Digging Up The Past

Pyramid of Chephren (Khafre) at Giza

Who made the Pyramids? and Why?

How did they get those weighty stones into position?

How did they acquire the skill to construct the pyramids with such mathematical precision?

Do Ancient Civilizations have anything to teach us today?

We find the answers to these and many other questions, as we penetrate the mists of ancient history and learn the origins of the past greatness of Egypt.

So let's continue our journey through the past, and discover the wonders of the Ancient world.

Who made the Pyramids & Why?

Skilled craftsman builds a boat with a method used thousands of years ago

These ancient people of Egypt were not primitive cave-men, arduously
climbing some evolutionary ladder.

They were, in fact, highly intelligent, technically skilled organisers and
craftsmen.

The first possible clue we have to the origins of this remarkable people is
found in the historical records of the Bible.

There we find that the Hebrew word which is translated "Egypt" is "Misraim," and in Genesis 10:1-20 we are told that Misraim was the son of Ham, who was the son of Noah.

Map of Ancient Nations

Click on the map to view ancient and modern Misraim

Misraim's decendants founded Egypt.

So a fascinating fact is that today "Misr" is the name Egyptians continue to apply to themselves.

Visitors to Egypt will notice the "MisrBank," the "Misr Travel Company," the "Misr Insurance Company."
Egypt is in North Africa. Just when Misraim or his descendants migrated to North Africa is not known.

It is known that early settlers buried their dead in the hot dry sand, and due to the dry climate, (Cairo has an average annual rainfall of only about 50mm or 2 inches and in Luxor it very seldom rains at all), the bodies quickly dehydrated and were remarkably preserved. (One such body is on display in the British Museum in London).

Anubis attends dead Pharaoh

This phenomenon, no doubt observed by the early Egyptians, may have supported the strong Egyptian belief in the immortality of the soul.
They may well have reasoned that if the body could be thus preserved, the departing soul they believed in, would also survive. In any case, the early Egyptians made great efforts to preserve the bodies of their departed friends, later embalming them as mummies.

What did the Egyptians believe, about Life & Death, Body & Spirit?

The "Ba" leaving the dead Pharoah

Mummies on display in Cairo

What did the Egyptians believe about Life and Death, Body and Spirit? Egyptian religion held that a person consisted of three distinct parts: the ka, the ba, & the akh. Egyptologists characterize the ka (represented by two upraised arms) as the individual's "vital force" or "spiritual twin." When a person was born, the god Khnum created his or her ka, modeling both body and spirit on his potter's wheel. Kings could have several kas; mere mortals had only one. During life the ka remained separate from the body. At death a person was said to have "gone to his [or her] ka." This was the Egyptian way of saying that the ka had merged with the deceased's lifeless form. To survive, the ka needed a body for its eternal home. The Egyptians believed that the ka dwelt within either the mummy or the tomb statue (sometimes called the ka-statue), a spare body needed if the corpse should be destroyed. The Egyptians called the second element of the soul the ba (or "animation"). It was the part of the spirit that was free to leave the tomb and travel about the earth during the day. The ba was obliged, however, to return to the tomb during the perilous hours of darkness. Artisans had several ways of showing the ba, sometimes as a bird, but most often as a human-headed bird. The ba came into being only when the ka and the dead body were united; without the ka and a mummy or ka-statue, the ba could not exist. Adapted from Death, Burial, and Afterlife in Ancient Egypt by James F. Romano. © 1990 The Board of Trustees, Carnegie Institute.

Ancient Inscriptions

Writing skills were developed early in the history of Egypt. The beautiful hieroglyphic writing was in use by the time of the first king of united Egypt. This complex script consisted of about 750 separate symbols or pictures, called hieroglyphs.

Temple inscription

About 700 BC, a popular script called Demotic was invented.
It was written from right to left and quickly became the common form of writing for business and literary purposes. It ultimately developed into the Coptic script.
Being a simplified cursive script, it was easily learned and written and was used more extensively than the more difficult hieroglyphic script.

Writing in Egypt was done on either stone or papyrus. Reeds of the papyrus plant grew profusely in ancient Egypt.

Papyrus along the Nile in Ancient Egypt

Cultivated papyrus at the Pharonic Village

Egyptian Scripts

Inscriptions on the Rosetta Stone

By 400 AD, the hieroglyphic form of writing had fallen into disuse and within another 100 years, the Demotic had also been dropped.

The Leyden Papyrus of the 3rd-century AD was a crucial key to the decipherment of the Demotic Ancient Egyptian dialect.
This 15-foot roll of papyrus manuscript appears to be a compilation by a practising Egyptian sorcerer, on Egyptian magic and medicine, revealing spells, incantations, aphrodisiacs, invoking various gods.

Napoleon Bonaparte

Napoleon Bonaparte invaded Egypt in the year 1798. In August of the following year, 1799, one of his officers was repairing the fort of St Julien near the town of Rashid, or Rosetta.

Here he found a large black stone, 112 by 82 centimetres and 25 centimetres thick. On it was a text inscribed in three scripts - Hieroglyphic at the top, Demotic in the centre and Greek at the bottom.

The Rosetta Stone, in the British Museum

The Greek, which could be understood, was a record of the commemoration of the accession to the throne of the Greek king, Ptolemy V, in the year 196 BC. It was assumed that this was a trilingual inscription recording the same message in the three different scripts, and that by comparing the three, it would be possible to decipher the meaning of the then unknown Egyptian hieroglyphs.

Before the French could do much work on the project, however, the British invaded Egypt and in 1801, the Rosetta Stone fell into British hands and was shipped to the British Museum, where it remains to this day.

Champollion Deciphers Hieroglyphs

Book by Champollion, Monuments of Egypt and Nubia

Comparison of scripts

The French had made a copy of the inscriptions on the Rosetta Stone, so both French and British scholars were able to work on the translation. An Englishman by the name of Thomas Young made some progress, but the hieroglyphs were finally deciphered by a young French genius by the name of Jean Francois Champollion.

Champollion was born on December 23, 1790. He had a phenomenal memory and a flair for foreign languages. At the age of eleven, he was fluent in Latin, Greek and Hebrew. A school inspector named Fourier, who had accompanied Napoleon's expedition to Egypt, was impressed by the lad's extraordinary intelligence and invited him to his home, where he showed him his Egyptian collection. The boy was enchanted by his first sight of a papyrus manuscript with its hieroglyphic writing and asked, "Can anyone read this?" Fourier shook his head. "Then I am going to do it!" the boy confidently announced.

At the age of twelve, the boy Champollion wrote his first book and at thirteen, began to study Arabic, Syrian, Chaldean and Coptic. He became so proficient with this last language that he wrote many of his journals in Coptic. Strange to say, he never did see the original Rosetta Stone, but at the age of eighteen, was given a copy of the inscription, which he began to study.

Jean Francois Champollion

Phonetic hieroglyphic alphabet by Champollion in 1822

For the next fourteen years he grappled with its translation. His task was made more difficult because the top portion of the stone containing the hieroglyphs had been broken off and was missing. Only fourteen lines had survived and none of these was complete.

In the year 1822, at the age of 32, Champollion was at last able to announce that he could read the mysterious Egyptian hieroglyphs. Six years later, just four years before his untimely death, he visited Egypt for the first time.

But the key to the hieroglyphs had been found. The historical information written on the monuments and in the papyri could now be studied and scholars were able to go to work piecing together, at last, the history of ancient Egypt.

Boastful Monuments

Inscriptions on monuments

River Nile - a Source of Life

Habitable Egypt consists primarily of the Nile valley, a narrow strip of fertile land averaging about twelve kilometres in width and extending about one thousand kilometres from south to north.

Because of its slightly higher altitude, the south is called Upper Egypt and the north is called Lower Egypt. To go up the River Nile, is to go southwards. The Nile flows northwards, from Upper Egypt to Lower Egypt. At Memphis, near modern Cairo, the Nile branches out into several arms, fanning out over the fertile delta. Below are maps of Egypt and the Nile delta throughout history:	River Nile from the Air - a strip of fertility in the desert
Harvested crops by the Nile	Nile farm-life today in a timeless land
Fertile delta of the Nile - a satellite photo	Lower Egypt, Sinai, Midian and Edom - a satellite photo
Lower and Upper Egypt in the North and South

Map of the cities of Egypt and beyond

Rulers and Dynasties

In earliest Egyptian times, small towns and villages were ruled by local chiefs or kings. The first man to unite Upper and Lower Egypt under one monarchy was Menes, and he is regarded as the founder of the First Dynasty.

Narmer's Palette

A dynasty is a line of kings where the crown is passed down from father to son for a number of generations.
When someone outside the family seized the throne, a new dynasty commenced. Ancient Egypt was ruled by a succession of thirty-one dynasties.

In the Egyptian Museum Cairo is a black slate palette, 64 centimetres high, which is attributed to Narmer, usually identified with Menes.
On one side it depicts Narmer holding an enemy by his hair with his left hand, while his right hand holds a lethally upraised club.
The obverse side depicts two lions with elongated necks intertwined about each other.
The depression formed within the circle of the intertwined necks was used to mix cosmetics,
hence this stone was called 'Narmer's Palette.'

Zoser's Pyramid

Pyramid of Zoser (Djoser) at Saqqara

It was not until the third dynasty that the era of pyramid-building began.
The first king of the third dynasty was Zoser who was fortunate to have as his visier a genius by the name of Imhotep. This man was not only the remarkable architect and engineer who designed and built the first great pyramid, but was also a renowned physician.

The kings of the first dynasty had tombs at Abydos and Saqqara, some 370km south of Cairo. They were buried under mastabas, which were mud brick buildings erected over their burial shafts. At Saqqara, Imhotep had a shaft 7 metres by 7 metres and 28 metres, dug deep down into the stone. At the bottom of this shaft was a burial vault and an extensive and complex series of passageways. The purpose of this maze of corridors is not known.

Above these excavations Imhotep built a stone mastaba about 63 metres by 63 metres and 8 metres high. This was the first time stone had been used in the construction of a burial monument. This mastaba was faced with white limestone and was subsequently slightly enlarged. Above the mastaba, a four-tiered step pyramid was erected and later expanded to become a six-tier pyramid. It measured 125 metres from east to west, 108 metres from north to south and 62 metres in height. The whole was then completely encased in glistening white Tura limestone and must have presented a dazzling spectacle.

Zoser's unusual step-pyramid

Zoser's sealed statue room

Where Imhotep got his idea from is a matter of speculation, but it seems highly probable that he borrowed it from the earlier civilisation of Mesopotamia where ziggurats, or temple towers, had been in use since the dawn of history. Probably the Tower of Babel, or Babylon, had been the first such tower.

Statue of Zoser

Zoser's stone pyramid close up

These towers had been used as centres of worship, and Imhotep simply adapted the idea to a burial custom. Apparently grave robbers broke into the tomb and stole its contents, because no trace of Zoser's body has been found. Two fine alabaster coffins were discovered however, one of which contained the remains of a child.

Temple at Abydos

Abydos temple wall relief

Sneferu's Pyramids

Sneferu's Bent Pyramid

With the beginning of the fourth dynasty came the development of the true pyramid. The first king of this dynasty was Sneferu, who, strange to say, seems to have been the builder of three pyramids. Why he should build three pyramids is also a matter of speculation, because not even a god-king can be buried in three places at one time. One plausible theory is that the first pyramid he built was the one at Meidum, about 64 kilometres south of Cairo.

The outside casing of this pyramid lies as a huge mass of rubble at the foot of the pyramid. It has been suggested that rather than disintegrating over the centuries, it collapsed when the pyramid was almost completed.

Perhaps, instead of trying to rebuild this pyramid, Sneferu ordered the second pyramid to be built at Dashur, some 45 kilometres to the north.

Sneferu's first pyramid collapsed

This is known as the Bent Pyramid because, while it starts out at an angle of 54 degrees (about the same angle as the Meidum Pyramid), about halfway up, its angle decreases to 43 degrees.
Some cracks, due to the enormous pressure from the weight of the stone, have been observed in this structure.
Was this the reason it was finished at a lower angle? Perhaps the builders decided to make sure that they had at least one pyramid that would not collapse.
They built the third pyramid, the Red Pyramid, at the low angle of 43 degrees, the same angle at which the Bent Pyramid was finished. After all, pyramid building was still experimental.

The Bent Pyramid at Dashur Sneferu's second

The Red Pyramid Sneferu's third and best

Khufu's Great Pyramid

The Great Pyramid

There was an entrance (16.5 metres up the north face and slightly off-centre to the left) that had been subsequently filled-in and concealed. From this entrance, a corridor less than 120 centimetres by 120 centimetres slopes down at an angle of 26 degrees, first through the stones of the pyramid and then through the solid bedrock for a distance of 105 metres. Then it levels out and enters an unfinished burial chamber. Down the descending corridor, about 18 metres, another corridor of the same dimensions slopes upwards also at 26 degrees, for a distance of 39 metres. The entrance to this ascending corridor was subsequently plugged from above with three large stones and the mouth of the corridor was faced with a limestone slab so that the entrance could not be seen.

The size of the stones overshadows most people

Ascending passage within the Great Pyramid

At the top of the ascending corridor a passage was cut horizontally into the exact centre of the pyramid, where it terminated in what is called the Queen's Chamber, though it is more likely that this was a place for a statue of the dead king.

Khufu's sarcophagus under the top of the pyramid

In 1986 French scientists used stone-scanning equipment on the pyramid and discovered three chambers on the west side of the passage leading to the Queen’s Chamber. A TV lens inserted into one of these chambers revealed that it was empty. The purpose of these chambers is unknown.

Aswan quarry produced granite blocks for pyramids

Also from the top of the ascending corridor, a superbly constructed gallery sloped upwards 46 metres to the King's burial vault. This vault is lined with polished blocks of granite, floated down the Nile from Aswan, some 1000km upriver to the south. These blocks, weighing up to 15 tonnes each, are so perfectly squared and fitted together that it is not possible to fit a postcard between them. A large granite sarcophagus stands at the south end of this vault. It must have been deposited in the vault as the pyramid was being built because it is slightly larger than the ascending corridor.

Two small "vents" slant upwards from the side of the vault and reach to the outside of the pyramid. These are not likely to be for ventilation purposes, as is commonly believed, for they would be totally inadequate for the workmen, and the dead king would not need to breathe. They were more likely to have been of ceremonial significance, perhaps to give the king's soul access to the outside world. Recently a small robot was made to crawl up the vent on the south side of the Queen’s Chamber and it is claimed that there is a stone portcullis door at the top.
Further investigation may reveal what is behind this door.

Pink granite showing its true colours

Faulty obelisk left unfinished at the quarry

Khafre's Pyramid

Khafre's (Chephren's) pyramid with Tura limestone top

Khufu's son Khafre (Greek:"Chephren"), built the next great pyramid. It was only three metres lower than his predecessor's, but because its angle of height is slightly more, 52 degrees 20 minutes instead of 51 degrees 52 minutes, it is 14 1/2 metres smaller at the base and consequently contains a much smaller volume of stone. This pyramid still retains at its top some of the original limestone facing with which most of the pyramids were covered. This Tura limestone was greatly coveted by local builders, who denuded the pyramids for their building needs.

To the east of Khafre's pyramid stands the giant Sphinx. It has the face of Khafre and the body of a crouching lion. It is 73 metres long and 20 metres high. The body was carved out of the solid rock that stood there on the site and the feet are made of bricks.

The enigmatic face of the Sphinx

Khafre's face with a lion's body standing guard

Menkaure's Pyramid

Menkaure's pyramid compared to Khafre's and Khufu's

Menkaure (Greek:"Mycerinus") was the builder of the third and much smaller pyramid of the Gizeh group. This pyramid occupies less than a quarter of the area covered by Khufu's pyramid. Its height was 66 metres when built. The upper portion was faced with white Tura limestone, but the lower sixteen layers were dressed with red granite from Aswan. Some of these layers have not been smoothed, thus indicating the method used to build all the pyramids, whereby all the facing was placed in position in the rough and then smoothed in sequence from the top down. The unsmoothed layers suggest that Menkaure died before his pyramid was quite finished.

Exterior roughness beneath the limestone facing

Pyramid of Menkaure (Mycerinus) at Giza

Building the Pyramids

Construction ramp remnants at Karnak temple pylon

How did the Pharaohs build these giant edifices and manoeuvre these huge stones into position? Ideas about ingenious mechanical devices, UFO's, helicopters, or so-called pyramid power, are sheer speculation. There are no inscriptions, no wall paintings, to tell us how the pyramids were built. We have only one real clue, and that is from the first pylon of the temple of Karnak. The stones for this structure were dragged into position up a ramp made of sun-dried bricks. We know this because many of the bricks are still in position.

How long did it take to build a pyramid? Herodotus states, "The work went on in three-monthly shifts, 100,000 men in a shift. It took ten years of this oppressive slave labour to build the track along which the blocks were hauled ... To build the pyramid itself took twenty years."

Karnak pylon above the ramp remnants

The old mudbrick ramp closeup

Pyramid construction model with a single ramp

We know, however, that the Bent Pyramid was built in about two years. Inscriptions at the foot of the pyramid and half way up, judged by the dates of the king which are given, are only one year apart, so Khufu's pyramid may have been built in three or four years. Herodotus’ figure may be exaggerated but Dr. Mark Lehner recently excavated a huge bakery near the pyramids. He found a hearth, dough vats and bread pots. He estimates that the bakery was capable of producing enough bread to feed 30,000 workmen each day.

There are the remains of about eighty pyramids in Egypt. None match the magnitude of the Gizeh group. Subsequent pyramids were made of smaller, roughly shaped stones, or even rubble, and faced with smooth limestone blocks. Nevertheless, thieves broke into all the pyramids and stole their treasures and the bodies of their kings.

Pyramid construction model with multiple ramps

The Bent Pyramid showing its damage

The leafy green fields of the Faiyum

Faiyum Oasis

The Twelfth Dynasty of Egypt had some powerful kings who developed the Faiyum, a fertile oasis supporting some two million people. The kings of this dynasty also built pyramids for their burials but they were of inferior construction. There were no more large pyramids built after the end of this dynasty.

The 12th Dynasty ruled for about 200 years and early scholars dated the commencement of that dynasty to about 2,000 BC, but recently some scholars have questioned this date. Proposed revisions based on scholarly analysis, would in fact synchronise the slavery of Israel with the 12th Dynasty and the Exodus early in the 13th Dynasty, for which there is significant archaeological evidence.

Even today this canal is known as Bar Yusef meaning Joseph's Canal

12th Dynasty temple relief on exhibit at the R.O.M.

Chronological Revolution

Archaeologist David Rohl's exciting book sold out in hardcover

Peter James and four other scholars, in “Centuries of Darkness”, published 1991, claim that the dates of Ancient Egyptian history need to be reduced by some 250 years. (Page 318).

In his forward to this book Colin Renfrew, Professor of Archaeology at Cambridge University wrote:

“I feel that their critical analysis is right and that a chronological revolution is on its way”. (Page XVI).

David Rohl in his book “A Test of Time” published in 1995, proposes an even more drastic reduction.

Such a reduction could mean that the Biblical stories of Joseph, the migration of Jacob and his family to Egypt, and their subsequent slavery to Pharaoh, would have occurred during the 12th Dynasty, and for that there seems to be some significant archaeological evidence.

Were some Egyptian dynasties contemporaneous, or only successive?

Revised Egyptian Chronology compared to the Traditional Chronology

Exodus from Kahun

Sir Flinders Petrie excavated in the Faiyum from 1880 onwards and in 1986 Dr Rosalie David of the Manchester Museum reviewed his work there. She published this review in "The Pyramid Builders of Ancient Egypt". Chapter 7 is titled "The Foreign Population at Kahun".

On page 191 she wrote:

"It is apparent that the Asiatics were present in the town (Kahun) in some numbers and this may have reflected the situation elsewhere in Egypt. It can be stated that these people were loosely classed as `Asiatics', although their exact homeland in Syria or Palestine cannot be determined ... The reason for their presence remains unclear".

Dr. Rosalie David and her book on the Kahun Exodus

Both Petrie and David assumed the traditional dates and did not associate these migrants with the Israelites, but by the revised dates the Israelites’ identification would be obvious.

One curious discovery made by Petrie was of large "wooden boxes ... underneath the floors of many houses at Kahun. They contained babies, sometimes buried two or three to a box, and aged only a few months at death". This would be consistent with the record, that Pharaoh decreed that all the male children were to be killed at birth, (Exodus 1:16), though some mothers managed to protect their babes until they were a few months old, (Exodus 2:3).

Home burial boxes for Israelite babies

Israel fled Egypt under God's command

The most striking feature of this slavery was their sudden disappearance from the scene.
David wrote, (page 199)

"The quantity, range and type of articles of everyday use which were left behind in the houses may indeed suggest that the departure was sudden and unpremeditated".

Baby Moses rescued from the bulrushes by Sobekneferu

Nile fertility god, Hapi

But when Moses was 40 years old he murdered an Egyptian who was ill-

treating an Israelite. When Pharaoh heard of the incident Moses was obliged to flee. This left Amenemhat without an heir. When his daughter died the dynasty came to an end, to be replaced by the 13th Dynasty.

Plagues Strike Egypt

Nile River turns to blood in the ten plagues of Egypt

During the 13th dynasty, the ten plagues fell upon Egypt and the Exodus took place. The Pharaoh of the Exodus could have been Neferhotep I, who was the last king before the Hyksos entered Egypt.

These plagues, as described in Exodus 7 to 12, must have devastated Egypt. A sage by the name of Ipuwer wrote on a papyrus a description of conditions at the time. This papyrus was found at Memphis, and is now in the Leiden Museum in Holland. In part it says: "Plague stalks through the land and blood is everywhere ... Nay, but dead men are buried in the river ... Nay, but the river is blood ... the stranger people from without are come into Egypt ... Nay, but corn hath perished everywhere". The Ancient Egyptians, pages 95-99.
A plague of blood is described in Exodus 7:14-24.

Flies and locusts plaguing the nation of Egypt

Egypt's cattle died from the hail and from disease

Ipuwer's Papyrus records the plight of Egypt

The strangers would be the Hyksos who invaded the land at this time. Quoting from Manetho, Josephus wrote,

"There was a king of ours whose name was Timaus. Under him it came to pass, I know not how, that God was averse to us, and there came, after a surprising manner, men of ignoble birth out of the eastern parts, and had boldness enough to make an expedition into our country, and with ease subdued it by force, yet without our hazarding a battle with them".

Egypt usually maintained a well-trained standing army. It is hard to explain how the Hyksos could occupy Egypt without a battle, unless the Egyptian army had been destroyed in the Red Sea. (Exodus 14:28). Whatever the reason, the dark ages had fallen upon the land of Egypt.

The Ipuwer Papyrus in the Leiden Museum

Leiden Papyrus number 344 style of script