Is there a 1,000 foot white pyramid in China? in the 1940s, U.S. service members have reported seeing a 1,000 foot white pyramid in Xi’an, China. If true, it would be the tallest pyramid in the world.
The legend of the Great White Pyramid of China does not go back very far. In fact, the story appears to have originated less than a century ago.
White Pyramid Sightings
The legend of the Great White Pyramid of China does not go back very far. In fact, the story appears to have originated less than a century ago.
– James Gaussman
The first account is from a United States Army Air Corps pilot named James Gaussman, who reportedly saw a massive pure white pyramid with a large jewel for a cap in 1945.
He was flying from India to China when he spotted it to the southwest of Xi’an. Unfortunately, this story does not seem to go back to an original source. However, Gaussman’s information, whether it is true or not, is neither the only account nor the most fantastic.
– Maurice Sheahan
Just two years after the supposed Gaussman sighting, Colonel Maurice Sheahan told The New York Times that he saw a pyramid that was roughly 1,000 feet tall in a mountain valley southwest of Xi’an. The article ran on March 30, 1947.
Those measurements would make the pyramid more than twice the size of the Great Pyramid of Giza. It would be the largest such pyramid ever found. Many explorers have gone out in search of the Great White Pyramid, but none have discovered it.
Pyramids of Xi’an
Interestingly, there are over 400 pyramids located within 35 kilometers northwest of Xi’an. They are dissimilar in material to most other ancient pyramids. These pyramids are more like the burial mounds of northern Europe than the pyramids of Egypt. The monuments consist of soil, stones, and sticks. They are pyramidal, but the covering consists of grass, not carved stones and jewels. Furthermore, none of them is equal in size to the pyramid Sheahan reportedly saw.
Controversial Yonaguni Monument of Japan
Details Emerge on the New York Time Article
One clue to the location of the Great White Pyramid of Xi’an, China, is a photograph posted in The New York Times a few days after Sheahan’s statements ran. The pyramid in the picture was not pure white. It was not capped with a jewel and subsequently identified as the well-known Maoling Mausoleum of Emperor Wudi of the Han Dynasty (206 BC to AD 220).
That should have put the story of the Great White Pyramid of China to rest, but it did not. Sheahan later spoke about the article and stated some of the translations from Chinese measurements to U.S. standard were incorrect. He allegedly never said anything about the picture, which many think was not associated with him at all, but rather filler added by the magazine. It was not the first, nor would it be the last time a magazine would run a misleading photo if that were the case.
You may also like: Etruscan Pyramid of Bomarzo, Italy
The Legend Remains
The alleged Great White Pyramid allegedly sits in a mountain range that is very steep and rugged. It could potentially hide a pyramid, but many doubt it could conceal a pyramid of such grand size. Satellite images, planes, and searches for the pyramid have yet to turn up anything. Not even a valley that would fit such a structure has been identified.
