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How pyramids was built?

Updated: 12/22/2022
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12y ago

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they were built by hand. Shortly after coming to the throne the Pharaoh would command his overseer of public works and architects to prepare a burial place in keeping with his status as a god-king, a launching pad to enable his soul to soar from the earth to join the gods and his ancestors in the heavens. The chosen site was usually one on the edge of the cultivated land in an already established pyramid field. The royal survey team set to work marking out the site. Great care was taken in orientating the site to the four points of the compass and in levelling the site to provide a foundation for the pyramid. When the slaves had cleared away the sand and rubble highly skilled masons were called in to level the foundations. This was done by cutting a grid of channels and filling them with water. The rock was then cut back to the water level to make it perfectly flat. Finally the water was drained away and the channels filled with rubble.

At any one time as many as 20,000 workers may have been involved on this massive project. Some of them were free men doing particular tasks such as masons, tool makers, carpenters, scribes and overseers. Many of course were unskilled slave labourers. A town was built for the free workers where they were provided with houses, food, clothing and even medical care. The slaves receive food and shelter in the form of a barracks, far less comfortable than the houses of the skilled workforce. They are naked, too low in status to wear clothes.

From the yawning depression of the quarry come the clink-clink of copper chisels and the thump of rock hammers of the quarry slaves toiling under the hot sun. After the stone blocks are extracted from the quarry face they are lowered onto sledges and a mark is made on the stone by one of the scribes. This aided them to place the blocks in the pyramid just as they came out of the quarry ensuring a better fit than random blocks without further finishing.

From dawn to dusk, gangs of slaves drag the sledges loaded with stones each weighing about two tons to staging areas at the base of the pyramid. Most of the stone blocks proceed up the ramp without future handling. Only a fraction of the stone blocks needed to be cut to precise dimensions by the masons. The slaves begin hauling the loaded sledges slowly up the clay and rubble ramp. Whether it was a single long or spiralling ramp depends on the size of pyramid.

When the sledges reached the working level teams of slaves called setters shifted the blocks from the sledges into their designated positions. These naked men used only simple levers, brute force and experience gained from years of hard labour. Once the stones had been delivered the hauling gang would make their weary way down the ramp carrying their sledge, in order to make the same back breaking journey up as they would several times a day.

Other slaves are employed in maintaining and extending the ramps as the pyramid grew. These ramps are made of rubble, bound together with desert tafla (a type of clay) and laid with planks to ease the passage of the sledges. Rows of slaves are seen breaking up waste material from the quarries, mixing them with the desert tafla clay and loading the finished mixture into baskets. Individual baskets are loaded onto the shoulders of slaves for delivery to the ramp builders on the pyramid.

Granite came from Aswan located 400 miles to the south. Granite was used for the lining of the burial chamber and the internal passage leading to it or in some instances the lower courses of the pyramid. These blocks were the largest in size used on the structure, for example, some of the granite stones used on the Great Pyramid at Giza weighs up to 70 tons. Copper chisels used for quarrying limestone could not be used, a harder material was required. Balls of dolerite, a hard, black igneous rock, were used in the quarries of Aswan to extract the hard granite. This is a place of great heat, dust and noise a hellish place to be sent to work. These dolerite "pounders" were used to pulverize the stone around the edge of the granite block that needed to be extracted. Teams of slaves pound away for weeks in order to expose enough stone for the block to be extracted from the quarry.

At the bottom, they ram wooden pegs into slots they have cut, and fill the slots with water. The pegs will expand and split the rock with a resounding crack much more impressive than anything heard with the softer limestone. With much cursing and sweat the slaves lower the great blocks onto sledges. As many as two hundred slaves, their nude bodies gleaming with sweat, drag the loaded sledges along a causeway to the river where they are loaded unto barges and floated downriver with the current to the pyramid site.

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10y ago
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12y ago

with stones that weigh 80 tones and worked quarter of a billion man hours each day and took 20 years

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they were step pyramids built out of stone


Where were ancient pyramids built?

Ancient Pyramids were built in Egypt and Mexico!


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The pyramids were primarily built in Egypt, with the most famous ones located near Cairo, in an area known as the Giza Plateau. These ancient structures are part of the larger complex of ancient pyramid constructions in Egypt, showcasing the architectural prowess of the ancient Egyptians.


When pyramids built and why?

The pyramids were built to protect the body of the dead pharaoh. Pyramids were built until the Egyptian middle kingdom ended. (c.1550BC) ~ Bye...'!


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