The title of the world's oldest pyramid is more contested than ever. While the Guinness World Records recognizes the Step Pyramid of Djoser in Egypt, a recent study proposes that a layer at the Gunung Padang site in Indonesia dates back tens of thousands of years, reigniting a heated academic debate.
The research, led by Danny Hilman Natawidjaja and published in the journal Archaeological Prospecting , describes a shaped andesite lava core and several overlapping construction phases . Its authors suggest that the oldest element began as a natural volcanic hill that was subsequently transformed using carving and block-laying techniques.
What is recognized and what the new study brings to the table
For official institutions, the starting point remains the Step Pyramid of Djoser in the Saqqara necropolis . This structure, attributed to the architect Imhotep and dated to around 2630 BC , is considered the oldest formally recognized pyramid, a milestone that the Guinness World Records still supports today.
The research on Gunung Padang , however, suggests that beneath the visible terraces lie buried layers of great antiquity. According to the team, the andesitic core was sculpted and stabilized, and geochronological dating of sediments points to thousands of years before agriculture ; some soil samples reach ages of up to 27.000 years , and the authors place the earliest human intervention at tens of thousands of years ago.
Techniques, chronology and archaeological parallels
The proposal highlights the presence of sophisticated techniques that, if confirmed, would date back to the last glacial period . This would challenge the conventional narrative that monumental construction originated with the agrarian Neolithic, as it would place advanced practices before the 11.000 years associated with agricultural expansion.
The authors link this hypothesis to other highly complex sites, such as Göbekli Tepe (Turkey), to illustrate that certain societies were able to possess remarkable technical knowledge long before textbooks indicated. Within this framework, Gunung Padang would be an extreme case, where a volcanic hill was shaped into a stepped architecture.
Objections from the academic community and ongoing review
The criticism was swift. Archaeologist Flint Dibble , from Cardiff University, told Nature that he sees no clear evidence that the buried layers were built by humans . According to his explanation, certain orientation patterns can appear when material rolls down a slope, without any human intervention.
Similarly, Bill Farley of Southern Connecticut State University acknowledges that the oldest soil dates are consistent in the laboratory, but underlines the absence of markers of human activity (such as charcoal, bone fragments, or other remains) in the dated strata.
In response to the controversy, the co-publisher of Archaeological Prospecting has confirmed that an editorial investigation into the article has been launched . This step does not invalidate the work, but it does entail a further review of the methods, data, and conclusions presented by the team.
Openness to scrutiny and what it would mean for prehistory
For his part, Natawidjaja has emphasized that the project is open to international scrutiny: the team says it is willing to host researchers from any country to study Gunung Padang on-site. The invitation aims to broaden access to samples, field records, and analytical procedures.
If future studies confirm ancient human intervention, the discovery would necessitate a re-establishment of the chronology of monumental architecture and a rethinking of the relationship between construction complexity and sedentarization . If, on the other hand, the features are shown to be the result of natural processes and later modifications, the record would remain with Djoser , and the discussion would have served to refine criteria for evidence and dating.
The controversy is not over: between an official record that currently supports Djoser and an ambitious hypothesis about Gunung Padang, the key will be to accumulate solid, replicable, and peer-reviewed material evidence that allows us to establish, without ambiguity, which structure can properly bear the title of the oldest pyramid in the world.
