History of the Pyramids

The pyramids were built by the pharaohs of Ancient Egypt, or better, by a huge number of people working for them. Although pyramid building spread through a long time period, the most important ones are from the rule of 3^rd and 4^th Dynasty of the Old Kingdom [for the history of Ancient Egypt, click here]. The first major pyramid was designed for the 3^rd dynasty pharaoh Djoser by the famous architect Imhotep. It is of step-like shape and hence called Step pyramid. Two unsuccessful attempts followed: the pyramids of pharaohs Sekhemkhet and (possibly) Khaba have never been finished. This bad fate by no means intimidated Sneferu, the first king of the 4^th dynasty, who erected three edifices, smooth-faced, all of them about 100 meters high, in 24 years of his reign. This makes him the most efficient pyramid builder ever. In terms of height and volume of a single object, the culmination was achieved under his son Khufu; his 147 meters high Great pyramid at Giza was going to be the highest man-made structure for more than four millenia. Khafre, at Giza as well, ended at just few meters less, although his pyramid is a bit steeper. After that, the pyramids did not pass half that height. Menkaure added his 65 m tall pyramid to the Giza complex. The pyramids of 4^th dynasty differ from others in the lack of interior decoration, but the Giza ones were supposedly covered with inscriptions on the faces. This can no longer be seen since the casing stones were stripped in the Middle Ages and used as building material. By now mentioned pyramids were constucted of limestone and other hard material. Therefore many of them are preserved in a relatively good condition, in spite of having been stripped. On the contrary, the Middle Kingdom pyramids were made of mud bricks, and have deteriorated badly during the time. Still, these edifices are special since they incorporated blind passages, trap doors and similar security measures not seen before. All together, there are about 25 major pyramids (including unfinished) dated to the Old Kingdom and about 10 to the Middle Kingdom.

Links

More info on pyramids

The pyramids buliders - a more detailed overview of Old Kingdom pyramids

Proceede to Pyramids as tombs.