Stone Egyptian Vases

Quoted text begins. Greetings
I ran into a lady who picked up a vase in Egypt years
ago and what it is carved out of what looks like an off
white marble, not clay. Any ideas on how they did that.
End of quote.

I really am lacking in the ancient carving dept. There are some
controversial theories and the like. Material hardness didn't deter their
efforts. Whatever they did, it was extremely advanced. They, the Egyptians,
carved some very fine diorite vases, elegant thin wall and very large 4-5
feet tall. I myself saw an artifact from Abydos that looks like a fan blade,
2-foot diameter, very thinly carved out of diorite. It seems impossible in
practical carving methods and probably is. (Diorite is like 8 on the mohs
scale of hardness)

A guy named Chris Dunn, who has researched quarry sites at Aswan and
concluded, they must have used ultrasonic techniques, noting very unusual
coring scars, circular in shape running in tracks along solid red aswan
granite. Wishful thinking on his part perhaps, or there may be some more
fitting explaination. Wooden mallets and copper chisels won't keep a granite
obelisk on a reasonable delivery schedule to my knowledge. Whatever
proficiency they had developed had to be applicable to both large and small
scale carving/quarrying.

Marc