THE PYRAMIDS

Helen        

Language Arts

   02/19/02     

    Can you imagine that about 4,000 years ago people had the intelligence to build a pyramid?  It wasn't even one pyramid, there have been eighty pyramids found.  The Egyptians were very smart and skilled people.  Think of how smart they would have to be to stack about 2,300,000 blocks on top of each other, with so little technology.  Plus, it took about twenty years to make a pyramid, and they only had a limited amount of tools and people per pyramid. 

    The pyramids were built in honor of the kings of Egypt, or their pharaohs.  Although the pyramids were made for the pharaohs, some pyramids have a special chamber just for the pharaoh's wife.  The Egyptians believed that their pharaohs became gods in the afterlife so the pharaoh's tombs were the biggest.  The pharaohs were lucky to have a pyramid in their honor, believe it or not; sometimes people in lower social classes only got a hole in the ground.

    The Egyptians made these pyramids because they believed in life after death.  They also preserved corpses for this reason.  Another reason why they preserved corpses was so that the ka, or the spirit, could travel between our world and the next.  Since life was short on Earth, the Egyptians made their houses of mud; since the afterlife was eternal, the pyramids were made of stone.  In fact, the pyramids were the first buildings made out of only stone.

    All pyramids were located on the west bank of the Nile River.  The pyramids were very big; one of them had about 124 levels.  The biggest pyramid of them all was called the Great Pyramid.  The Great Pyramid was the tallest building in the world for 4,000 years.  It was 146.5 meters (481 feet) high, but today it is only 137 meters (449 feet) high.  Almost twice the size of the Statue of Liberty.  But, over all these years the Great pyramid lost 9.5 meters (31 feet) from the top.

    The ground under a pyramid needed to be perfectly flat.  A slight difference could cause the pyramid to collapse.  The Egyptians used water to make sure the ground was perfectly level.  

    Every pyramid was made of limestone and granite blocks.  Since the granite was harder, they used it to line the chambers on the inside, the limestone was used on the outside of the pyramid.  

    The Egyptians had a very precise way of placing each and every block.  Did you know that every block had the name of the team who worked on it?  And that every block was numbered by where it would be placed?  These blocks weighed two or three tons each and they couldn't have any more than four or five men per block.  They could have had fifty men per block but, to make the pyramid in so little time, they needed fewer people per block because they only had about 5,000 people or less.

    The only resources that they had back then were simple machines.  To make the pyramids, they used the lever, inclined plain, wedge, wheel, pulley, and the screw.  Most of these tools were made out of copper or dolerite, (which is a very hard stone) with a wooden handle.  Metalworkers fixed the worn tools and also made new ones.

    To transport the blocks on top of each other, the Egyptians built a ramp (made out of mud and water,) around the perimeter of the pyramid.  To make it easier to slide the blocks in place the men probably poured olive oil or water over the blocks.

    There were many things inside each pyramid.  One of the rooms, called the storage room, had all of the pharaoh's prized possessions.  For example, some of the clothes he or she wore, some of the jewelry he or she wore.  The Egyptians even put a boat in the pyramid so that the ka could travel to the next world. All of the rooms were fifteen feet below the surface.  On the east side of the pyramid was a false door,  which the ka traveled through.  There was also a false burial chamber to fool thieves.  The Egyptians used portcullises, (granite doors built into the walls of the pyramid,) to seal the tomb after the burial.

    The Egyptians are known for these amazing monuments.  It took a lot of time and energy to make the pyramids.  We have so much technology these days, I doubt that anyone in the 19th century could even imagine making a pyramid.

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If you are looking for more information on the pyramids, here are some books and internet sites that I used.

Science in Ancient Egypt by: Geraldine Woods

Pyramid by: David McCauley

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/pyramid/