The Natural Sun
Announcements about our sun and its natural conditions
- Chapter 46 -
Iron production and use; building technology and private dwellings upon the sixth equatorial pair.
The building and metal industries are mainly understood by the work these people do.
2
The solar mountains in this belt contain a type of metal resembling an alloy of gold and iron. This metal firstly is quite common and is therefore secondly not hard to find and thirdly, it is malleable and yet resiliently hard and hence suitable for all sorts of hammering and cutting tools.
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But these equatorial inhabitants are most proficient in its production having great ironworks for tool production. A number of people specialise exclusively in this industry. They indeed charge nothing for this work, but those wanting it must supply the equivalent weight in fruit and food.
4
That these tools are not of negligible weight will be understood, especially the hammer axes for these seldom weigh less than between fifty and a hundred hundredweight. With this tool, these inhabitants can indeed erect those gigantic buildings.
5
Private dwellings are rare, meaning that they are not tightly ranged against one another as you might assume, but are as far apart as your towns. But wherever there is one, it represents more than the biggest city upon your planet, accommodating a population proportional to its size. Thus, not infrequently, dwellings house from five to ten million people.
6
From this you will see what a colossal thing such a dwelling is. To describe this dwelling in writing would take you at least ten years, without counting details. But I shall nevertheless give you a brief outline.
7
Such a house normally has seven storeys, but occasionally ten. How are these storeys arranged? Think of a square with each side seventy miles (GM) long. Within this square i.e. bordering the outline, the first storey rises to a height of sixty metres, by your measure. The width of each room is one hundred metres.
8
This storey or great outer border of the building, like the rest of them has no pointed roof, being completely flat and fitted at the outer and inner edges with solid and stylish railings. The walls are continuous, and at regular intervals of ten metres are fitted with big windows similar to those in your houses of prayer - the so-called Gothic style; each room has from seven to ten such windows.
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Inside the room the ceiling is carried throughout the length of the building by sturdy pillars. The windows themselves like yours are closed off with a type of glass, which however is not as hard and brittle as yours but rather plastic and pliable, being produced from the juice of a root plant which is planted everywhere in great profusion - approximately the way you would make glue from animal cast-offs. The glass is inwardly of a green colour i.e. by nature, but people sometimes mix other colours into the juice: these windows are also cut from multi-coloured glass.
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The rooms are quite plain but certainly not without taste. Thus, there is also diverse but simple decoration of walls and ceilings. The floors usually are made of multicoloured, square stone tiles, finely cut and polished. The people place much store by the shine of room objects.
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There are large, circular benches around the pillars in the middle, as well as straight benches along the walls, softly cushioned with foliage fillings, decorously covered.
12
To get an idea of the number of rooms, with their sizes related to the number of windows and their distances from each other in such a peripheral building, you divide the number into the length of seventy miles GM(= approx. 500km), there being an entrance and exit for every room from the outer and inner side. The rooms are, in turn connected by doors, so that one can actually walk around the entire storey through the rooms. Furthermore, a decorous and easy staircase along the lateral wall fitted with railings, leads to the storey's flat roof. Each room is occupied by a family unit.
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Therewith we have the first storey. Then think of a free space or rather a road, one hundred metres wide. There the second storey building begins. This building has two storeys in actuality, the first running parallel with the first outer, big edge building, the second storey resting upon the first (outline) building. The roof is also flat and suitable for strolling on and is fitted with sturdy, stylish railings.
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Think of a road running in a straight line for some five hundred kilometres and the grandeur of this private dwelling shall start to sink in!
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Let us go through this second building! It too has a width of one hundred metres like the first. After that there is another one hundred metre-wide road.
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Here the third storey building rises from ground level, each storey the height of the first outer building, the latter as said, rising to a height of sixty metres. Wherefore, with this third storey, we reach a total height of a hundred and eighty metres. Here of course we find something new only in the third storey, which easily overlooks the second storey.
17
Going through this building we again come to a road one hundred metres wide, where we see the fourth storey (building), which completely resembles the other buildings in everything, except for bulkier walls than the previous buildings. Here too the roof is fitted with sturdy and decorous landings and one can again overlook the other three storeys.
18
Let us go through this building again and notice another one hundred metre-wide road and a five storey building which has of course shorter sides than the outer building, yet the shorter distance does not amount to one (GM) mile and you would still need to walk several days to cover just one side of this building which is the fifth storey. It hardly needs mentioning that this fifth building also resembles the others except for the walls, which are sturdier.
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Let us go through this building and another one hundred metre-wide road emerges and we are able to see the front of the sixth storey building. This building too is indistinguishable from the others except for the still stronger and lower walls and the colour for the storeys begin to change from the sixth storey and that in accordance with the colours of the rainbow which of course is a most splendid thing to see. The roof area is enclosed by a pyramid railing, each pyramid topped by a big golden ball. This distinguishes the sixth building from the others, whilst the rooms once again are of similar layout.
20
And so we walk through this sixth building again. Here we suddenly come to a two kilometre-wide road, which is ground and polished throughout like your mirrors. And finally, the seventh building is seen to raise its grand pillars. It is distinguished not only by colour but also by the supporting interior and exterior pillars. For the walls begin to rise inside these mighty pillar galleries. It speaks for itself that the lower storey pillars are sturdier than the upper ones, as they carry heavier burdens. Each row of pillars is of a different colour, again in the order of a rainbow. This roof also is flat and an obelisk stands above each pillar, which again is topped by a golden ball. The roof obelisks are connected with decorous railings, giving an appearance of splendour. This second building, on account of its pillar galleries that are each forty metres wide, is therefore much wider than the others, with an overall width of two hundred metres.
21
These numerous dwellings end here, whilst the immensely roomy inside is a place of common scenic beauty and an ornamental garden, well stocked with thousands of landscape type, smaller structures, as well as many avenues of fruit trees. Nor are all kinds of aquatic art works, of which these equatorial inhabitants are great masters, missing, because these diverse aquatic ducts are also part of their building technique.
22
Some private dwellings are similar to the foregoing and have seven storeys, or sometimes three more thus having an eighth, ninth and tenth storey building, which again has a one hundred metre wide road between each storey. Since these extra buildings resemble the seventh storey building, the road between each of them is two hundred metres wide. Thus the inner area is somewhat reduced in size, yet still large enough to take you several days to walk around it.
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Behold, these are the private dwellings of the equatorial inhabitants. Your imagination would be too restricted to even approximately conceptualise the splendid sight of these private dwellings.
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You must not regard these dwellings as the limit of the architectural techniques of these people. Only when we examine their roads, bridges and temples shall you form a concept of their building technology with astonishment. But their highways and bridges shall always be of the greatest grandeur, because you have not dreamt of anything like it and you can take it from Me that the presentation of their road and bridge technology leaves even your most colourful fantasy far behind.
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As this presentation will be a rather drawn out one for your comprehension, we shall leave it until next time.