Weighing over 100 tons each, they are solid granite from Aswan and are precisely engineered to tolerances that are considered amazing today.
How did the ancient Egyptians build and erect the 24 strange and sinister black sacophages that were found in the hillside 12 miles south of the Great Pyramid of Giza?
And more importantly, why?
The skill of cutting the stone, with an accuracy of a few microns, is so amazing that some experts have concluded that they were not built for the Egyptian pharaohs, but in fact were left on earth by an alien race and simply appropriated by the pharaohs for their own needs.
Some sarcophagi have hieroglyphs, but they are of such poor quality that these scribbles are simply considered graffiti.
The actual purpose and function of the drawers remains unclear, but they were clearly important as they were cut with such precision that they could remain airtight for millennia.
They are also known as the Saqqara Serapeum in the now abandoned city of Memphis, Egypt.
In Egyptology, the serapeum is a temple or other religious institution dedicated to the syncretic Greek-Egyptian deity Serapis, who combined the images of Osiris and Apis in a humanized form.
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Serapis was recognized throughout the Mediterranean region and appears in both Greek and Gnosic religions - usually in the form of a man with a three-headed dog on a chain.
The formal burial is believed to have been built 3,300 years ago by Pharaoh Ramses II.
Recent studies show that this was the burial place of the Apis bulls, who were worshiped as the embodiment of the god Ptah.
Egyptologists say that due to the fact that the bulls were honored by the gods Haymweze, the son of Ramses II, ordered a tunnel to be dug through one of the mountains in this section and designed with side chambers so that large granite sarcophagi weighing up to 100 tons could be installed each to hold the mummified remains of the bulls.
The temple was discovered by Auguste Mariette, who went to Egypt to collect Coptic manuscripts, but later became interested in the remains of the Sakkar necropolis.
In 1850, Mariette discovered that the head of one of the sphinxes had appeared from the desert sand dunes, cleaned the sand and found this place along the road that appeared.
After using explosives to clear the rocks blocking the entrance to the catacomb, he excavated most of the complex.