Volume of an Egyptian pyramid. The Pyramid of Cheops is the largest pyramid in Egypt. Late pyramids in the Sneferu complex

Unsolved mysteries There are fewer and fewer people on our planet every year. Constant improvement of technology, collaboration of scientists from various fields of science reveals to us the secrets and mysteries of history. But the secrets of the pyramids still defy understanding - all discoveries give scientists only tentative answers to many questions. Who built the Egyptian pyramids, what was the construction technology, is there a curse of the pharaohs - these and many other questions still remain without an exact answer.

Description of the Egyptian pyramids

Archaeologists talk about 118 pyramids in Egypt, partially or completely preserved to this day. Their age ranges from 4 to 10 thousand years. One of them - Cheops - is the only surviving “miracle” from the “Seven Wonders of the World”. The complex called the “Great Pyramids of Giza”, which includes and, was also considered as a participant in the “New Seven Wonders of the World” competition, but was withdrawn from participation, since these majestic structures are actually a “wonder of the world” on the ancient list.

These pyramids have become the most visited excursion sites in Egypt. They are perfectly preserved, which cannot be said about many other buildings - time has not been kind to them. And local residents contributed to the destruction of the majestic necropolises, removing the cladding and breaking out stones from the walls to build their houses.

Egyptian pyramids were built by pharaohs who ruled from the 27th century BC. e. and later. They were intended for the repose of rulers. The enormous scale of the tombs (some reaching almost 150 m in height) was supposed to testify to the greatness of the buried pharaohs; things that the ruler loved during his lifetime and that would be useful to him in his lifetime were also placed here. afterlife.

For construction, stone blocks of various sizes were used, which were hollowed out of the rocks, and later brick began to serve as material for the walls. The stone blocks were ground and adjusted so that a knife blade could not slip between them. The blocks were stacked on top of each other with an offset of several centimeters, which formed a stepped surface of the structure. Almost all Egyptian pyramids have a square base, the sides of which are oriented strictly to the cardinal points.

Since the pyramids performed the same function, that is, they served as the burial place of the pharaohs, their structure and decoration are similar inside. The main component is the burial hall, where the sarcophagus of the ruler was installed. The entrance was not located at ground level, but several meters higher, and was masked with facing slabs. Stairs and passages-corridors led from the entrance to the inner hall, which sometimes narrowed so much that they could only be walked on squatting or crawling.

In most necropolises, burial halls (chambers) are located below ground level. Ventilation was carried out through narrow shaft-channels that penetrated the walls. Rock paintings and ancient religious texts are found on the walls of many pyramids - in fact, from them scientists draw some of the information about the construction and owners of burials.

The main mysteries of the pyramids

The list of unsolved mysteries begins with the shape of the necropolises. Why was the pyramid shape chosen, which is translated from Greek as “polyhedron”? Why were the edges located clearly in the cardinal directions? How were huge stone blocks moved from the excavation site and how were they raised to great heights? Were the buildings built by aliens or people in possession of a magic crystal?

Scientists even argue over the question of who built such tall monumental structures that stood for thousands of years. Some believe that they were built by slaves, who died by the hundreds of thousands during the construction of each. However, new discoveries by archaeologists and anthropologists convince us that the builders were free people who received good food and medical care. They made such conclusions based on the composition of the bones, the structure of the skeletons and the treated injuries of the buried builders.

Mystical coincidences were attributed to all deaths and deaths of people involved in the exploration of the Egyptian pyramids, which provoked rumors and talk about the curse of the pharaohs. There is no scientific evidence for this. Perhaps the rumors were started to scare away thieves and looters who wanted to find valuables and jewelry in the graves.

To the mysterious interesting facts The short time frame for the construction of the Egyptian pyramids can be attributed to this. According to calculations, large necropolises with that level of technology should have been built in no less than a century. How, for example, was the Cheops pyramid built in just 20 years?

Great Pyramids

This is the name of the funeral complex near the city of Giza, consisting of three large pyramids, a huge statue of the Sphinx and small satellite pyramids, probably intended for the wives of rulers.

The original height of the Cheops pyramid was 146 m, the side length was 230 m. It was built in 20 years in the 26th century BC. e. The largest of Egypt's landmarks has not one, but three burial chambers. One of them is below ground level, and two are above the base line. Intertwining corridors lead to the burial chambers. Along them you can go to the chamber of the pharaoh (king), to the queen's chamber and to the lower hall. The Pharaoh's Chamber is a chamber made of pink granite, measuring 10x5 m. It contains a granite sarcophagus without a lid. Not a single report by scientists contained information about the mummies found, so it is unknown whether Cheops was buried here. By the way, the mummy of Cheops was not found in other tombs.

It still remains a mystery whether the Cheops pyramid was used for its intended purpose, and if so, then apparently it was plundered by looters in past centuries. The name of the ruler, by whose order and design this tomb was built, was learned from the drawings and hieroglyphs above the burial chamber. All other Egyptian pyramids, with the exception of Djoser, have a simpler engineering design.

Two other necropolises in Giza, built for the heirs of Cheops, are somewhat more modest in size:

Tourists travel to Giza from all over Egypt, because this city is actually a suburb of Cairo, and all transport interchanges lead to it. Travelers from Russia usually travel to Giza as part of excursion groups from Sharm el-Sheikh and Hurghada. The trip is long, 6-8 hours one way, so the excursion usually lasts 2 days.

The great buildings are accessible to visitors only during working hours, usually until 17:00, in the month of Ramadan - until 15:00. It is not recommended for asthmatics, as well as people suffering from claustrophobia, nervous and cardiovascular diseases, to enter inside. Be sure to take drinking water and hats with you on the excursion. The excursion fee consists of several parts:

Entrance to the complex.
Entrance inside the pyramid of Cheops or Khafre.
Entrance to the museum Solar boat, on which the body of the pharaoh was transported across the Nile.

With the Egyptian pyramids in the background, many people like to take photos while sitting on camels. You can bargain with camel owners.

Pyramid of Djoser

The first pyramid in the world is located in Saqqara, near Memphis, the former capital of Ancient Egypt. Today, the pyramid of Djoser is not as attractive to tourists as the necropolis of Cheops, but at one time it was the largest in the country and the most complex in terms of engineering design.

The funeral complex included chapels, courtyards, and storage facilities. The six-step pyramid itself does not have a square base, but a rectangular one, with sides 125x110 m. The height of the structure itself is 60 m, inside it there are 12 burial chambers, where Djoser himself and members of his family were supposedly buried. The pharaoh's mummy was not found during excavations. The entire territory of the complex, 15 hectares in size, was surrounded by a 10 m high stone wall. Currently, part of the wall and other buildings have been restored, and the pyramid, which is approximately 4700 years old, has been preserved quite well.

MOSCOW, November 2 – RIA Novosti. Physicists have found a previously unknown void area in the Cheops pyramid that may be a secret tomb or a passage into it, according to a paper published in the journal Nature.

“When we saw this area of emptiness, we realized that we had come across something very interesting and big, we abandoned all other projects and concentrated on studying this area, located directly above the corridor to the tomb of Cheops. Now we are sure that it really exists, and this "This is the first discovery of its kind in the Cheops pyramid since the Middle Ages, when it was opened by Caliph Al-Mamun in the 9th century," said Mehdi Tayoubi from the HIP Institute in Paris (France).

Physicists have found two “unknown voids” in the Cheops pyramidArchaeologists and physicists have discovered two, as they put it, “previously unknown voids” inside the Cheops pyramid, which may be secret rooms where the remains of Pharaoh Khufu rest.

Secrets of the Pharaohs

The Pyramid of Cheops, one of the Seven Wonders of the World, was built in the middle of the third millennium BC, during the time of Pharaoh Khufu (Cheops), a representative of the fourth dynasty Ancient kingdom, - at the same time as all the “great pyramids” of Ancient Egypt. This structure, 145 meters high and 230 meters wide and long, remains one of the tallest and largest buildings ever created by mankind.

Over the past two centuries, scientists have discovered three rooms in the pyramid, in one of which the pharaoh himself was supposedly buried, in the other his wife, and the third was considered a bait or trap for robbers. In the walls of the corridors that lead to Khufu's tomb, unusual channels and structures were found, which scientists believe are elements of the “security system” that protected the pharaoh from defilers.

The mummies of the pharaoh and his wife were never discovered, which is why many archaeologists believe that in fact their tombs are still hidden in the thickness of the pyramid. Two years ago, scientists from the universities of Nagoya, Paris and Cairo began searching for these secret rooms, studying the pyramid using cosmic particle detectors and telescopes as part of the ScanPyramids project.

Breath of space

Every second in upper layers The Earth's atmosphere produces millions of muons - charged particles resulting from the collision of cosmic rays with gas molecules in the air. These collisions accelerate muons to near-light speeds, thanks to which they penetrate tens and hundreds of meters deep into the surface of the planet. Scientists' measurements show that every square meter of the Earth's surface absorbs about 10 thousand of these particles.

French archaeologists and physicists, together with Japanese scientists, have adapted telescopes that can “see” muons to search for voids and hidden rooms in monuments ancient architecture.

This technique works very simply - the flux of muons decreases in the air and in empty space much more slowly than when passing through rock or earth, which makes it possible to search for secret rooms by bursts in the muon background.

In October last year, participants in the ScanPyramids project announced a sensational discovery - they managed to find several previously unknown voids in the pyramid, which could be the secret tombs of the “lord of two houses” and his wife. This discovery caused sharp rejection among archaeologists and Egyptologists, who accused physicists of incorrectly interpreting the data obtained.

Physics and lyrics

These accusations forced scientists to take repeated measurements using three different muon telescopes. This time, as Tayoubi emphasized, the observations were carried out according to the same rules and principles by which the Higgs boson and other particles unknown to science were searched for at the LHC and other accelerators.

“Our measurements absolutely rule out that this void area could have arisen due to differences in the properties of the stones or due to errors in construction,” says Zahi Hawass. Voids of this size and configuration could not have appeared between the blocks by chance, neither with engineering nor any other technology. "The Egyptians were too good builders to screw up the pyramid, leave a hole in it and create a room or corridor somewhere else," said Hany Helal of Cairo University.

Checking whether this is true or not, scientists installed a set of films sensitive to the action of muons in the supposed tomb of Cheops’s wife, and placed semiconductor particle detectors at the bottom of the pyramid. After a few months, they collected the data, processed it and compared it with how muons should move through the pyramid if there were no other voids in it, except for the already known corridors and rooms.

If the initial results of scanning the Cheops pyramid were erroneous, then, as Elal notes, the “pictures” obtained by different muon telescopes would not match. In fact, they turned out to be the same, which confirmed the assumptions of physicists and refuted the insinuations of archaeologists.

The images showed that above the main corridor of the pyramid there is a zone of emptiness thirty meters long, eight meters high and about two meters wide. As Tayubi noted, it can be either a solid corridor running parallel to the ground, up or down, or a suite of rooms. So far, physicists do not have enough data to rule out the first or second option.

Scientists emphasize that they are not interpreting their discovery in any way and do not claim that they managed to find a secret room - this task, according to them, should be carried out by Egyptologists.

Jean-Baptiste Mouret, a physicist at the University of Paris, hopes his team's discovery will convince Egyptian historians that they were wrong in their assessments and will open the door to debate whether it is worth trying to penetrate this void zone. if yes, how to do it.

A new round of history

In the near future, as scientists noted, they plan to continue studying the void zone, as well as other sections of the Cheops pyramid, including the tomb of the pharaoh himself, and will begin to scan other pyramids that may hide secret rooms and unknown voids.

These data, physicists hope, will help us understand exactly how the pyramids were built and whether we can trust the descriptions of their construction, which have come down to our time in the works of Herodotus.

At the same time, as scientists noted, muon scanners can not reveal all the secrets. ancient history. For example, according to Tayubi, they cannot be used to search for the secret tomb of Nefertiti in the tomb of Tutankhamun, the existence of which was recently announced by the famous British Egyptologist Nicholas Reeves.

“Muon scanners cannot be used to study the tomb of Tutankhamun and other burials in the Valley of the Kings for the reason that we do not know how the voids are distributed in the rocks located above them,” the scientist explained, answering a question from RIA Novosti.

Such research, added Sebastien Procureur, a colleague of Moret, is further complicated by the fact that man-made particle accelerators cannot be used to scan pyramids and other ancient buildings, since delivering them to Giza or the Valley of the Kings would entail unacceptably high costs.

“In short, this is simply not feasible. Muons cannot be created directly - they arise from the decays of kaons and pions, and there are too few particle accelerators in the world capable of accelerating them to the required speeds. In addition, they are all very large - at least 700 meters in length. It would be easier for us to transport the pyramid to such an installation than to try to build it in Giza or other parts of Egypt. Therefore, we have to rely on space in such observations,” the agency’s interlocutor concluded.

The Pyramid of Cheops

The largest pyramid of Ancient Egypt is the Pyramid of Cheops. The volume of this pyramid is approximately 2,521,000 cubic meters. Its base area is 53,000 square meters. The weight of the pyramid is 6,400,000 tons.

Initially, the height of the pyramid was 146.6 meters, but due to the loss of the crowning granite block - the pyramidion - as a result of an earthquake, its height has now decreased by 9.8 meters and is now 137.2 meters. The length of the side of the pyramid is 230 meters. It is made up of approximately 2.3 million stone cubes, stacked in 203 tiers (originally 210). The average weight of a stone is 2.5 tons, but there are also larger ones whose weight reached 15 tons.

The pyramid was built in the 26th century BC. e. Pharaoh Khufu (2590-2568 BC), in Greek his name sounded like “Cheops”. Thus, more three thousand years (before construction cathedral in Lincoln, England, around 1300), the pyramid was the tallest building on Earth. The volume of this pyramid is approximately 2,521,000 cubic meters. Its base area is 53,000 square meters (the area of 10 football fields). The weight of the pyramid is 6,400,000 tons. Its base rests on a natural rocky elevation about 9 m high in the center. The architect of the pyramid is considered to be Hemiun, a vizier and relative of Cheops.

One of the wonders of the world

Already in ancient times, the pyramids of Giza were considered one of the seven “wonders of the world.” The largest of the pyramids was built by Pharaoh Khufu (2590 - 2568 BC), in Greek his name was Cheops. Currently, the height of the pyramid is 138 m, although originally it was 147 m: the top stones fell during earthquakes. The pyramid is made up of 2.5 million limestone blocks of different sizes, weighing an average of 2.5 tons. Initially, it was lined with white sandstone, which was harder than the main blocks, but the lining has not been preserved. At the base of the pyramid lies a square with a side of 230 m, oriented to the cardinal points. According to some legends, the corners of the square symbolize Truth, Reason, Silence and Depth; according to others, the pyramid is based on the four material substances from which the human body is created.

There are no inscriptions or decorations inside the Cheops pyramid, with the exception of a small portrait in the passage leading to the Queen's chamber. This image resembles a photograph on a stone. On the outer walls of the pyramid there are numerous curvilinear grooves of large and small sizes, in which, at a certain lighting angle, one can discern an image 150 meters high - a portrait of a man, apparently one of the deities of Ancient Egypt. This image is surrounded by other images (the trident of the Atlanteans and Scythians, a bird-plane, plans of stone buildings, pyramid rooms), texts, individual letters, large signs resembling a flower bud, etc. On the northern side of the pyramid there is a portrait of a man and a woman with their heads bowed towards each other. These huge images were painted just a few years before the main pyramid was completed and installed in 2630 BC. top stone.

Inside the Cheops pyramid there are three burial chambers, located one above the other. The construction of the first chamber was not completed. It is carved into the bedrock. To get into it, you need to overcome 120 m of a narrow descending corridor. The first burial chamber is connected to the second by a horizontal corridor 35 m long and 1.75 m high. The second chamber is called the “queen’s chamber,” although according to the ritual the wives of the pharaohs were buried in separate small pyramids.

Pyramid of Khafre

The second largest pyramid of Giza belongs to Pharaoh Khafre.

It was built 40 years later than the first. Sometimes it seems that the pyramid of Khafre is even larger than Cheops. It's actually a little smaller. The side of the square base of the Khafre pyramid is 215 meters. Height - 136 meters.

The ensemble of the great pyramids of Giza is completed by the pyramid of Mikerin. Its construction was completed in 2505 BC. This pyramid is significantly smaller than its predecessors. The base side is 108 meters, the original height is 66.5 meters (today - 62).

The burial chamber of the pyramid is carved into its rocky base. The Pyramid of Mikerin emphasizes the greatness of the pyramids of Cheops and Khafre. The latter are not difficult to distinguish from each other: the Pyramid of Khafre has partially preserved white basalt cladding near the top

Many years of research by scientists have shown how the pyramids were created. Stone blocks were cut down in Mount Muqattam on the other side of the Nile. The ancient quarries are still clearly visible. They were then transported by ship to Giza along a canal specially dug for this purpose. Recently, archaeologists found a pier next to the pyramids. The blocks were dragged onto the pyramid along an inclined earthen embankment.

The Great Pyramids are part of the vast necropolis of Giza. Next to them are several small pyramids, where the wives of the pharaohs, tombs of priests and major officials are buried.

Great Sphinx

Not far from the pyramids of Giza there is another famous monument of Ancient Egypt - the Great Sphinx.

Near the lower granite temple, devoid of a roof, lie the ruins of the Sphinx temple. And behind them, the ancient guardian of the pyramids, the Sphinx, a resting lion with the head of a man (Mamluk soldiers shot off his nose), turned his gaze to the east.

The Great Sphinx is a mysterious creature with the body of a lion and the head of a man, carved from solid stone. The length of the Sphinx from the tip of its paws to its tail is 57.3 meters, its height is 20 m. It is believed that the Sphinx was cut down during the construction of the Pyramid of Khafre, and its face bears the features of this pharaoh. According to one version, the Sphinx was fired upon by Napoleon's artillerymen in the last century. According to another, the Mamelukes, who ruled Egypt at one time, fired at the Sphinx from cannons.

In Egypt, during the Middle and New Kingdoms, sphinxes were often depicted with the head of a ram or falcon. For example, in the Karnak Temple a whole alley of ram-headed sphinxes has been preserved. However, the Great Sphinx of Giza is the most ancient of the Egyptian sphinxes. Apparently, the sphinxes played the role of guardians of sacred places. It’s hard to even imagine how many centuries have flown past this proud guardian of antiquity. And each generation settled only as dust from the sands at his paws. How many different faces and peoples he saw! Entire civilizations buried in the sands of oblivion.

Egypt is a country of ancient secrets, still protected by its sphinxes from overly curious eyes, but revealing its secrets to those who seek knowledge.

The Pyramid of Cheops is a rare case in Egyptology when we can be sure who owns the monument. Often the ancient monuments of Egypt were appropriated by later rulers. The technology of appropriation was very simple - the name of the pharaoh-builder (cartouche) was simply lost from the inscriptions in the temple or in the tomb, and another name was knocked out.

This phenomenon was very common. Take, for example, the famous Pharaoh Tutankhamun. Until 1922, when archaeologist Howard Carter dug up, Egyptologists doubted the existence of this ruler. There was almost no written evidence about him; everything was destroyed by subsequent pharaohs.

In the 19th century, archaeologists often used very barbaric research methods. In the Cheops pyramid, gunpowder explosions were used to find hidden rooms. You can still see traces of such methods on the surfaces of structures (see photo on the left).

During this study, small rooms were discovered above the main burial chamber. Explorers rushed there in the hope of finding treasure, but, of course, there was nothing there except dust.

These rooms, only 1 meter in height, had a purely technical purpose. These are unloading chambers; they protect the ceiling of the burial chamber from collapse and relieve mechanical stress. But it was on the walls of these unloading chambers that scientists discovered inscriptions made by ancient builders.

These were block markings. Just as we now put a label on a product, the ancient Egyptian foremen marked the blocks: “This block is for the pyramid of Khufu, produced at that time, laid at that time.” These inscriptions cannot be fake; they prove that this structure was built by Cheops.

A little about Pharaoh Cheops

In the last paragraph we used the name “Khufu”. This is the official Egyptian name of this pharaoh. Cheops is the Greek interpretation of his name, and not the most common one. Other pronunciations “Cheops” or “Kiops” are more common.

The name “Khufu” is more common in the world. If you are going on an excursion to Giza with Russian speaking guide, then there will be no problems, he will be aware of this phonetic difference. But if you communicate with local residents or tourists from other countries, we recommend using the name “Khufu”.

Although Pharaoh Khufu is one of the, it is impossible to write much about him. We know very little about him.

In addition to the fact of the construction of this pyramid, we know that Khufu organized expeditions to develop useful resources in the Sinai Peninsula. That's all. To this day, only two artifacts have survived from Khufu - a giant pyramid 137 meters high and a small ivory figurine only 7.5 centimeters high (pictured on the right).

Pharaoh Cheops remained in people's memory as a tyrant ruler who forced people to work on grandiose construction. We can read about this in the works of the Greek historian Herodotus, who visited Egypt and recorded the stories of the priests.

Surprisingly, his father, Pharaoh Snofru, remained in people's memory as a very kind ruler, although he built as many as three pyramids (and) and overexerted the country twice as much as Cheops.

An amazing fact, but in the ancient Egyptian pyramids there is not a single tomb of ancient rulers. If mummies and remains of human skeletons were found in huge buildings, then they all belong to more later periods, having nothing to do with the era of the pharaohs.

Empty pyramids

In September 2002, a grandiose event took place on the Giza plateau, located in the suburbs of Cairo - the opening of the Cheops pyramid. Previously it was believed that it contained a sarcophagus with the mummy of the second king of the IV dynasty. The infiltration was broadcast to the whole world.

The results were shocking: in none of the three halls were any signs of burial, treasures, amulets or vessels found. The sarcophagus was open and empty. Later studies showed that there were no signs of a mummy inside.

This is not the only disappointment of the servants of science, who previously considered the pyramids to be the burial place of the kings of Egypt. In 2015, scientists from the Paris Institute of Innovation and Cairo University began studying the Bent Pyramid, built in the 26th century. BC e under Pharaoh Snorfu. His name was inscribed on the walls of the structure, so the goal of the expedition was to discover the ruler’s mummy.

The scanning method was used for research cosmic rays, allowing you to detect hidden rooms. The study of the pyramid took four months, after which scientists released information: there are no secret rooms or a pharaoh in the Bent Pyramid.

Valley of the Egyptian Kings

On west coast River Nile, opposite the city of Thebes (the territory of modern Luxor), stretches the Valley of the Kings - the place where the real tombs of the great pharaohs are located. A giant necropolis is hidden in a rocky gorge.

The first burial place in the valley was the tomb of Thutmose I. Shortly before his death, the pharaoh, who feared that his last refuge plundered, gave the order to find a place in the desert hidden from people. The grave was carved into the rocks; the entrance to it was cut out at a height of 30 m above the surface of the gorge. Later, the Valley of the Kings became a shelter for the pharaohs of the XVIII-XX dynasties.

All the tombs were built in the same way: a descending corridor about 200 m long led to rooms whose ceilings and walls were decorated with paintings telling about the afterlife and religious texts. Next, the entrance to the burial chamber opened.

There are 64 tombs of rulers in the Valley of the Kings ancient egypt, buried from the 16th to the 11th centuries. BC e. In 1881, the tomb of Ramesses the Great was discovered here, and in 1922, the burial place of Tutankhamun.