But erecting the final resting place of a god-king involved more than structural and aesthetic considerations.  Hemienu was creating sacred ground, and within Khufu’s holy mountain there were specific paths to be trodden and a celestial order of operations to be observed. 

Beginning with the physical evidence from the pyramid, Jean-Pierre Houdin pieces these ancient traditions together in a way that suggests where to look and what to look for in unlocking the secrets of the Great Pyramid.  This is the third in a series of articles and interviews conducted by Marc Chartier with Jean-Pierre and other key members of Team Khufu, provided in English exclusively to Em Hotep.

In his studies of the Great Pyramid, presented in Khufu Reborn (read the exclusive interview given by the author to Pyramidales), Jean-Pierre Houdin has identified a “Noble Circuit”, namely the ritual route inside the monument followed during the Pharaoh’s funeral. One stage of this circuit did not pass unnoticed, and for good reason: two antechambers with corbelled vaults, a few meters before the entrance to the King’s Chamber, designed to shelter the sovereign’s goods and personal possessions.

Here Jean-Pierre Houdin contributes a few remarks in addition to the interview mentioned above, for readers of Pyramidales.

In the summer of 2003, when Jean-Pierre Houdin had already invested several thousand hours in 3D computer modeling, he made an observation that led him to suspect the existence of two antechambers in the pyramid of Khufu. A “dark zone” in the middle of the known internal structures kept coming up in his research. He could already distinguish this zone by analysis of micro-gravimetric readings that were in his possession but, oddly, had been overlooked. Now comparative observations of pyramids from the Third and Fourth Dynasties provided an answer to this dark zone.

The architect did not in fact consider the pyramid of Khufu as an isolated monument, even if it was the most famous in ancient Egypt. He placed it in a lineage, in an architectural scheme in which, from the stepped pyramid of Djoser to the smooth pyramids, each pyramid designer built on the innovations used in previous ones, while further developing the architectural concept. This is what Jean-Pierre Houdin sums up with the term “inheritance”. And Khufu did not escape the rule.

Two Observations

Two observations in particular captured the architect’s attention.

Firstly, the strange misalignment of the corridors and the Grand Gallery in the pyramid of Khufu, relative to the north-south axis. Such an offset could not be the result of chance. Nor could it be a “mistake” made by the Egyptian architects: they knew their job perfectly, based on solid tradition. So this could not possibly be an error, but a project, a plan, even if it is not necessarily easy to grasp at first glance, especially when we are bogged down in what Jean-Pierre Houdin calls “consensus thinking”.

After years spent 3D-modeling numerous potential solutions, illumination – the second observation, the real turning point of Khufu Reborn – was finally provided by another pyramid: the Red Pyramid, the last construction of Snefru, Khufu’s father. So, what was observed? This pyramid, built just before that of Khufu, encloses two magnificent antechambers with corbelled roofs, in front of the entrance to the funeral chamber. They are level with the base of the pyramid, although the chamber is nearly 8 m higher. This was a change in pyramid architecture: the funeral apartments had gained in height.

“Why, all of a sudden,” Jean-Pierre Houdin wondered, “did Khufu’s architects abandon this type of antechamber? They already had a lot to tackle, with the new roofing technique (flat ceiling) for the King’s Chamber, and they were not going to change everything from one pyramid to the next. They had a duty to respect their tradition, thus to ‘develop’ but not ‘revolutionize’ ”.

The two antechambers and the funerary chamber of the Red Pyramid

The two antechambers and the funerary chamber of Khufu’s Pyramid: a perfect copy and paste

Jean-Pierre continued his reasoning thus: “An experiment was called for: one of taking the antechambers from the Red Pyramid of Khufu’s father and quite simply ‘pasting’ them into his son’s pyramid, on a ‘design grid’ made up of one-cubit-sided squares. (1 cubit = 52.36 cm.) The funereal apartments of the Red Pyramid then appeared perfectly positioned in the pyramid of Khufu.”

“My investigation was making clear progress,” adds the architect-researcher. “I had a perfect antechamber model, similar to those we can visit today in the Red Pyramid at Dashur. And using CATIA 3D design software from Dassault Systèmes, I merely had to paste this model onto the Khufu grid, taking into account various factors already known or that I had found:

• for the Queen’s Chamber: a second entrance, a section of the ‘Noble Circuit’ and a marked deviation in the northern shaft;
• for the King’s Chamber: a very precisely located second entrance and a bizarrely routed northern shaft.

And here again: surprise! The model fitted perfectly. Not only did both the antechambers from the Red Pyramid ‘fit’ the grid perfectly, but they were centered on the north-south axis. The two antechambers from the Red Pyramid and the associated ‘Noble Corridor’ fit perfectly into the pyramid of Khufu. The interior architecture of the Great Pyramid was finally beginning to look like the funereal architecture of Egypt’s Fourth Dynasty.”

The Red Pyramid and the Pyramid of Khufu:  Look for the Similarity!

The press release summarizing Jean-Pierre’s research and conclusions and issued at the official presentation of Khufu Reborn on January 27, 2011, provides further explanations:

The Red Pyramid has the purest plan. The funeral chamber is in the edifice, preceded by two antechambers. The access corridor, antechambers and the chamber are perfectly aligned along the monument’s axis. The antechambers served to store the funeral belongings left to the deceased.

This very pure plan and these antechambers, led Jean-Pierre Houdin to wonder about Khufu’s inheritance. No antechambers in his pyramid, strangely offset corridors? Why this apparent inconsistency in the plan for the Great Pyramid? Why was the technique of antechambers with corbelled vaults, long since perfectly mastered, not used again? Would Khufu have had no goods? Hard to imagine for a king who left us the most imposing monument ever!

Hence the intuition by the author of Khufu Reborn to superimpose plans for the two pyramids. Let’s read on:

Jean-Pierre Houdin raised the corridor from the Red Pyramid and the antechambers so that the latter became those of Khufu’s chamber. They match perfectly. Better still, an explanation emerges for the well known misalignment of the descending and ascending corridors and the Grand Gallery. On the other hand, the set of antechambers is located precisely along the north-south axis and the west wall of the second antechamber is on a perfect alignment with the west wall of the King’s Chamber!

View from above

Although the current descending and ascending corridors of the Grand Gallery are generally considered as the circuit by which Khufu’s mortal remains were transported into his pyramid, Jean-Pierre Houdin has always challenged the funereal character of the Grand Gallery. For him, it was only a slide used to house the counterweight system.

Furthermore, using this passage poses an insoluble problem in connection with the sealing of the King’s Chamber. The granite block that obstructed the north-east entrance to the King’s Chamber (which entrance is not to be confused with the other one – the real one – on the west side of the chamber’s north wall), which was removed by Al-Ma’mun, could only be put back in place from the inside. And it is inconceivable to consider that a few unfortunate workers were walled up alive in the company of the dead king!

The pyramid’s plan can now be viewed in a new light. On the one hand, a consistent architectural legacy between the Red Pyramid and that of Khufu is re-established; on the other, the offset in the distribution of the corridors, considered strange until now, is explained.

As Jean-Pierre Houdin’s research progressed, his intuition, nurtured by further clues and a comparative study of pyramids from the Third and Fourth Dynasties, became a conviction: the King’s Chamber in the Great Pyramid, just like the internal layout of the Red Pyramid, based on the logic of architectural legacy, was itself preceded by two antechambers with corbelled vaults.

One final observation: inside the second antechamber of the Red Pyramid, high up, three pairs of circular holes face each other. The upper level of these holes is at exactly the same level as the floor of the corridor leading to the funeral chamber. According to Jean-Pierre Houdin, these holes were used to embed wooden beams across the antechamber and, over these beams, Egyptian builders placed a kind of “piston” made from a long piece of wood operated from below by a system of ropes. Pulling on these ropes pushed the piston forward in the corridor leading to the King’s Chamber. The piston then moved a block forward, sliding on a very thin layer of sand, and ended up resting against the floor of the King’s Chamber and sealing its entrance forever.

This closure block had quite simply been stored in the corridor’s east wall, in a small perpendicular passage in which its “twin” was also stored; a clever system, based on a pushing block and derived from a closure technique by drop-stone trap in the Bent Pyramid at Dahshur, pushed the two twinned blocks from a notch, once a wedge has been removed: the closure block was located in the corridor ready to be pushed by the piston and its twin took its place in the wall. This system can be observed in the Red Pyramid.

For Jean-Pierre Houdin, the transfer of this technique to the pyramid of Khufu seems to be a logical conclusion. Why – in what quest for originality – would the Great Pyramid’s builders have refrained from what, as a means of sealing a pyramid, was without any doubt the fruit of an architectural legacy, which, moreover, nothing would have allowed them to disregard?

 Many Centuries of Archaeological Myopia

Even if it meant facing the wrath of the higher echelons of Egyptology or researchers with various degrees of training in the vast and inexhaustible field of pyramidology, Jean-Pierre Houdin could no longer escape his own convictions: in his view, a structural analysis of the monument sheds new light on the real route of the funeral procession inside the Great Pyramid.

In this approach, without claiming to play the killjoy or, worse still, the kamikaze, he expects to have to confront many centuries of archaeological myopia. But his new plan of the Great Pyramid, in his opinion, has the merit of being based on history and sound reasoning, and, as well as being geometrically correct, explaining the many strange features in the pyramid’s design.

Above all, in the architect’s view, it provides King Khufu with the antechambers for the royal funeral goods, a logical deduction far removed from the fantasies of the treasure hunters.

In connection with these antechambers, Jean-Pierre Houdin likes to quote something a friend wrote to him in congratulation: “You have filled a historic void with a hole that dates back several millennia…”

That sums it up…

Clues from the Red Pyramid

“The Red Pyramid at Dahshur has two antechambers. Inside the second, high up, three pairs of circular holes facing each other. The upper level of these holes is at exactly the same level as the floor of the corridor leading to the funereal chamber. I considered that these holes had been used to embed wooden beams across the antechamber and over these beams, Egyptian builders had placed a kind of ‘piston’ made from a long piece of wood operated from below by a system of ropes. Just pulling on the ropes was enough to advance the piston into the corridor. Thus it pushed the block, sliding on a very thin layer of sand, ending up resting against the floor of the King’s Chamber and sealing its entrance forever.

This scenario was perfect, but still needed one most important answer: how do you push a block that could not have been lifted high enough, and that could not have been stored in the corridor because it would have prevented the funeral procession from passing. This squares the circle!

I have found part of the answer in another pyramid of Snefru: the Bent Pyramid, built just before the Red Pyramid.” (Jean-Pierre Houdin)

Clues from the Bent Pyramid

“To block the passage and prevent access to Snefru’s funereal chamber, the architects had installed two enormous portcullises in the corridor leading to it that, were retained in very narrow and inaccessible recesses before being lowered. The most interesting thing for me was the way in which these portcullises were released to block the passage:

• firstly, in the raised position, they were held leaning on a small block that prevented them remaining stuck in place at the moment they were released;
• secondly, a simple wooden wedge (in red) held them in this raised position.

To close the passage, the workers just had to remove the wedge and the portcullis was lowered automatically.”

Copyright by Marc Chartier, 2011.  All rights reserved.

Our master builders have different goals, however.  The first, Hemienu, was determined to build the greatest pyramid ever, and the second, Jean-Pierre Houdin, was equally determined to figure out how he did it.

Jean-Pierre Houdin and Bob Brier wrote a book—The Secret of the Great Pyramid—about this very subject in 2008 and the paperback edition is due to hit bookstores October 6, 2009.  Ahead of the paperback, Em Hotep!  is providing you with a multi-part primer to Houdin’s work, to be followed with an interview with the man himself.

But first, who are these two architects?

Hemienu, son of Nefermaat—or Snefru

Hemienu: Vizier, Master of Works, and architect of the Great Pyramid (courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

Although the Great Pyramid bears the name of Pharaoh Khufu, Hemienu was the genius behind its construction.  It was no coincidence that Hemienu should be selected for the job, and his pedigree would have well prepared him for the task.  What we don’t know from primary sources we may infer from what we do know about his probable history, and history in general.

There are two main theories regarding Hemienu’s childhood.  According to one theory he was the son of Pharaoh Snefru’s vizier, Nefermaat.  Vizier Nefermaat also bore the title “King’s Eldest Son,” which taken literally would have made Hemienu Snefru’s grandson.  As the positions of Vizier and Master of Works usually went hand-in-hand, it is believed that Nefermaat probably designed and built Snefru’s pyramids, including the Red Pyramid, the first true pyramid

If Nefermaat was Hemienu’s father, it is not difficult to imagine the two of them visiting building sites together, the youngster rapt with his father’s instructions to the workers, his discussions of geography and topography as he surveyed locations, and geological reports delivered from distant provinces.  He would have witnessed firsthand the difficult and painful lessons of the failures of the collapsed pyramid at Meidum and the second guessing that led to the oddly shaped Bent Pyramid at Dashur.

Pharaoh Snefru (courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

The other theory is that Hemienu was the son of Snefru, the pharaoh himself.  As a son of the pharaoh, Hemienu would have had an elite education leaving him well versed in the principles of mathematics and astronomy, and with an appreciation for the importance of architecture in religion.  His days at the court would have familiarized him with the intricacies of leadership and logistics.

While Hemienu, as the son of Pharaoh Snefru, may not have visited the building sites of the pyramids (although he very well may have), he would have been privy to the discussions of their construction.  We may safely assume this from the fact that regardless of who his father may have been, he eventually became vizier and Master of Works himself for his brother—or uncle—Khufu.  And as such, he showed clear signs of having learned from, and improved upon, the methods used by pyramid builders who preceded him.

The Pyramid Age had been ushered in by Imhotep, the vizier and master architect of Pharaoh Djoser.  Imhotep invented the pyramid, and while the form he designed may have changed, his template for pyramids and the complexes associated with them would set the standard for centuries to follow.  Before Imhotep, pharaohs and other nobles were buried under mastabas, rectangular stone buildings that contained mortuary shrines to the deceased and often symbolically mirrored the homes they occupied in life.

Imhotep conceived of a burial monument consisting of a number of mastabas stacked on top of each other, growing smaller as they rose.  His invention was the Step Pyramid, and he arrived at it through a process of modification and experimentation.  Like a Third Dynasty Einstein, Imhotep started with the idea of a pyramid and by devising, testing, and refining his idea, he achieved what had never been done before.

Hemienu, on the other hand, was more like Michelangelo.  He knew exactly what he wanted from the beginning, and by precisely executing his vision he achieved what has never been done since.  He had a plan which underwent very little modification, nor could it have.  Hemienu understood how every layer had to look and function—from the underground provisional tomb to the pyramidion—before he began digging.

Jean-Pierre Houdin, son of Henri

Jean-Pierre Houdin (center) - An architectural solution to an architectural question (courtesy of Jean-Pierre Houdin)

Jean-Pierre Houdin also grew up among the construction of great monuments.  His father, Henri Houdin, was part of the generation of French children born after WWI whose lives would be shaped by the events of WWII.  At the end of the war, he earned a Ph.D. in engineering from Paris’s presti-gious École des Arts et Metiers.  With more than 7,000 bridges to be rebuilt, young engineers were given tremendous responsibilities. Thus in 1947 24-year-old Henri Houdin was placed in charge of rebuilding the Conflans Bridge outside of Paris (Brier and Houdin, pp. 2, 38).

Jean-Pierre was born in 1951, the younger of two sons, and spent much of his childhood playing at construction sites with his brother, Bernard.  Henri had been assigned to the Ivory Coast, a French protectorate, where he was instrumental in the rebuilding of that country, and family outings often consisted of picnics at construction sites (Brier and Houdin, pp. 38-40). 

It was thus no surprise when Jean-Pierre decided to become an architect.  He entered the École des Beaux-Arts in 1970 for that purpose where, as part of his final year studies, Jean-Pierre designed a solar house that would be considered cutting edge green technology today.  The year was 1976.

Henri Houdin first became intrigued with the construction of the Great Pyramid in 1998, when he viewed a television program on the subject, The Mystery of the Pyramid.  He watched with interest as the theories of construction were spelled out, but his instinct told him that the conventional theories didn’t quite add up.  They were illogical to the trained eye of an experienced master builder and were neither based on true civil engineering techniques nor masonry processes.

The engineer immediately spotted two misconceptions. The first was that blocks were always depicted being delivered to the site from the base to the top from the outside. The second misconception was that the pyramid facing was shown being installed at the end of the process, from top to base, with no means of controlling the shape of the monument. Henri didn’t see how that could be possible.  He then had an ingenious idea: if he would have to build a pyramid, he would build it from the inside.

Henri Houdin now had a project to keep him busy in his retirement, and he tackled the quandary with relish.  How would he, as an engineer, build the pyramid?  He worked and reworked his ideas, and in 1999 went so far as to publish his theory in the journal of the French National Society of Engineers and Scientists (Brier and Houdin, p. 126).

Henri discussed his newfound passion often with Jean-Pierre, but just as the engineer had seen flaws in the approach of the non-engineers, the architect son began to notice things his engineer father had missed.  For instance, Henri had envisioned an internal ramp spiraling up the inside of the pyramid in a circular fashion.  Jean-Pierre knew that it would be impossible to move heavy blocks in a circular pattern—there is no efficient way to push or pull such weights around a constant curve. 

Jean-Pierre also knew that there was no way the internal ramp could accommodate some of the larger blocks used in the construction of the King’s Chamber (Brier and Houdin, p. 126).  Somehow Hemienu had found a way to move granite slabs, some of which weighed more than sixty tons, to a height of nearly 200 feet and maneuver them into exactly the right place. 

So the architect stepped in where the engineer left off.  How had Hemienu done it?  Or more to the point, how was Jean-Pierre going to do it?  How do you reverse engineer a five and a half million ton pyramid?

Synthesis

About a hundred feet to the east of the Great Pyramid, cut into the limestone bedrock, is a sixty-foot trench first surveyed in the 1880’s by Sir William M. Flinders Petrie.  The trench contains, rendered in 3D, an exact model of the descending and ascending passages of the pyramid, around which the rest would be designed.  Although the halls are much shorter, they are the exact dimensions of the real thing, a veritable walk-in blueprint, right down to the narrowing of the ascending passageway to allow blocks to be wedged in (Brier and Houdin, pp. 114-17).

As it turns out, Jean-Pierre Houdin would approach the problem in exactly the same way Hemienu did.  Thinking like his architect predecessor, Jean-Pierre used architectural software to produce the first true 3D model of the pyramid since Hemienu.  Other models had been made of the pyramid, to be sure, but Jean-Pierre was able to use specialized computer imagery that allowed him to turn the pyramid in any direction, to see the interior through its external skin, and to virtually travel through its passages just as Hemienu did in his 3D model.

The Great Pyramid of Khufu - Does a mile-long ramp lie hidden within? (Photo by Keith Payne)

Jean-Pierre’s life experience as the son of an engineer, his professional training and experience as an architect, and his technological savvy made him an ideal person to reexamine the question of how Khufu’s Pyramid was conceived, planned, and ultimately built.  His zeal would bring him to the attention of Dassault Systèmes, the world leader in 3D imaging, where he would assemble a dream team of modern pyramid builders and gain the resources to give his project the attention it deserves.

Hemienu to Houdin—Building a Great Pyramid

Over the next few weeks Em Hotep! will take you inside Jean-Pierre Houdin’s ideas, explore his vision, and evaluate his conclusions.  The first part will be an examination of the internal ramp theory.  What are the shortcomings of the traditional theories and how does his internal ramp resolve these issues?  Then we will go into the core of the pyramid itself and explore Houdin’s explanations of some of the pyramid’s abiding enigmas, such as the purpose of the Grand Gallery, and how those titanic granite blocks were put into place.  Finally, we will end with an exclusive interview with Jean Pierre Houdin himself to get clarification and find out where he will take us next.

Jean-Pierre Houdin’s mind is in perpetual motion, and describing Khufu’s Pyramid as his passion is actually an understatement—it is his magnum opus, his mission.  With his and Bob Brier’s book, The Secret of the Great Pyramid, just going into paperback in October, you can rest assured his work has continued.  In addition to the coming interview, he just might provide some clarification as we explore his theory.  Who knows what new insights may arise?

Next Part: 

Hemienu to Houdin Part One: How Do You Prefer Your Ramp, Straight or With a Twist?

Work Cited:  Brier, Bob and Jean-Pierre Houdin.  The Secret of the Great Pyramid.  New York:  Smithsonian, 2008.

Photographs ”Statue-of-Hemiun.jpg” by Einsamer Schütze and “Snofru Eg Mus Kairo 2002.png” are provided courtesy of Wikimedia Commons  and are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 License. In short: you are free to share and make derivative works of those files under the conditions that you appropriately attribute them, and that you distribute them only under a license identical to this one. Official license.  Both photographs of Jean-Pierre Houdin are courtesy of Jean-Pierre Houdin, all rights reserved. 

ALL OTHER photographs and text are copyright (c) 2009 by Keith Payne, all rights reserved.

Fourth Dynasty

The Zenith of the Pyramid Age

2613 to 2494

In the Fourth Dynasty, the pharaoh is Egypt.  Absolute and centralized power, wide prosperity, and religious and political nationalism combine into a period of high spirituality, monumental architecture, and efficient bureaucracy.

After all, as informative as it is, the new post doesn’t really contain anything new.  Of course, he is currently blogging about the pyramids in the vicinity of Dashur.  I think I might know why..

The Bent Pyramid of Dashur (courtesy Wikimedia Commons)

The Bent Pyramid of Snefru at Dashur is interesting to behold.  It isn’t as klunky as King Huni‘s Meidum Pyramid, or the fortress-like Black Pyramid.  When you look at the Bent Pyramid you can really see where Snefru was going with the project.  Unfortunately, the path he was taking to get there was a bit too steep. 

It isn’t difficult to imagine Snefru shaking his head and saying “I want something more like this..” as he traces the outline of the future Red Pyramid.  But there is just something, well, endearing about the Bent Pyramid, sort of like a speckled pup.

Dr. Hawass loves to build anticipation.  Toward the end of his latest posting he reminisces: 

I once came here with a group of my students from the American University in Cairo, and introduced them to my good friend Dr. Rainer Stadelmann, who has dedicated his life to the study of pyramids and was excavating at Dashur at the time. When we entered the pyramid we had an odd experience that is unique to the Bent Pyramid, and something that had been noted by earlier explorers. Standing within the pyramid you can sometimes feel cool air flowing from inside the pyramid to the exit.

Could this too be intended to build anticipation? 

Is it possible that you, too, might soon be able to stand within the Bent Pyramid and feel the cool breeze?

Only if the Bent Pyramid, and possibly other previously inaccessible sites at Dashur are about to be opened to the public…

HINT:  The fifth question down

Copyright 2009, all rights reserved.

Pharaoh Khufu

Pharaoh Khufu (courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

Pharaoh Khufu was known as Cheops to the Greeks, and was also called Suphis by the Ptolemaic-Era Egyptian historian Manetho.  His actual name was Khnum-Khufwy, which means “the god Khnum protects me.” 

Khufu reigned from 2589 to 2566 BC and was the second pharaoh of the Fourth Dynasty, the son of Pharaoh Snefru and father of kings Djedefre and Khafre.  He was coroneted in his early twenties, although sources vary regarding the length of his reign.  The earliest source, the Turin King List, has him ruling for 23 years, the Ptolemaic Era Egyptian historian Manetho has him ruling for 63 years, and the Greek Historian Herodotus puts his reign at 50 years.

Although he had a reputation for cruelty to friend and foe alike, he was worshipped until well into the Twenty-Sixth Dynasty, nearly 2000 years, although this may have something to do with his rather impressive pyramid.  Dr. Zahi Hawass, Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, has recently postulated that the reason for Khufu’s bad reputation may have to do with his declaration during his lifetime that he was the god Ra.  Its one thing for a pharaoh to be a living god, quite another to declare oneself to be the living god.

The Great Pyramid of Khufu

Also known as the Great Pyramid and the Pyramid of Cheops, the Pyramid of Khufu is the oldest of the three pyramids which dominate the Giza Plateau.  It is also the largest, although the Pyramid of Khafre appears taller due to being built on a higher part of the plateau.  The pyramid was believed to have been completed during Khufu’s lifetime. 

The architect of the Great Pyramid was Hemienu, Khufu’s Vizier and Master of Works.  Hemienu was either the son of Nefermaat, the architect who built King Snefru’s pyramids, or was a son of Snefru himself, and brother to Khufu.  Either way, the perfecting of the pyramidal form, from the step pyramid design to the flat-sided Red Pyramid, occurred during Hemienu’s lifetime. He would have observed firsthand the failure of the collapsed pyramid at Meidum and the tough lessons of the Bent Pyramid, which owes its odd shape to a decision to change the angle after construction was well underway.

The Great Pyramid of Khufu (Photo by Keith Payne)

At an original height of about 481 feet, the Pyramid of Khufu was the tallest building on Earth for more than 3,800 years, until the completion of the Lincoln Cathedral around AD 1300.  It is believed that more than 2.3 million blocks were used in its construction, not including the limestone casing.  Theories regarding its manner of construction abound. 

It is interesting to note that even given Manetho’s rather high estimate of Khufu’s reign, the Egyptians would have had to quarry, dress, move, and place just over 100 blocks per day, at an average weight of 2.5 tons, non-stop, 24 hours a day, for 63 years to complete the Great Pyramid.  Given the more likely reign of 23 years, that would mean about 274 blocks per day, 24 hours a day, seven days a week—about one block every five minutes.  Such logistics naturally raise a few questions.

(For some potential answers, be sure to read the Em Hotep! exclusive series, Hemienu to Houdin)

One two-ton block, every five minutes, day and night, non-stop, for 23 years? (Photo by Keith Payne)

All theories aside, the notion that Khufu’s pyramid was built by slaves has been roundly discredited.  Ruins of what seems to be the builders’ village have been uncovered, along with tombs of their own.  Evidence suggests that the building of Khufu’s pyramid was a national project that drew laborers, engineers, architects, craftsmen, and all of the specialized labor necessary to support such a workforce from all over Egypt.  From a social perspective, the construction of Khufu’s pyramid may be compared to the conscription efforts of World War II, had the war lasted 23-63 years…

Climbing into the Thieves' Entrance (Photo by Keith Payne)

There has been some debate over whether the Great Pyramid was intended as a tomb for the pharaoh, or if it served more of a symbolic function.  Most Egyptologists agree that the pyramid was intended for the burial of Khufu, but not everyone agrees on where in the pyramid he may have been interred.  Zahi Hawass has expressed doubt that the King’s Chamber was the tomb of Khufu, which he thinks may still lie undisturbed within the pyramid.

Access to the pyramid is gained through the Thieves’ Entrance, a rough-hewn cave dug out by robbers more than eleven centuries ago, which leads into the original descending passageway.  This in turn leads to a narrow 130 foot-long ascending passageway which is 3½ to 4 feet high, and extremely steep.  This passageway lets out in the Grand Gallery, a 30-foot high passageway that continues along at a 29 degree incline, and opens into the King’s Chamber.

The Grand Gallery inside Khufu's Pyramid (Photo by Keith Payne)

Inside the King's Chamber of the Great Pyramid (Photo by Keith Payne)

The King’s Chamber is lined with red granite, and the sarcophagus inside is hewn from a single block of the same.  To date, two rooms besides the King’s Chamber have been found.  The middle chamber is called the Queen’s Chamber, although there is no evidence it had anything to do with any of Khufu’s queens, who have their own pyramids.  Its true function is unknown.  The third chamber was never completed and may have originally been planned to hold the sarcophagus, but again, there is no way to be certain.

Jean-Pierre Houdin has argued that all three chambers were intended for the burial of the king, but at different times.  From the outset, he contends, Hemienu wanted to make certain that the king had a suitable burial chamber, and the primary goal of the pyramid is the King’s Chamber.  But Hemienu knew that completion of the King’s Chamber, the final resting place for Khufu, was a while off, so the pyramid was built with contingency burial chambers. 

The underground tomb was built first and left in the rough—if needed it could be finished fairly quickly.  If the king should die during the first ten years of construction he could be buried in the underground tomb.  The Queen’s Chamber was then built as a more fitting temporary grave, and would have allowed Hemienu to test some of the techniques he would be using in the much grander King’s Chamber.  Finally, the King’s Chamber was completed.  It was fortunate the underground and middle chambers were never required, but Hemienu left nothing to chance.

Khufu's Sarcophagus--or was it? (Photo by Keith Payne)

Khufu’s valley temple, causeway, and mortuary temple (pyramid complex) are all but gone, with only a few basalt paving stone left to delineate their outline.    His cult pyramid was recently located to the southeast of his pyramid, but the most exciting discovery was a perfectly preserved and fully intact funeral barge.  (For more on the funeral barge see my feature article on the Giza Plateau here.)

The only remaining Wonder of the Ancient World (Photo by Keith Payne)

Further Reading

Egyptian Monuments:

Pyramid of Khufu

LookLex:

Khufu

National Geographic:

Great Pyramid:  Earth’s Largest

Tour Egypt:

Khufu

The Pyramid of Khufu at Giza in Egypt:  An Introduction

Photograph “WIKI – Khufu.jpg” is provided courtesy of Wikimedia Commons  and is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 License. In short: you are free to share and make derivative works of the file under the conditions that you appropriately attribute it, and that you distribute it only under a license identical to this one. Official license 

ALL OTHER photographs and text are copyright 2009, all rights reserved.

There are three of them, they are located in the middle of the Egyptian desert, they were built by slaves, and they have mummies in them.

Right?  Well…

They are large and they do have four sides.  They are wide at the bottom and come to a point, although you could park a large SUV on some of those points, and still have room for a picnic.  They are triangular in shape, but some of them have a step-shaped contour, others look like a few different sized boxes stacked on top of one another, and at least one sharply changes the angle of its slope two thirds of the way up.  Many of them look like piles of rubble. 

So far more than 130 pyramids have been found in Egypt, and more have been discovered in Sudan.  They are located in the desert,  but the most famous pyramids are within walking distance of a city with twice as many people as Los Angeles.  They were not built by slaves, and until very recently, no mummies had been found in any of them.  

The Giza Pyramids

Built during the Old Kingdom Period, particularly during the Third and Fourth Dynasties, the pyramids represent a time when power was absolutely centered in the person of the Pharaoh.  They required a huge workforce ranging from general labor to artists and engineers, and the notion that they were built by slaves, Hebrew or otherwise, has been widely discredited.  There are many theories regarding their construction, each of which has its own set of unanswered questions.

Guarding the Giza Pyramids

Mastabas

The early forerunner of the pyramid is the mastaba, the Arabic word for bench, so-called for their bench-like shape.  In the pre-dynastic and early dynastic periods, the mummified bodies of the dead were buried in shafts cut into the stone ground, and mastabas were built over the grave.  Mastabas were rectangular structures with sloping sides and a flat top.  They were generally made of mud brick, but in later times royalty and more important court officials might have mastabas constructed of dressed limestone.  Cemeteries of mastabas often mirrored the social strata of the living, with more grandiose tombs being set apart on larger plots of land while those of lesser personages were lined up in avenues like city streets.

An avenue of mastabas at Saqqara

The mastabas included a small shrine where offerings of food and incense could be made for the deceased, and a concealed a room called a serdab, where a statue of the deceased was housed.  The walls inside the mastabas typically had detailed murals and friezes depicting the everyday life of the deceased, and in fact, these paintings provide much of what we know of Egyptian life during that period.  The mastaba was not just the tomb of the deceased, it was a representation of their home in the afterlife, and so great care was taken in its construction and preservation.  Although not built until the Sixth Dynasty, the mastaba par excellence is that of Vizier Mereruka, at Saqqara.

The Step Pyramid

Post-mortem accommodations would take a quantum leap forward in the Third Dynasty when Imhotep, chief engineer and architect of King Djoser, conceived of a way to symbolize the king’s ascension to divinity.  Imhotep started with a basic mastaba, but constructed it in a square rather than the traditional rectangular shape.  He then added another smaller mastaba to the flat surface of the first, and continued to build upward until he had six square mastabas, each smaller than the previous, stacked one on top of the other.  The result was the original Stairway to Heaven—the Step Pyramid of Djoser.  Pharaoh was greatly pleased…

The Step Pyramid of Djoser

Although the mastaba would remain in use for thousands of years, Imhotep started a craze that would earn him deification, a rare honor for a commoner.  The evolution of the pyramid form may be observed in the region of Dashur, where attempts were made—and in some cases failed—at making a true smooth-sided pyramid.  But the procedure would be perfected during the reign of Snefru, the first king of the Fourth Dynasty.

Evolution of the “Modern” Pyramid

Meidum Pyramid (courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

Snefru’s first contribution to pyramid building was his completion of the pyramid begun by his father, King Huni, at Meidum.  The Meidum Pyramid began as a step pyramid, but in completing it Snefru attempted to smooth its sides, resulting in a large blocky structure.  It would mostly collapse later, during the New Kingdom Period. 

Snefru's Bent Pyramid (courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

Snefru built his second pyramid intending to attempt a smooth-sided pyramid from the outset.  This attempt is called the Bent Pyramid because the top third was constructed at a radically different angle than the bottom two thirds.  It is believed that the angle of the bottom part, a 55-degree grade, was too steep and when the construction began to show signs of stress, the angle for the remaining part was changed to a much more stable 43-degrees.

Snefru's Red Pyramid (courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)

They say the third time is the charm, and King Snefru would agree.  His third contribution to the Pyramid Fields of the Memphis Necropolis was the Red Pyramid, the first true smooth-sided pyramid.  Having learned from his mistakes, such as they were, the Red Pyramid was constructed at a 43-degree gradient from the first block, and is the third largest pyramid in Egypt, being just barely exceeded by those of Khufu and Khafre at Giza.

Snefru’s Red Pyramid would be surpassed by that of his son, Khufu, on the Giza Plateau.  Others would follow, including the pyramids of Khafre and Menkaure, but the Great Pyramid was the pinnacle, literally, of pyramid building.  Khafre’s Pyramid looks larger because of its location on higher ground, but Khufu’s Pyramid is the undisputed champion.

The pyramids of Khafre and Khufu

The Pyramid Complex

Pyramids are actually just the centerpiece of a larger complex.  Each pyramid contains a number of elements, all associated with the afterlife.  There is typically a valley temple, a pavilion where the body of the king was received, which was connected to the Nile.  From the valley temple there would be a causeway leading to the mortuary temple, which was dedicated to the worship of the deceased king. 

Mortuary temples had their own priests who not only performed the funerary rites but who assured that the cult of that particular king would be sustained in the future.  There was often a smaller “cult pyramid” which was built to honor the king’s Ka (his spirit or soul).  Pyramid complexes often also included cemeteries, or even additional pyramids, for the king’s family and chosen servants.

Khufu's Queens' Pyramids

It goes without saying that pyramids were associated with the afterlife, and are the center of the king’s funerary complex, but some controversy remains regarding exactly what function they served.  It seems obvious they were intended to hold the body of the dead king—including the presence of burial chambers and sarcophagi.  However, out of the nearly 140 pyramids discovered, not a single king’s mummy has ever been recovered from a pyramid.  The only mummy found in a pyramid thus far is that of Queen Seshseshet, discovered in her pyramid in November, 2008.

Some speculate that the king’s pyramids may have served a ceremonial function, possibly as a location for the initiation of the king into divinity and preparation for the afterlife.  Others speculate that the kings were indeed interred in their pyramids, but that their bodies were later removed for various reasons.  It is possible that the pyramids served as both tombs and places of initiation.  All that is certain is that we can’t be certain, which is a large part of the pyramids’ appeal.

Backside of the Giza Pyramids

Further Reading

Egyptian Monuments:

Archive for the ‘Pyramid Fields’ Category

(Probably the best online resource on pyramids, hands down)

LookLex:

Giza – The Pyramids

National Geographic:

Introduction to Pyramids

Queen’s Mummy Found In 4,300-Year-Old Pyramid

Tour Egypt:

Overview of Pyramid Construction

Photographs ”WIKIpyr01 – Meidoum_pyramide_006.jpg” by Wiki user Neithsabes, “WIKIpyr02 – Snofru’s_Bent_Pyramid_in_Dahshur.jpg” by Wiki user Ivrienen, and “WIKIpyr03 – RedPyramid.jpg” by Wiki user Chipdawes are provided courtesy of Wikimedia Commons  and are licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 License. In short: you are free to share and make derivative works of those files under the conditions that you appropriately attribute them, and that you distribute them only under a license identical to this one. Official license 

ALL OTHER photographs and text are copyright 2009, all rights reserved.