Who Was Pharaoh Khufu?
that Khufu was one of Sneferu's sons from his first wife, Queen Hetepheres I. Despite this, some historians still repeat what James Henry Breasted wrote about his belief that Khufu was a leader from the Minya region based on the existence of a country called Menat-Khufu, i.e. Khufu's nanny.
However, it is an established fact that Menat-Khufu was only one of the estates he inherited from his father, called Menat-Sneferu, which he changed its name to Menat-Khufu and the full royal name of King Khufu as it appears on the royal cartouche Ḫnum-Ḫwfw (Ḫwfw).
Khufu's Rise to Power and His Foreign Expeditions
Khufu took the throne of Egypt and reaped the fruits of his father's reforms. If we take a look at his various works, we realize that the construction policy that Sneferu had laid the foundation for continued. His name is found in many countries of Egypt, whether in the Delta or in Upper Egypt, and he also sent expeditions to Wadi Maghareh to bring turquoise and possibly copper from there.
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| The Fourth Dynasty of Ancient Egypt: The Era of King Khufu |
Khufu’s Trade with Byblos and Lebanon
The foreign trade of Egypt, especially with the Phoenician coast, was prosperous, and it is very likely that an Egyptian community has resided in the city of Byblos, north of present-day Beirut, since the days of the Second Dynasty, and Sneferu was interested in building his ships from Oak wood and Cedrus libani wood, and used it in his buildings, but at least since the time of Khufu, an Egyptian temple was built in the center of Byblos, to which those who came after him added, as stones were found from it bearing his name and their names.
Why Is the Great Pyramid So Famous?
But these various works were not the reason for immortalizing his name in history throughout the generations. Rather, it was his pyramid that he built on the Giza plateau, known as the Great Pyramid, which is still standing intact and defying time, capturing our admiration today as it captured the admiration of all ancient peoples. People recognize today as they did yesterday that it is not only one of the seven wonders of the world, but it is the most important of them because it is still alone throughout the generations.
How Was the Great Pyramid of Giza Built?
Sneferu's engineers spent nearly a quarter of a century constructing his pyramids and the tombs of his family and senior officials, during which time they supplemented their great experience in the construction of pyramids. When the day came when they started building the pyramid of his son Khufu, they wanted to make it greater than his father's pyramids, not only in size, but also in design, in the ratio between its parts, and in the complete perfection of the art of construction.
How Many Blocks Were Used in the Great Pyramid?
If we want to describe the pyramid briefly, we mention that it occupies an area of no less than thirteen Feddan ( 1Feddan = 4200 square meters) and that they used in its construction no less than 2,300,000 blocks of stone cut from quarries in the plateau itself, some of which weigh more than eight tons and others (the upper part of the pyramid) weigh less than one ton.
The height of the pyramid is 146 meters and the length of the side of its base is 230 meters, but all of this is dwarfed by our admiration for the accuracy of the Egyptians in that distant era and their superiority in the art of construction and its miraculous reach in adjusting angles and dimensions. The visitor will be even more impressed if he visits its interior and makes his way through those low-height roads, then finds himself in that elevated hallway and finally stands looking at the sarcophagus of King Khufu in the burial chamber.
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| the Great Pyramid of Giza |
Changes in the Pyramid’s Design During Construction
When Khufu's engineers began to build this pyramid, the original design was not the current building we see in front of us, but it was less than it. His burial chamber was not inside the building, but was cut into the rock and led to it by a sloping corridor in the ground, and during the work they changed the design and increased the building and the burial chamber became inside the building itself, which is now mistakenly known as the queen's chamber.
For the second time, they changed the design, and the engineers made the grand hallway that leads to the burial chamber.
The Pyramid Complex: Temples, Causeways, and Satellite Pyramids
The entire pyramid was covered on the outside with white limestone cladding cut from the quarries of Tura on the eastern shore of the Nile and had a large funerary temple on its eastern side, the remains of which still exist, most notably its floor of black Diorite Rock cut from quarries north of Lake Qarun in Fayoum.
Some of the walls of this temple were inscribed, and some of them were found in the excavations of the Antiquities Authority in 1938, and on the eastern side of the temple they built a huge bridge that descended from the edge of the plateau to the valley, and they used this bridge to be the road to the valley temple, which may have been located under the current houses of Nazlet El-Semman.
There was a small pyramid on the southern side of Khufu's pyramid that was demolished and its stones were removed long ago, and they also cut large places in the rock in which they placed large wooden ships to be at the king's disposal when he made the day and night journeys with the sun god Ra and for various purposes when crossing rivers and lakes in the other world.
The Solar Boats of Khufu
Excavations long ago uncovered three of these boat places on the eastern side of the pyramid. In the summer of 1954, two more were found on the southern side, and the huge stones with which they had roofed one of them were lifted, revealing a large Cedrus libani boat in good condition, with all its oars, ropes, and a seating compartment. oars, ropes, and a seating compartment.
We now know that this boat is forty-three and a half meters long, with a bow height of five meters and a stern height of seven meters. The Palermo Stone from the time of Sneferu himself mentions the construction of many ships, each of which was a hundred cubits long, which is more than fifty-two meters.
The idea of boats in the vicinity of the pyramids was not new to archaeologists.) two on the eastern side and a third beside the road to the Wadi Temple). We also know of at least five in the vicinity of his son Khafre's pyramid.
Some wooden boats were found in the vicinity of Senusret III at Dahshur, two in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo and a third in a museum in Chicago, USA, but they are much smaller in size and quality of workmanship, and Khufu's boats are not the oldest we know of, as we know of this type of boat in the vicinity of the First Dynasty tombs at Saqqara and Helwan.
But although the idea was not new to archaeologists, the new discovery is of importance that cannot be underestimated, and this discovery will not only increase our knowledge of shipbuilding and carpentry in that distant era, but our knowledge will increase greatly from the study of the various materials found at the site and used with the ship.
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| Sun boat |
What Is the True Purpose of the Solar Boat?
This ship is often mentioned as the sun boat or the sun ship, but we must be wary of this name; because we have absolutely nothing to prove that it was one of the two ships of the journey of the sun, but there is more than one evidence that indicates the opposite and that it was one of the seven or eight ships mentioned in the pyramid texts associated with the king's journey after his death in the other world, because the specialized sun ships had a special shape and contained special religious symbols erected in them, and all this was not available in the discovered ship.
How Long Did It Take to Build the Pyramid?
As for the time it took to build this pyramid, we only know what the Greek historian Herodotus said he heard from the Egyptian priests that it took ten years to build the lower parts and the ascending corridors, and that it took twenty years to build the pyramid itself, and the number of workers was one hundred thousand working three months a year.
But historians are skeptical about the veracity of this story, because Herodotus did not hear it until more than two thousand years after the pyramid was built, and his interlocutors were only minor priests, and they are no more knowledgeable than the current Tour guide we see around the pyramid, if not less knowledgeable than them.
The priests told him the stories that the people were telling him, some of which are unbelievable, but despite this, architects have studied the subject and are convinced that it took at least as long to build the pyramid. As for the number of laborers, it may be true that they were brought in at the time of the flood, while the specialized quarrymen and sculptors worked throughout the year.
Were Pyramid Builders Slaves or Paid Workers?
Herodotus also told us that Khufu was cruel to his people and that he mocked the people without mercy, which is why they hated and envied him, but whether this is true or not, we have not found any texts that prove it. We often read some writers' scathing criticism of the slave labor in the construction of the pyramid, and of rulers who drain the blood of the people in order to achieve things that are of no benefit to the people, but only to the ruler himself to boast about them.
Others wanted to defend the ancient Egyptians, saying that Khufu and other kings used to build pyramids to help the unemployed in the months of the flood when the fields are covered with water, so there are fewer job opportunities and scarce food for the poor who did not prepare for those days, so the construction of pyramids was a humanitarian act because it guarantees them food and drink.
Both views are far from correct because we cannot judge the past by the logic of the present age, or by its teachings and opinions.
Ancient Egyptian Views on the King and Labor
The king in Egypt was a god worshipped by his people, a god like other gods in heaven, but he was content to live on earth in order to rule it and make the people happy with his presence among them.
If we put this in our minds, we would realize that many people, especially those living in remote villages far from the cities, would have been pleased to have an opportunity in the days of the flood, and at the same time days of financial distress, to visit the capital, whose wonders they had always heard about, and to see the temples of the gods and the palaces of the great ones.
They were undoubtedly pleased to contribute to doing something for their god, hoping that it would be an offering and mercy for them, and the poor commoners were pleased to ensure that they would not be in need during their stay in the capital.
Tombs Around the Great Pyramid: Family and Officials
Khufu allowed the tombs of those close to his family, courtiers and senior officials to be built close to his pyramid to be around him in the afterlife, as they were around him in their world, thus guaranteeing themselves a happy immortal life. They dedicated the eastern side of the pyramid to his family members, so you see in the first row near its eastern side three small pyramids for three of his wives, and then we see the tombs of his sons, brothers and other family members in rows until the tombs reach the edge of the plateau.
Some of his brothers (such as Hemiunu, a son of Sneferu who supervised the construction of Khufu's pyramid during one of the periods of its construction and others with a large number of courtiers and employees were buried on the western side of the pyramid in rows with straight roads between them.
Most of these tombs were looted by thieves in ancient and modern times, but many important artifacts remained, especially inscriptions, statues, etc. There is evidence that the pyramid itself was opened and looted during the period of weakness that afflicted Egypt during the First Period, i.e. the aftermath of the Old Kingdom.
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| The pyramids of the three wives of King Khufu |
The Conflict Between Khufu’s Sons
We see in both tombs, especially the eastern one, the traces of the bitter conflict between the sons of Khufu, and among them are many tombs that were not built or whose walls were not inscribed, and among them are inscriptions that erased the names and images of their owners. The conflict is summarized in the fact that Khufu married more than one wife and had sons from each of them, and the conflict between the sons, supported by their mothers and some courtiers, appeared to take over the throne. From one of the tombs in the eastern necropolis, the tomb of Queen Meresankh III, we can learn some aspects of this tragedy.
We see Meresankh III and her mother wearing clothes that differ from the clothes of Egyptian women, and the color of her hair is also different, as it is blond with some redness and her eyes are blue, which is why George Andrew Reisner believed that there is northern blood in her, meaning that she may have been the descendant of one of the houses that settled on the North African coast in that era and had migrated there from her original homeland in northern Europe.
Whether or not it is true that this queen was of Libyan descent through her mother, we do know that her mother, Princess Hetepheres II, was the wife of Crown Prince Kawab, whose brother, Djedefra, had arranged to have him killed in order to take the throne.
Djedefra was the son of a second wife who may have been of Libyan descent from the same branch as Hetepheres II and her daughter. He succeeded in his plot and took the throne, and Hetepheres II took Kawab's wife to be one of his wives. Hetepheres II did not give birth to a son for the new king, while this son was born to another wife, and Hetepheres II became one of the secondary wives.
Finally, after eight years, Djedefra disappeared from the scene and a brother named Khafre took over the throne of Egypt. He had married the daughter of Kawab and Hetepheres II's second daughter, Meresankh III.
But the conflict between the two branches of the family did not end there, as we realize from the Turin Papyrus and the history of Manetho that this other branch managed at least twice to seize the throne for a short period, one after the death of Khafre and before his son Menkaure was able to regain his father's throne.
And the second time in the late days of the family after the death of Shepseskaf, the last of its recognized kings, as most of the texts of that family and the documents written in the following eras considered those kings belonging to the other branch as usurpers of the throne and did not mention their names, and only mentioned the names of Khafre, Menkaure and Shepseskaf.
Forgotten Pharaohs of the Fourth Dynasty
In 1950, an inscription was discovered on a rock in Wadi Hammamat in which the names of some of the kings of the Fourth Dynasty were listed in a royal box. Although the date of writing this inscription cannot be earlier than the Twelfth Dynasty, it depicts at least what was known about the succession of the kings of the Fourth Dynasty in the Middle Kingdom.
The order of these kings in the Wadi al-Hammamat inscription is as follows: Khufu, Djedefre. Khafre, Djedefhor, and finally Bau-f-Râ. That is, in the period after Khafre's death, not one but two people took the throne, the first of whom, Djedefhor, we know from many documents, as he was a son of Khufu and was famous for his wisdom and has a tomb in Giza, while the second does not have a known tomb in Giza.
King Djedefre reigned for only eight years and had not finished his pyramid when he died.
Djedefre’s Rise and His Pyramid at Abu Rawash
Djedefre did not build his pyramid close to his father's pyramid, but chose a spot north of the Giza Plateau in an excellent location overlooking the valley near the current village of Abu Rawash, and his pyramid was not the first tomb to be built there, but the area was known since the days of the First Dynasty and had several tombs from the First and Second Dynasties.
In the vicinity of the pyramid building, some tombs were cut into the rock, and others were built for a number of his employees.
Written by H. Moses
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References
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- Breasted, James Henry. A History of Egypt: From the Earliest Times to the Persian Conquest. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1905.
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