The pyramid at Giza is the world's largest pyramid.
The pyramids of Egypt are mammoth structures that were built as tombs for the country's ruling pharaohs. One hundred and thirty-eight of these structures are in existence in the country, with the largest at Giza. The Pyramid of Khufu is the only one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World still standing. For years, mystery has surrounded the question of how the ancients built the pyramids.
Manpower
The building of the pyramids in Egypt came down to brute manpower. Between 20,000 to 30,000 men took 23 years to build the Great Pyramid at Giza. And contrary to popular opinion, it was freedmen and not slaves who were involved in the construction, according to Donald Redford, professor of classics and ancient Mediterranean studies at Penn State. Redford says that the peasants who worked on the buildings were given incentives such as tax breaks, in addition to free housing, food and clothing.
Materials
Limestone was used to build the pyramid's core, while a finer quality limestone would be used to complete the outer layers. Other materials such as granite and basalt were used for the capstone (the tip of the pyramid), which was sometimes plated in gold. Pink granite would be used for the interior walls, while basalt or alabaster would be used for floors.
Tools
Workmen used a variety of tools for cutting out the blocks used to build the pyramids, including copper pickaxes and chisels, granite hammers and dolerite pounders. The limestone used for the core was quarried at sites close to the buildings and the individual blocks were marked out with enough space between each of them to allow for a worker to get down and cut the limestone. The finer limestone was a different task and had to be quarried farther afield with the stone often located deeper underground. Normally huge chunks were removed first and then cut into smaller blocks that were then dragged by oxen to the building sites. Granite and the materials came from even farther away and was transported from quarries on Nile barges.
Transportation
Stones were dragged from one place to another on a lubricated slipway. Evidence for this, according to Redford, comes from a scene illustrated on a 19th century B.C Egyptian tomb that shows a statue being pulled by 173 men with someone lubricating the ground as they go.
Completion
In order to get the large stones into place once they were at the building, site ramps were built out of mud brick that was then covered in plaster chips, which resulted in a hardening of the surface. The stones would then be dragged up these ramps and then dropped into place. The ramp would then be raised level by level until the pyramid was completed.
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