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Tombs and Pyramids
From earliest times the Egyptians believed that
people continued their existence after death, and the burial place
(grave, tomb, or pyramid) was designed to protect the body and
provide a location to which the deceased owner’s spirit could return
at will to partake of food and other offerings. In the first
Neolithic communities of the Badarian Period, the graves were
situated away from the living communities, at the edge of the
desert. They were mostly oval in shape and contained single burials,
although some held two bodies. The body, wrapped in coarse matting
or placed in a coffin of woven twigs or in an animal skin, lay a few
feet deep in the sand. Such graves were probably marked by a small
pile of sand or stones placed on top of the burial.
Early Tomb Development THE MASTABA By c.3400 BC (Nagada II Period) the burial customs had changed, and although the pit graves continued in use for the poorer classes a new type of tomb was introduced for the ruling class. The new type of tomb known today as a mastaba set the pattern for wealthy burials in the Archaic Period and Old Kingdom. Rectangular in shape with four sloping sides, the mastaba tomb was at first built of mud brick, but later it resembled the pile of stones used to mark the location of each predynastic tomb. Those built as early as Dynasty 4 actually consisted of heaps of stone covered with a casing of sloping flat blocks. The burial chamber, cut in the rock, was reached by means of a shaft that led down from the roof of the mastaba. In the earliest examples the interior walls were lined with matting or strengthened with wooden planks, but in early dynastic times this had developed into a wooden coffin or a wood-paneled chamber. The wooden coffin (which eventually entirely replaced the custom of placing the body in a reed mat) was placed in a recess cut into the side and floor of the burial pit. Apart from this substructure below ground, there was a superstructure within the stonecased walls above ground. This housed the tomb goods and accommodated the tomb chapel, where offerings were brought as eternal supplies for the deceased. The interior walls of the chapel were decorated with scenes of the everyday existence of the owner and of food production and harvesting so that his soul would never experience hunger. Throughout Dynasty 1 the substructure was deepened and enlarged in an attempt to protect the funerary goods from robbers. The size of the tomb was increased, and a staircase was built onto the east side of the superstructure; this led directly down to the burial area and was an additional security feature, since it could be blocked with stone slabs. It also provided an easier route for transporting the increased number of tomb goods. At this time two important tombs those of Enezib and Queen Herneith were built; these possessed features that may have formed the basis for the building designs ultimately found in the first step pyramid at Saqqara. By the end of Dynasty 1, the substructure continued to be enlarged and deepened, but the storerooms, once situated in the superstructure, were now discontinued. Funerary goods were placed in the burial chamber, although the food and drink offerings were kept in subsidiary rooms. The tomb structure itself became more elaborate, but the quantity of funerary goods diminished. A large, rectangular stone coffin, which sometimes contained a wooden coffin, was now used. The external walls of the mud brick mastabas were originally covered with recessed brick paneling that as a decorative feature simulated the facade of contemporary palaces. This again disappeared, however, toward the end of Dynasty 1. The recesses in the paneled facade were translated into niches that perhaps acted as false doors in the superstructure to allow the deceased’s spirit to gain access to the storeroom inside. When the storage rooms were discontinued the recesses were reduced to two in number, situated at the east end of the mastaba. One was now the false door to the tomb and the other formed a subsidiary entrance. Burial structures developed and became more elaborate throughout Dynasty 2, but by the end of the Archaic Period mastaba tombs had become standardized for the rulers and nobility. Toward the end of the Old Kingdom, when the king’s power declined and nobles seized their own opportunities, they increasingly prepared their tombs near their own homes instead of at the base of the king’s pyramid. The nobles now preferred to be buried in rock tombs cut into the steep cliffs fringing the river in Middle and Upper Egypt. It was probably the stepped, layered brick superstructures of the earlier mastabas, however, that formed the inspiration for the Step Pyramid at Saqqara and later pyramid constructions. . Pyramid Construction STEP PYRAMIDS The Step Pyramid at Saqqara consists of a series of superimposed mastaba tombs of decreasing size. It was constructed at the beginning of Dynasty 3 by Imhotep, the royal architect, for King Djoser and was originally designed as a mastaba but later extended upward to incorporate six steps. Below ground level there is a deep shaft that allows access to a series of corridors and rooms where Djoser and his family were buried. This pyramid retains the two main areas of a mastaba tomb: the superstructure and substructure. It has been suggested that step pyramids were associated with a star cult, whereas the later “true” pyramids were symbols of the sun god. The Step Pyramid at Saqqara was only the central feature in a vast complex surrounded by a wall of white limestone (which may have imitated the wall around the king’s palace). The complex was planned as a single unit, and it is unique; there is no known precedent for any of the buildings, and the overall scheme was never repeated. The complex displays many interesting features: The craftsmen were novices in the use of stone for large monuments since mud brick, wood, and reed had been used for earlier religious buildings, and there is evidence of experimentation with different forms. Stone fluted and ribbed columns imitated the bundles of reeds and wooden pillars found in earlier buildings, and it is uncertain if free-standing columns would hold up the roof the builders designed engaged columns to give added support; also, small stone blocks rather than the massive pieces found in later constructions were employed here to imitate the mud bricks used in earlier tombs. .
TRUE PYRAMIDS
It was perhaps a religious change from a star cult to the sun cult
that prompted the transition from step pyramid to the true, or
smoothsided, pyramids. It is possible to trace this development in a
number of pyramids. Several stepped or layered pyramids are known;
for example, the Meidum pyramid was originally designed as a small
step pyramid, which was subsequently extended to incorporate seven
or eight superimposed layers. When the steps were infilled with
local stone and the sides of the pyramid were faced with white
limestone, it became a true pyramid. It is believed that the
smooth-sided angles of the true pyramid form may have symbolized the
sun ray which provided the king’s soul with a means of access to
heaven. The first building planned from its inception as a true
pyramid was the northern pyramid at Dahshur; its southern neighbor
(both were probably built for King Sneferu) was planned as a true
pyramid, but perhaps because of anxiety over the original angle of
its sides, the angle of incline was later sharply decreased just
beyond halfway up the monument’s height, producing a bent, or
blunted, effect. It was at Giza, however, that the pyramid complex
reached its classical form. Cheops (Khufu) chose this dramatic site
a slightly elevated plateau which provided him with the opportunity
to build an unrivaled monument with surrounding space for subsidiary
buildings. He not only constructed the Great Pyramid; sufficient
evidence remains of the adjacent minor pyramids, boat pits, and
mastaba tomb fields for his relatives and courtiers to convey
something of his original scheme. His son Chephren (Khafre) and
grandson Mycerinus (Menkaure) also built pyramid complexes at Giza,
and in Chephren’s burial we can see the fully developed elements of
the classic complex: a pyramid for the royal burial, an adjoining
royal cult complex for the burial rites and subsequent rituals to
provide the king’s eternal food supply, and a covered causeway that
joined this complex to the valley building where the king’s body was
first received on its final journey. The valley building lay at the
river’s edge and was also the place where the eternal supplies would
have been landed and unloaded.
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Building Methods
Little is actually known of pyramid construction methods and work practices, although there are many theories. It has been suggested that the peasants, occupied for most of the year irrigating the soil and cultivating the land, may have been summoned to work at the pyramid site for three months annually, when the inundation placed much of the soil underwater. Paid in kind, this work would have kept them from starvation and also occupied them so that they did not cause political or social problems. It is generally accepted that construction of a pyramid involved the laying of individual courses of stone from the center outward, building the inner core of local stone and using Tura limestone and occasionally granite for the outer casing, which was smoothed from the apex downward once the pyramid was finished. There has been much discussion, however, over how the stones were lifted from the ground to the required height or level and then moved into place. Brick ramps may have been used; lengthened and raised as each course was laid, the stones would have been dragged up these, possibly on sledges. Remains of such ramps have been found at a couple of sites, but the effort involved in building these would have been very great. An alternative theory (although no archaeological evidence has yet been found to support this) is that they constructed girdle ramps around the four sides of the pyramid. .
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Tombs and Pyramids
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