| Fact file |
When built: 2589-2566 BC
Height: Originally 146.5m tall - now 137m
Width: Originally 230m, now 227m
Weight: 6.5 million tons
Timescale: 20 years
Area: 52,815 sq m
Number of stones: 2.3 million
Construction material: Limestone and granite
|
|
At around half the height of the Eiffel Tower, the Great Pyramid in Egypt was the world’s tallest building for over 4,000 years. An engineering feat of magnificent scale and astonishing precision, its four triangular sides rise at an angle of 51.5 degrees. Each side of the pyramid meets at the apex – 146.5m above its perfectly level base – they deviate by just half a metre.
An amazing 2.3 million blocks, weighing between two and 70 tons, were all hand-carved to create the structure. As the pyramid rises through more than 200 courses of stone, a network of passages descend at gradual and unfaltering angles into a collection of subterranean galleries and tombs. This is where the master of the project, the Pharaoh king Khufu - also known as Cheops - was laid to rest.
Archaeologists believe that a workforce of up to 25,000 toiled on the project for what they estimate to be 20 years. Just like a modern construction site, they would have included and army of masons, quarrymen, and labourers. But rather than slaves as first imagined, many of them would have been waged.
The Great Pyramid is surrounded by two smaller pyramids, which are attributed as those of Khufu’s son and heir, Kephren, and grandson, Mykerionos.
|
You are not logged in
