Surely "slaves built the pyramids" implies that at least the majority of people involved were slaves. The article inverses that simplified statement, implying the same caveat: at least the majority of people involved weren't slaves (though some might have been).
If slaves were present in the society, it's absurd to interpret a blanket statement like "not slaves (built the pyramids)" to imply no slaves were involved, especially when it's a direct response to the blanket statements "the pyramids were built by slaves" (which noone would take to mean that no non-slaves were present anywhere near the construction site -- it's a given that someone would need to oversee the slaves somehow).
But we're literally arguing over semantics. Unless you assume that all generalisations are always intended to be understood 100% literally and that archeologists would want to express 100% confidence in knowing exactly what group in society each person involved in a construction project thousands of years ago belonged to, there really isn't anything worth arguing over.
General ignorance has it that the pyramids were built almost entirely by slaves. This article claims that is not the case. Everything else is just fluff to make for a better read.
>Surely "slaves built the pyramids" implies that at least the majority of people involved were slaves.
If I heard "structural engineers built the suspension bridge" I'd simply assume they were involved, not that they were physically responsible for over 50 percent of all tasks.
If slaves were present in the society, it's absurd to interpret a blanket statement like "not slaves (built the pyramids)" to imply no slaves were involved, especially when it's a direct response to the blanket statements "the pyramids were built by slaves" (which noone would take to mean that no non-slaves were present anywhere near the construction site -- it's a given that someone would need to oversee the slaves somehow).
But we're literally arguing over semantics. Unless you assume that all generalisations are always intended to be understood 100% literally and that archeologists would want to express 100% confidence in knowing exactly what group in society each person involved in a construction project thousands of years ago belonged to, there really isn't anything worth arguing over.
General ignorance has it that the pyramids were built almost entirely by slaves. This article claims that is not the case. Everything else is just fluff to make for a better read.