us the expression of a thought

of a science different from ours by

the apparent simplicity of its

genius a thought which could be that

of the humanity of

tomorrow an entire universe could

open up to exploration perhaps that

made thousands of years ago by the

builders of Barabar and Nagar

genunny this is perhaps in these

troubled times what these rooms tell us

who we were but also

who we are extraordinary

builders capable of the worst as well as the

best

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[Applause]

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