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This image seems to be doing the rounds on Facebook at the moment, purporting to be an ancient pyramid either in Indonesia or the Kola peninsula in Russia. Is there any evidence that it is an artificial pyramid?

enter image description here

The article linked to the Facebook post also uses the same image, but describes a site in Indonesia.

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    I did a very quick search on Google Scholar for "Kola peninsula pyramids" and obtained no result. – Taladris Nov 01 '21 at 06:41
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    The landscape/climate looks much more like Kola than Indonesia (note the snowcover on the rear mountain). – gerrit Nov 01 '21 at 09:28
  • @gerrit indeed, I feel cold just looking at it! ;o) –  Nov 01 '21 at 09:33
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    Facebook has deleted my comments on the article pointing out the misrepresentation of what the geologist actually found. :rolleyes: –  Nov 01 '21 at 14:32
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    I would have said "no" from these picture alone. I can see they are naturally produced without looking around. – Joshua Nov 01 '21 at 20:33
  • @Joshua, yes, and indeed I did. –  Nov 01 '21 at 21:52
  • Yet another reason to just say no to Facebook. I'd call them Fakebook, but there is a nice series of Jazz charts under that title. – boatcoder Nov 03 '21 at 05:58

1 Answers1

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I mainly posed this question to provide somewhere to park the results of a brief investigation in case it is useful to someone else.

TL;DR No, none whatsoever.

Firstly, the mountains are not in Indonesia, nor in the Kola Peninsular, but they are two mountains called Hafjall (background) and Halgafelli (foreground), viewed looking South-East(ish) from a mountain called Klakkur (I think), near a town called Klaksvík in the Faroe Islands (in the North Atlantic north west of the UK). This image is from the website of photographer Peter Lam.

enter image description here

I don't think there can be any doubt this is the same mountain as the road at the base of the mountain on the left is clearly there on both images.

Thanks to @LangLangC for the suggestion, here is the view from instantstreetview.com:

enter image description here

The first claim I can find about this being a pyramid actually does say it is on the Faroe Islands, and it is from 2014. That article identifies the mountain as being Kirvi, but I don't think that is correct.

Update: I found a good map, the small road that goes up to the base of Halgafelli is clearly marked. Here is a link to the more recent map found by @gerrit (see comments below).

enter image description here

The shape of the mountain seems likely to be due to the cirque erosion caused by glaciers (The Faroes are obviously glacially shaped), giving rise to a pyramidal peak.

The cited article discusses the work of Dr. Danny Natawidjaja,

"In 2010, geologist Dr. Danny Natawidjaja, who earned a doctorate at Cal Tech, recognized the mountains as possible artificial pyramids and began to explore using seismic tomography, resistivity survey, and other remote sensing techniques, as well as some direct excavations and deep core drilling.".

However, his research clearly states it is a volcanic intrusion, the top of which has been artificially worked, so he clearly would not say there was any possibility of it being an artificial pyramid.

Note the indonesian site isn't even particularly pyramidal. So not only did they misrepresent Natawidjaja, they also misrepresented the actual archaeological site by using an image that suggested that it looked like a pyramid

enter image description here

H/T: Facebook user Oli Skardenni, who apparently lives in the village at the base of the mountain (lucky chap!) and provided the link to Peter Lam's website. Once you know the name of the mountain it isn't difficult to find additional corroborating images.

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    Klakkur is on Streetview. Looked from different angles, and from above, one gets to appreciate the original photo in claim as rather 'nice'… – LangLаngС Oct 31 '21 at 13:11
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    I think I may have got the name of the mountain wrong and added an update, but it looks like a peak on a ridge, so it was definitely taken from a rather well chosen vantage point! –  Oct 31 '21 at 13:16
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    Actually, that place is advertising ["pyramid shaped mountains"](https://issuu.com/visitfaroeislands/docs/vfi_hiking_uk_hq.compressed) for interested hikers. And has more of em: Háfjall, Hálgafelli, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lopra – LangLаngС Oct 31 '21 at 17:17
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    The source of the map is hard to read. Could you transcribe that into the answer text? – gerrit Nov 01 '21 at 09:31
  • I've added a link to the original source (which I hadn't made a note of, but fortunately TinEye reverse image search was able to find it). –  Nov 01 '21 at 09:39
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    @DikranMarsupial Hmm, yes. I tried the URL embedded in the image, but that one is sadly a broken link (I was hoping for an online interactive map where I could pan and zoom). – gerrit Nov 01 '21 at 09:46
  • @gerrit, an interactive map with that level of geographical detail would be an excellent resource! –  Nov 01 '21 at 09:51
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    @DikranMarsupial https://kort.foroyakort.fo/kort/?extent=214301.0019%2C897902.5464%2C230557.0344%2C906140.6296%2C5316 is the closest I can find; click on the symbol with the four squares (Bakgrundskort) in the top bar, then on "Topografiskt kort". I agree that the photographer is standing on Klakkur (summit or somewhere on the slope). – gerrit Nov 01 '21 at 10:00
  • I think it is a bit downslope, I wandered around a bit on instantstreetview to match up the images as best I could - not quite as good as wandering around there in person! –  Nov 01 '21 at 10:16
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    @LangLаngС I'd heard theories that the man-made pyramids in both Egypt and Mesoamerica were likely inspired by naturally pyramid-shaped mountains in the areas. It's apparently not that uncommon. – Darrel Hoffman Nov 01 '21 at 13:53
  • @DarrelHoffman where are these pyramid-shaped mountains near the Giza pyramids in Egypt? It seems unlikely there were many glaciers there to form them – Henry Nov 02 '21 at 14:43
  • @Henry https://www.jstor.org/stable/26664988?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents ? –  Nov 02 '21 at 15:00
  • @Henry Dikran just posted a link to a book about the ones in Egypt. Evidently glaciers are not the only way such mountains can form, as that would also not explain the Mesoamerican ones - I've seen some of those myself near Teotihuacan in central Mexico. Some are probably volcanic. Not sure about Egypt as I'd never heard of volcanoes in that region, but they can definitely be seen around the Valley of the Kings. – Darrel Hoffman Nov 02 '21 at 15:08
  • It shows that debunking facebook BS can end up teaching me something I didn't know (even though I've seen *every* episode of the documentary series Stargate SG1 ;o) –  Nov 02 '21 at 15:11