Are there documented archaeological findings of towers beneath Egyptian pyramids?
Executive summary
There are no widely accepted, peer-reviewed archaeological findings that document “towers” beneath the Egyptian pyramids; sensational claims of vast cylindrical shafts and an underground “city” have been published by a small team using radar-based methods but remain unverified and strongly disputed by mainstream Egyptologists and independent fact-checkers [1] [2] [3] [4]. At the same time, legitimate geophysical surveys have identified smaller subsurface anomalies and shafts in the Giza area, which warrant further study but are not evidence of the dramatic subterranean towers portrayed in popular reports [5] [6].
1. The flashy claim: radar reveals deep cylindrical “pillars” under Khafre
A group led by Corrado Malanga and Filippo Biondi released results they say show multiple deep, vertical, cylinder-shaped shafts and linked chambers beneath the Khafre pyramid—descriptions that press coverage summarized as a vast underground city stretching for hundreds to thousands of metres below Giza [1] [7] [2].
2. Immediate scholarly pushback: experts call the megastructure implausible
Prominent Egyptologists and geophysicists have rejected the megastructure interpretation, with figures such as Zahi Hawass dismissing the claims as baseless and noting no missions or credible evidence support columns beneath Khafre, while independent specialists warn that the radar techniques used cannot image reliably to the claimed depths without coring or peer review [1] [3] [2] [4].
3. What has actually been documented beneath Giza: anomalies and historic shafts
Separately, legitimate archaeological prospection around the Giza plateau has documented subsurface anomalies and engineered shafts: recent ground‑penetrating radar and resistivity surveys have revealed an “anomaly” and possible chambers near the royal cemetery and rediscovered engineered shafts hundreds of feet deep that may relate to mastabas or ritual architecture—findings that are cautious, localized, and published by mainstream teams, not synonymous with the sensational “underground city” narrative [5] [6].
4. Media, fringe amplification, and the gap between data and interpretation
The controversy reflects a recurrent dynamic: preliminary or proprietary radar data are amplified into grand narratives by online channels and fringe sites, while specialists emphasize method limits, lack of independent peer review, and the necessity of targeted excavations or coring to validate subsurface tomography—fact‑check organizations and mainstream outlets have therefore flagged the more dramatic claims as unproven or misleading [7] [8] [4] [3].
5. How to read the record: provisional anomalies, not documented towers
The defensible conclusion from the public record is that there are documented subsurface anomalies and some engineered shafts around Giza that archaeologists have investigated and described with caution [5] [6], but there is no accepted archaeological documentation of colossal “towers” or a confirmed subterranean city beneath the major pyramids; the sweeping radar-based assertions remain unverified, contested, and lacking the peer-reviewed publications and on‑site corroboration necessary to reframe ancient Egyptian built history [2] [9] [4].