University of Bologne Engineer Redates the Great Pyramid?

Italian UFO enthusiast and University of Bologne engineer Alberto Donini has "always been passionate about ancient lost civilizations In 2021-25, was a speaker at the World Paleo-astronautics Symposium in RSM with various conferences on the mysteries of ancient civilizations." He has 15 non-peer-reviewed papers on Research Gate (mostly repeats of the same material) on these topics. In one of them he presents an innovative way of finding the answer to the question of the dating of thge Great Pyramid. He calls it the “Relative Erosion Method” ('Preliminary Report on the Absolute Dating of the Khufu Pyramid Using the Relative Erosion Method', January 2026). This Relative Erosion Method is based on determining the ratio between two types of erosion affecting the same type of rock in the same location: one with a known date and the other with a date to be determined, this ratio is then used to calculate the age of the stone block under examination.  

It is based on the fact that the basal layer (or a basal layer) of the pyramid construction does not 'fit' the foot of the pyramid's final casing. So, when the latter were placed on top they protected PART of the slab from erosion. When the casing stones were removed down to that basal layer (which we know happened under the Mameluke caliphs in the 1300s AD) the whole slab was exposed to sub-aerial erosion (but also locally to foot passage - page 6 of his report and his fig. 4, a vry clear example). So, he reasons, by measuring the differences in roughness of the more eroded edges and the less eroded "shadow" are - Donini reckons - all other factors being equal, we can calculate how much longer the edges were exposed to erosion than the areas originally covered with casing stones.

So Donini undertook fieldwork at the site to take measurements at twelve points around the Great Pyramid, another nine at the Pyramid of Khafre and a number at the site of three Queens' Pyramids in the Giza Eastern Cemetery. Here it should be noted that nowhere in the report is there mention of this fieldwork taking place under a permit issued by the Egyptian authorities or in collaboration with the archaeologists already having the concession for investigations of these monuments. This is a big no-no, and also potentially illegal. 

As a result of the measurements taken, Donini arrives at a view (p. 34) that:

"although the resulting date ranges are wide, the conclusions indicate a low probability for the official archaeological dating of 2,560 BC, which remains plausible only for the two Queens’ pyramids analysed (G1b of Meritites I and G1c of Henutsen).

For these reasons, it is likely that the pyramids of Akhet Khufu and Khafra (G1 and G2) date back to approximately 19,000–23,000 BC, whereas at least two of the Queens’ pyramids (G1b and G1c), located adjacent to the Pyramid of Khufu, were constructed much later, presumably between 2,500 and 5,000 years BC. It is therefore plausible that the pharaohs Cheops and Chefren merely renovated the two largest pyramids on the Giza plateau, attributing their authorship to themselves, and possibly built the Queens’ pyramids.

On the basis of this preliminary report on relative erosion measurements (REM) carried out on selected pyramids of the Giza plateau, it can be concluded that around 20,000 years before Christ there existed a civilisation in Egypt capable of constructing at least the two main pyramids (G1 and G2)."

and there the engineer's text ends.

The method is at the same time at first sight a very clever one, but at the same time it is based on a totally false premise, one of which the author himself seems already aware - but ignores the implications of (pp. 8-9). The first is assuming that all weathering of the 'shadow zone' (the bits of blocks exposed by removing the casing) POSTdates the removal of the overlying blocks, and secondly that the minute the casing stones were gone, the shadow zone was cleanly exposed to subaerial erosion and remained like that for over 700 years.

                                 Ancient Architects                         

The first cannot be assumed. The blocks would be quarried, brought to the site and may well have been stockpiled before a team was gathered to level the limestone outcrop on which the monument was later to stand and then to actually lay the foundation pavement. Once that had happened the first course could be laifd on top (but NOT where the later casing stones were going to stand0. in any case, it is possible that the construction began from making a central core and the peripheral blocks of each course may have been added in a later stage of the buildig process. In the meantime all sorts of activities could have been undertaken on the pavement around the edges of the construcytion activity. One cannot therefore assume that the casing stonnes were placed on a pristine fresh-from-the-quarry surface. It may already have undergone some erosion before sealed under the casing.

Secondly, Donini has not done his homework and determined the previous history of the parts of the monument he is interacting with. What other researchwers have done what to it before he got began his investigations? This is normal preliminary work in any archaeological project.

If Donini had done that, he would find that the current state of the site is the result of massive clearance of sand and rubble from around the pyramid base in the 19th and early 20th century. Photos of the site from the 19th century (Francis Frith for example) show the lower flanks covered by piles of debris. So neither the 'shadow zone' nor the outer edge zone of the pavement blocks were at that time NOT being eroded. If you think about it, the Mamelukes removing the blocks all up the side of the pyramid cannot have done so without debris falling down all along the side of the monument being worked upon, and there was no real reason to clean up the devastated site after the stone robbing was suspended. This immediately cancels one of the values in Domini's calculations, there was not a 700-year exposure of the 'shadow zone', it was much less. The edge zone erosion is largely that from the period from the construction to the slabs being covered up by debris. But since the time when there was erosion of the 'shadow zone' is unknow, the "rate of erosion" of the 'edge zone' cannot be put into years.