Many ancient writers supported Herodotus’ record of underground passages connecting major pyramids, and their evidence casts doubt on the reliability of traditionally presented Egyptian history. Crantor (300 BC) stated that there were certain underground pillars in Egypt that contained a written stone record of pre-history, and they lined accessways connecting the pyramids. In his celebrated study, On the Mysteries, particularly those of the Egyptians, Chaldeans and the Assyrians; Iamblichus, a fourth-century Syrian representative of the Alexandrian School of mystical and philosophical studies, recorded this information about an entranceway through the body of the Sphinx into the Great Pyramid:2….
“This entrance, obstructed in our day by sands and rubbish, may still be traced between the forelegs of the crouched colossus. It was formerly closed by a bronze gate whose secret spring could be operated only by the Magi. It was guarded by public respect, and a sort of religious fear maintained its inviolability better than armed protection would have done. In the belly of the Sphinx were cut out galleries leading to the subterranean part of the Great Pyramid. These galleries were so artfully crisscrossed along their course to the Pyramid that, in setting forth into the passage without a guide throughout this network, one ceasingly and inevitably returned to the starting point.”
Local 19th-century Arab lore maintained that existing under the Sphinx are secret chambers holding treasures or magical objects. That belief was bolstered by the writings of the first-century Roman historian Pliny, who wrote that deep below the Sphinx is concealed the “tomb of a ruler named Harmakhis” that contains great treasure”, and, strangely enough, the Sphinx itself was once called “The Great Sphinx Harmakhis” who mounted guard since the time of the Followers of Horus”. The 4th-century Roman historian Ammianus Marcellinus made additional disclosures about the existence of subterranean vaults that appeared to lead to the interior of the Great Pyramid.