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Rising from the ruins
Posted on Friday, October 03, 2008 (CDT) by Thoth
 Recent studies have pointed to a fourth pyramid that was built during the fourth dynasty of ancient Egypt. Local authorities are already talking about plans to open it to visitors next year. Can anybody lose a pyramid in Egypt? Apparently, yes, in a place called Abu Rawash, some 8km north of Giza where the country’s great pyramids are.
Recently, media members who congregated in Giza, in the south-west of the capital Cairo in northern Egypt, found themselves coming face to face with an Egyptian man on a mission. Dr Zahi Hawass, the secretary-general of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities, declared that by next year, he wants all the pyramids to be opened to the public.
“Anyone who comes to Egypt will be able to go and see Abu Rawash, which will be opened to the public,” he said at a press conference in May, during which newsmen were treated to an abridged version of The History Channel’s new documentary, The Lost Pyramid.
But, really, how can anyone miss a pyramid? After all, it is one of those massive stone structures hundreds of feet tall, right?
The fact is, even though
there are more than 80 of these burial monuments along the Nile River,
they are all in various states of ruin, with some barely recognisable
as pyramids. Indeed, some resemble little more than mounds of sand.
The most well-known, of
course, are the three located on the Giza Plateau, constructed by the
fourth-dynasty pharaohs of Egypt’s Old Kingdom, more than 4,000 years
ago. Indeed, speak the phrase “pyramids of Egypt”, and most people will
think of these imposing triangular structures.
Built by the pharaoh Khufu,
his son Khafre and his grandson Menkaure, they represent the peak of
pyramid-building, both in size and construction techniques, during
their time.
As Dr Peter Brand, from the
University of Memphis in Tennessee, United States, says in the
aforementioned documentary: “When we think of pyramids we think of the
fourth dynasty, because the best pyramids, the largest pyramids, the
most solidly built ones, and the ones that have survived the test of
time, are all from the fourth dynasty.”
The other son
But Khufu had another son,
Djedefre, who became pharaoh after him, before Khafre. As such, many
people – historians, Egyptologists, archaeologists – reasoned that he,
like his father, must have built a burial monument.
“People have known that
there is, as it were, what I call a ‘fourth’ pyramid ... they knew that
one existed. They knew that Djedefre must have had something,” said
Anthony Geffen, chief executive of Atlantic Productions that made The
Lost Pyramid.
A likely candidate for that
“something” was some ruins – which in modern times was located in a
high-security military zone – in Abu Rawash. There was more than one
theory about what those ruins could have been, including that of a sun
temple, or an incomplete pyramid.
Then in 1995, Swiss
Egyptologist Dr Michael Valloggia learned about the ruins and became
one of the few allowed access to the site. The excavation work that has
been undertaken since then has apparently revealed the true nature of
the site.
According to Dr Hawass, at
Abu Rawash are the remains of a fully constructed pyramid, not an
incomplete one, as some people had contended. There are many indicators
as to its completion, but the final nail on the tomb, so to speak, is
the existence of auxiliary pyramids.
“The discovery of auxiliary
pyramids found near the Abu Rawash pyramid of Djedefre proves that this
pyramid was finished,” said Dr Hawass. More significant than that was
the discovery that the tomb belonged to Djedefre, who built it after
his father had done his.
Later, as he led
journalists on a tour of the Abu Rawash site, archaeologist Hasan Abd
El-Razek told us that Djedefre’s cartouche was found in the burial
chamber. A cartouche in Egyptian hieroglyphics is a figure that
contains characters representing a name. Because of that cartouche, “we
can say this one (pyramid) belonged to him,” he said.
Location, location, location
As we trudged in and around
the ruins, and clambered into the burial chamber, it is not so easy to
believe that this was a pyramid as large and magnificent as the ones in
Giza. In fact, it wasn’t as large as either Khufu’s Great Pyramid or
Kahfre’s.
Yet the excavation indicates that Djedefre’s must have been an amazing testament to Egyptian technology.
The blocks of limestone,
typical building blocks of the Giza tombs, were here angled towards the
centre of the pyramid. This technique, first used on the Step Pyramid,
about 40km away in Saqqara, helped make the tomb more durable and
stable. As if that was not enough, Djedefre’s workers used granite pins
to keep the blocks in place.
But what helped it stand
out, in addition to the outer shell of smooth limestone and a cap of
electrum (seemingly a common feature of the era’s pyramids, it was a
mixture of copper, silver and gold), was the band of polished Aswan
granite around its base.
Not only is granite harder
to cut and shape than the softer limestone, the Aswan quarry was
located hundreds of kilometres to the south. As such, granite was
expensive to acquire, manipulate and transport, and its use was a show
of Djedefre’s power.
This pyramid was
constructed on a rocky outcrop – which also formed its foundation and
internal structure – that rose 120m above the Giza plains. Which, to
the casual observer, may or may not have disguised its short stature,
relative to the Great Pyramid.
Hasan said the height of the pyramid was calculated to be about 65m (the Great Pyramid is 147m tall).
Hasan also pointed out that
it was “smaller than the Great Pyramid. But when we talk about
elevation, the plateau here (in Abu Rawash) is higher than that in
Giza.” As a result, it stood higher than his father’s pyramid.
Twenty years later,
Djedefre’s nephew Menkaure erected his pyramid using his uncle’s tomb
as his template. So if you want to get an idea of what Djedefre’s
burial monument might have looked like, you only need to look at
Menkaure’s.
But why do we not see it now, towering, as it should, over the landscape?
Hasan said historians wrote
of “300 camels filled with stones from this pyramid to be used for the
construction of a nearby village....”
He added that in 1805,
Muhammad Ali, the so-called founder of modern Egypt, “ordered the outer
casing to be chiselled to be used for the villages.” So it seems that
over two centuries ago, Egyptians used the stone blocks to build the
foundations of old Cairo.
Still, what remains is
enough for archaeologists to uncover a more accurate picture of this
family of pharaohs from the fourth dynasty. Perhaps, in a year, others
may get a look at this fascinating piece of Egyptian history – from the
outside.
As Geffen said during the
conference: “I don’t think they’re going to open the pyramid and let
everybody go down into the base of the pyramid ... it’s pretty
treacherous. Anyway, you would ruin it, it’s very fragile.
“So I think ... it would very much be ... a visit to the outside (with) almost nobody being allowed inside.”
That journos like me were
allowed the rare opportunity to tour and take photographs of the
archaeological site is perhaps an indication of things to come for
Egypt’s heritage business. Maybe Abu Rawash really will be opened in
2009, as Dr Zahi Hawass promised.
Copyright: The Star Online
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