Ben van Kerkwyk

The role of a visual investigator

Van Kerkwyk works primarily through films, interviews, articles, and visits to sites. His material includes Egyptian monuments and Andean masonry, bringing viewers close to details that can disappear in a conventional panoramic photograph.[1]

This visual approach has an immediate strength. It redirects attention from a monument as a famous silhouette towards the physical decisions embodied in it. A corner, recess, drill trace, or unfinished area becomes a question about work. The audience is encouraged to imagine the sequence of actions required to produce it.

His role in the vessel investigations should be described accurately. On the vase-scan resource page, he calls himself essentially a reporter rather than the person performing the primary research. He identifies other participants and provides links to reports and files.[2] That distinction makes the work easier to assess: the presenter, owner, scanner, analyst, and interpreter may all be different people, each responsible for a different part of the evidential chain.

The possibility of two technological traditions

Van Kerkwyk describes a “tale of two industries”: differences among objects that he interprets as evidence of substantially different manufacturing capabilities. In his account, some work looks broadly compatible with familiar techniques, while other examples demand a different explanation.[3]

The proposal is more specific than saying everything ancient was impossibly advanced. It asks whether variation within the material record reflects different technical traditions, perhaps including an inherited capability that was later lost or incompletely understood.

Variation, however, has several possible causes. Objects can differ because of their date, intended use, material, cost, workshop, state of completion, or later alteration. A case for separate technological systems must distinguish among those explanations. The strongest version would identify a reproducible cluster of features and show that it belongs to a coherent historical setting. A contrast between selected impressive and ordinary examples is an opening observation, rather than a complete chronology of technology.

Why the stone vessels became central

Small vessels offer a different kind of evidence from gigantic walls. Their interiors and exteriors can potentially be measured together, creating questions about circularity, wall thickness, symmetry, and the relationship of handles to the body. A whole object can be studied rather than a few accessible surfaces on a building.

The UnchartedX resource page gathers structured-light reports, downloadable models, and additional analyses. This makes the subject more accessible to independent examination than an argument based entirely on a presenter's description.[2]

The crucial next step is to identify what is extraordinary about a particular vessel. Is it close to a circular form in one section, consistent across many sections, or related to a proposed ideal design in a more complex way? Those are different findings. A headline about precision needs to lead to an explicit measurement, because different geometric properties can otherwise be grouped together as though they were one remarkable number.

What the original report records

The publicly available metric report for one much-discussed vessel identifies Alex Dunn as report author and names Dunn, Nick Sierra, and Adam Young as operators. It presents measurements of features including the lip, mouth, body, handles, and base. The report uses millimetres and geometric reference features.[4]

This is useful material, but its interpretation requires the language of the report. A deviation associated with a fitted feature is not automatically the tolerance of every part of the object. Nor is an instrument's ability to record small differences the same thing as evidence that a maker intended a specific tiny tolerance.

A responsible presentation should explain what was measured, how the reference geometry was selected, and what uncertainties affect the result. It should also make clear that Alex Dunn's authorship of a report is distinct from Christopher Dunn's broader ancient-technology publications. Precise attribution prevents a network of collaborators from becoming an indistinct single authority.

Independent methods and the value of comparison

A supplementary report associated with Danville Metal Stamping describes physical inspection using a rotary table, dial indicators, and related measurement procedures. It also discusses comparison with a modern vessel.[5]

Such work can be valuable because a second method may reveal whether a digital result depends on the scanner or its processing. Agreement across genuinely different approaches strengthens confidence in the measured property. Disagreement can identify something important about registration, access, calibration, or the choice of reference.

However, repeating a measurement is different from independently establishing an object's antiquity. Several technicians can agree about the shape of the same recently encountered vessel while all depending on one undocumented account of where it came from. Independence needs to be specified: independent instruments, independent analysis, and independent historical evidence answer different questions. The collection should recognise what each comparison adds without assigning it a broader role than it has earned.

Geometry, design, and mathematical interpretation

Mark Qvist's analyses at unsigned.io explore possible geometrical relationships within the scanned vessel. They attempt to reconstruct a constrained design, using digital models and relationships among features. The later article makes clear that its illustrations include simulated appearance and that the analysis does not establish who made the object or when.[6]

This is a useful distinction. A modern mathematical model can describe an object's shape without reproducing the original maker's instructions. Many different procedures can produce related forms, and a familiar ratio may emerge during fitting even if it was never consciously specified in that form.

The strongest design argument would predict features beyond those used to create the model. It would also compare alternative models with similar flexibility. Probability claims require particular care: an intentionally made object should not be compared only with completely random shapes if the real alternative is skilled craft. The historical question concerns which kinds of design and production best explain the material.

Provenance and the difference between a type and an object

Ancient Egyptian stone vessels are a documented category. It does not follow that every vessel resembling that category has a secure ancient origin. An individual object needs its own record: excavation documentation where available, collection history, earlier photographs, repairs, transfers, and comparison with securely contextualised material.

This becomes especially important when the most striking measurements concern privately held objects. A modern scan may be excellent while the object's earlier history remains incomplete. The two assessments should be recorded separately rather than averaged into one general impression of reliability.

The same distinction applies in reverse. Uncertainty about one private vessel does not make every museum vessel ordinary, and an authentic museum example does not authenticate every similar private object. A productive research programme identifies objects individually and publishes the basis for their attribution. That approach makes it possible for a genuinely unusual ancient object to stand out without borrowing certainty from a broad category.

The museum investigations

The Artifact Research Foundation describes a 2024 study of approximately thirty objects at the Petrie Museum. Its public account identifies the scanning methods and discusses selection, materials, collection information, and analyses of circularity and concentricity.[7]

Moving into museum collections is an important development because it can connect measurement with stronger historical records. The quality of that connection still varies by object. An excavated vessel and an object bought locally by an early collector may have different levels of contextual information even when both now belong to a museum.

The published results also need to distinguish instruments and measurements from institutional conclusions. Permission to examine a collection is not the same thing as the museum endorsing every interpretation arising from the work. The most informative outcome would be a shared object-by-object record, linking measurements to accession information and original excavation documentation where it survives. This would let archaeological and engineering questions genuinely meet.

A peer-reviewed comparison changes the discussion

In December 2025, Max Fomitchev-Zamilov published a metrological study in npj Heritage Science. It compares nineteen Predynastic museum vessels with twenty-five modern machine-made and twenty-four contemporary handmade examples, using metrics based on circularity and concentricity. The paper proposes a classification method relevant to assessing unprovenanced objects and possible forgeries.[8]

Its importance is that it supplies an explicit comparative method rather than a general assurance that handwork could explain everything. The categories, measurements, and statistical reasoning can be examined and challenged.

Peer review does not turn a chosen metric into a complete description of manufacture or a direct dating technique. A useful evaluation asks how representative the samples are, whether different materials affect the comparison, and whether the selected properties capture the features under dispute. The study raises the standard of discussion by offering a specific model. Its conclusions should be assessed through that model, rather than treated as either unquestionable authority or irrelevant institutional opinion.

Van Kerkwyk's response and the replica question

Fomitchev-Zamilov's later public writing describes commissioned modern replicas and argues that highly precise private vessels are modern. Van Kerkwyk's May 2026 response disputes the broader conclusion and rejects the attribution to him of the claim that the vessels could not be manufactured today.[9]

This distinction deserves clear presentation. Demonstrating that modern machinery can make a comparable object answers a modern manufacturing question. It does not, by itself, date a different object. Conversely, arguing that one replica fails to reproduce every feature does not establish that the original is ancient.

The disagreement also concerns how precision is defined. A test centred on circularity may leave other proposed relationships unexamined. Advocates of those additional relationships need to specify them beforehand and show why they matter technologically. The best outcome would be a common test with agreed target properties, documented manufacturing stages, and measurements applied consistently to originals and replicas. Then the argument could advance through results rather than changing definitions.

From a small object to a lost civilisation

The largest step in the UnchartedX perspective is the move from challenging artefacts to a missing chapter of technological history. A securely ancient object with unexpected properties would indeed require explanation. It would not automatically identify a global civilisation, the date of its destruction, or the origin of every other remarkable monument.

Those larger claims need additional evidence of production and social organisation: workshops, tools, unfinished pieces, transport, materials, waste, and patterns of distribution. A capable society leaves more than its most impressive finished products. Investigating that wider record is how a technological anomaly could become a historical reconstruction.

The same restraint applies to extraterrestrial explanations. An unresolved manufacturing question does not identify an alien maker. The available material can motivate research into human technical history without first deciding whether its missing elements were industrial, ritual, or something more unfamiliar. Uncertainty is most useful when it points towards specific work that could reduce it.

How to follow the work productively

UnchartedX's great strength is its ability to make people look. The next step for a university reader is to follow the links beyond the film: identify the object, open the report, examine the metric, and compare the interpretation with alternatives. Experimental studies of Egyptian stone manufacture offer one relevant line of comparison.[10]

This does not require everyone to become a machinist or archaeologist. It requires the presentation to keep the steps legible. Observation, measurement, manufacturing inference, historical attribution, and a broad civilisation hypothesis should each have a visible basis.

Van Kerkwyk's perspective is therefore most valuable as a sustained challenge to explain the material in detail. The outcome may differ from object to object. Some apparent puzzles may yield to known craft processes; others may reveal knowledge that needs fuller reconstruction. A collection that leaves both possibilities open can preserve the wonder of ancient achievement while giving readers the means to judge the arguments themselves.

The most encouraging feature of this discussion is that some of its questions are answerable through shared work. Better collection records, comparable scans, and documented replication can change what is known. Readers do not have to decide the whole history of civilisation before contributing to the examination of one object. That smaller scale can be the route to a larger discovery.

Research notes and sources

Based on public UnchartedX articles and resource pages, measurement reports, published analyses, a peer-reviewed comparison, and public responses. Complete video archives and paid scripts were not accessed. Scans were not independently reprocessed and objects were not physically examined for this essay. Source descriptions distinguish direct measurements, interpretations, and publication records. Sources accessed 29 October 2026.

[1] UnchartedX, current project overview and video subjects: https://unchartedx.com/site/

[2] UnchartedX, “Vase Scan Resources,” including van Kerkwyk's statement of his reporting role: https://unchartedx.com/site/vase-scan-resources/

[3] Ben van Kerkwyk, “Ancient Precision Vases are Fakes Again?” (2026), including his explanation of the “two industries” hypothesis: https://unchartedx.com/site/2026/05/20/precise-vases-are-fakes-again/

[4] Alex Dunn, metric vase report (2023), operators identified as Alex Dunn, Nick Sierra, and Adam Young: https://unchartedx.com/site/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/VASE-REPORT-METRIC.pdf

[5] Danville supplementary inspection report (2023), published through UnchartedX: https://unchartedx.com/site/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Danville-Summary-Results-2023-10-01.pdf

[6] Mark Qvist, initial geometric analysis: https://unsigned.io/log/2023_02_24_Initial_Geometric_Analysis_of_the_Pre_Dynastic_Vase.html ; subsequent analysis and modelling account, “Abstractions Set In Granite”: https://unsigned.io/granite-artifact/

[7] Artifact Research Foundation, public account of Petrie Museum work: https://www.artifactfoundation.org/petrie-museum-artifacts . This is the research group's report, not a museum endorsement of its conclusions.

[8] Max Fomitchev-Zamilov, “A metrological method for manufacturing quality assessment and classification of ancient Egyptian stone vessels,” npj Heritage Science 13, 659 (2025): https://doi.org/10.1038/s40494-025-02196-7 . Publication and abstract verified through the journal search record; direct journal opening encountered an access error. The paper is not represented as independently replicated here.

[9] Fomitchev-Zamilov, “The ‘Impossible’ Granite Vase Replicas Revealed” (2026): https://maximus.energy/index.php/2026/04/22/the-impossible-granite-vase-replicas-revealed/ ; van Kerkwyk's reply is source 3. The authors' characterisations of each other's positions are treated as disputed claims.

[10] Denys A. Stocks, “Testing ancient Egyptian granite-working methods in Aswan, Upper Egypt,” Antiquity 75 (2001), 89–94: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003598X00052777 ; “Stone sarcophagus manufacture in ancient Egypt,” Antiquity 73 (1999), 918–922: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003598X00065704 . Accessible abstracts and publication records consulted.