No written evidence of how the pyramids were built has come down to us, no drawings, no reports of construction have survived. However, the study of the created and unfinished structures allows us to imagine what methods and tools were used by the ancient builders. With the exception of a few not yet clarified details, all construction processes can be fairly accurately reproduced. We started by choosing a place. The pyramid was supposed to be located west of the city of the living: in the west the sun sets. It was believed that the pharaoh, after his death, accompanies the sun god Ra in his daily journey through the sky. The meeting point was sunset, that is, the west. The pyramid was supposed to stand not far from the Nile, since the material was partially delivered to the construction site by water.
The soil under the structure had to be strong enough not to sink under the enormous weight of the structure. And finally, the pyramid could not be too far from the capital or from the palace of the pharaoh: the ruler wanted to oversee the construction of his future tomb. After the location was determined, the sand layer was removed, exposing the stone base, and the construction of underground structures began. The rectangle on which the pyramid was supposed to stand was surrounded by a waterproof shaft made of sand and stones. A dense network of small canals was punched into the rocky ground and filled with water. The water level was marked on the walls of the canals, then the water was drained. After that, all irregularities above these marks were removed, and the channels were filled up. Remained strictly horizontal surface - the base of the pyramid. This method was amazingly accurate:the southeast corner of the Cheops pyramid is only two centimeters higher than the northwest corner.
How did the Egyptians determine the direction to the north
The next important thing was to find a direction to the north. (There was no compass at that time.) Around the center of the construction site, a circular wall was erected in the height of a man with a flat horizontal upper line. In the middle of the fenced circle, the priest was expecting the appearance of Venus; the place where it rose above the wall was marked on an artificial horizon, the same was done a few hours later at the place of its sunset. Lines drawn from these two points to the center of the circle formed an angle whose bisector indicated the exact direction to the north. To be sure, the result was checked against other stars. This method was also extremely accurate. The northern face of the Cheops pyramid deviates from the north direction by only one-thirtieth of a degree.
Next, a square was marked, which served as the base of the future pyramid. For this, a special measuring rope was used, with which a right angle was marked.
After that, a holiday was held, which was much more important than the ceremony of laying the first stone in the construction of modern buildings: accompanied by the high priest, the pharaoh again checked the direction to the north and then went around the base of the future pyramid around the perimeter.
Promotional video:
How stone blocks were cut out of the rocks
In the meantime, work began in the quarries. According to the drawings, blocks of a certain size were cut out of the stone monolith. Most of them had a side length of about 1.3 m and weighed 2.5 tons. But there were also huge ones - 200 tons and more. The Egyptians used an excellent tool for processing and stacking blocks. They had saws, chisels, hammers and copper drills with wooden handles. They also used balls of dolerite, a hard green stone that had been brought from the desert from the eastern shore of the Red Sea. The workers used these balls to hit the stone along the intended dividing line until it broke off.
In order to crack a particularly hard stone, there were two other methods: Along the marked line, holes were drilled in the rock. Then they hammered wooden wedges into them and filled them with water. The tree swelled and cracked the stone.
A fire was made along the marked line on the rock. After the stone was heated, the flame was quickly flooded with water. And when the stone, which had expanded from the heat, suddenly collapsed, a crack formed in it along the line. On each block, ocher was marked for which place of the pyramid it was intended. However, there were also inscriptions that had nothing to do with construction, for example: "How powerful is the white crown of Cheops" or "How drunk was the Pharaoh"
After the stone block was cut out of the rock, it was loaded onto a sledge-like stand, secured with ropes, and dragged to the construction site. White limestone for cladding was delivered from Tura, an area on the right bank of the Nile. There the slabs were loaded onto a sailing ship and floated to Giza by water.
How they lowered the sarcophagus into the burial chamber
Even during the life of the pharaoh, a sarcophagus intended for him was delivered to the tomb. The size of the sarcophagus was usually so large that it was impossible to drag it through the passages and shafts of the pyramid, so it had to be installed during construction. The ancient Egyptians did not know of either pulley blocks or cranes, and yet they managed to lower the multi-ton sarcophagus into place. At first, the burial chamber was fenced off from the entrance with a stone wall. Then it was filled with sand to the very top. A sarcophagus was placed on the sand. After that, the wall was dismantled and the sand was carefully scooped out from under the sarcophagus. As the sand ebbed away, the sarcophagus sank until it finally stood in place.
Now the most difficult and dangerous lay ahead: the lifting of stone blocks from the surface of the earth to the next building platform of the pyramids! Setting blocks for the first, lowest, level was easy. But the pyramid grew, and along with it the effort required to lift the blocks grew.
All pyramids were built with these tools. The Egyptians knew no iron, no bronze, no cranes, no pulley blocks. Tools were made of copper
To cope with all this, huge mounds were made, reinforced with wood and lime mortar. Near the pyramid in Medum and near the pyramid of Sekhemkhet in Sakkara, there are still remains of such mounds. Until now, scientists argue about the number and shape of these auxiliary structures. Some believe that they built only one huge embankment at one of the four faces of the pyramid, adding and increasing it as the pyramid grew.
Other researchers believe that the embankments were built on each side and, like snakes, wrapped around the growing pyramid. Still others argue that the embankment (or embankments) was attached only to the lower level of the blocks, and further upward they rose like a kind of modern scaffolding. It is possible that all methods were used: four embankments for the large pyramids, one for the smaller ones.
On the construction platform, they tried to deliver each block as close as possible to its intended place. This place and the walls of neighboring blocks were covered with lime mortar, the stone was removed from the sled using levers and poles and installed. So, block by block, a stepped pyramid with a center propped up by buttresses grew. The stepped shape arose due to the fact that as the pyramid grew, the buttresses rose less and less above it. After the builders completed all the main work, the steps were laid with a stone mixture and another intermediate layer was obtained. At the end, it was faced with white limestone, which was specially brought from the other bank of the Nile, from Tura. The slabs were carefully ground and polished so that together they made up a smooth and shiny surface like a mirror. This is how the classic smooth-walled pyramid was created.
When constructing the outer planes, a problem arose: how to make all the side faces converge exactly at the top? After all, it would have been impossible to correct the mistake made. For example, a 2 ° deviation of one of the faces of the Cheops pyramid would mean that the other faces deviate from the given point by 15 m.
To prevent this from happening, the Egyptians made a hole in the center of the upper platform of the inner, stepped pyramid and a pole was inserted there. At the top of this pole, all four side ribs should have closed. Focusing on this point with the naked eye, the builders erected all four faces, and the error in tilt was practically excluded.
How many people built the pyramid of Cheops
The organization of construction work was surprisingly simple. Each unit was dealt with, as we would say now, by a brigade headed by its chief. The group for the delivery and installation of the stone weighing 2.5 tons consisted of eight people. If the block was heavier, then the number of people increased. From the beginning to the end, the members of the group remained at their "own" stone. After the stonecutters cut it out of the monolith, the “team” delivered the block to the construction site on a special stand on skids, lifted it along the embankment and installed it in the appropriate place, and after completing the work, returned back to the quarry to deal with the next stone. Work with one stone from the first blows of the dolerite ball to leaving the pyramid lasted an average of eight days. According to Herodotus, 100,000 people were employed in the construction of the Cheops pyramid,primarily peasants and slaves.
Many came voluntarily because they were proud that they could take part in the construction of the pyramid. They worked only from August to October, when the Nile water flooded the ground. When the flood subsided, people returned to their fields. In addition, 4,000 people worked on the construction permanently. They were architects, stonemasons and other craftsmen. They built temples, laid passages in the pyramid, decorated the inner walls with friezes, painted them and prepared work for 100,000 people for the next year. They lived with their families in rugged houses, the remains of which can be seen today. These people lived near the pyramid of Cheops for 20 years - this is how long the construction of the stone giant lasted.
100,000 people, 20 years, more than 2 million stone blocks - and all this just to lay down a tomb for a single person, even a king? This is argued over and over again. The most incredible hypotheses are put forward.