The PYRAMIDS of ANCIENT EGYPT

The Egyptian Pyramids are the oldest and only surviving member of the ancient wonders. Today there are about eighty (80) surviving pyramids in Egypt, the three largest and best preserved of these being at Giza, near the city of Cairo. They were built at the beginning of what we call the Old Kingdom, starting around 2560BC (over 4,500 years ago!) The largest of the Pyramids at Giza is the "Great Pyramid" constructed for the pharaoh Khufu. It is 146 metres high and covers more than 52,609 square metres. Historians believe that it took over 100,000 workers and an estimated 2.3 million stone blocks about 20 years to built this pyramid.

Early historians believed that only slaves were used to construct the pyramids but many modern historians now think that the pharaoh Khufu employed people for three months of each year during the time of the Nile's annual flood which made it impossible to farm the land and most of the population was unemployed. By working on Khufu's "Great Pyramid" the people had food and clothing during these periods of inactivity.

The pyramids were built as tombs or burial places for the Egyptian pharaohs or kings. It was very important to the ancient Egyptians to protect the bodies of their pharaohs as they believed in an after-life when they would climb into the sky and join the gods. To keep the mummified body safe the insides of the pyramids were like mazes, with secret doors, dead-end passages and booby-traps.

To help the pharaoh in his after-life jewelry, food, clothes, furniture and even servants and pets were entombed with him. Because of this almost all the tombs and pyramids were ransacked or "burgled" by tomb robbers many thousands of years ago who stole most of the treasures.

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For more information and pictures visit these sites:

The Pyramids	OnLine Adventure - the Pyramids
Pyramids and Temples	The Great Pyramid of Khufu

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