Through all of my research in the past few weeks concerning the burial place of King Khufu, one thing I can't get my head around is if he was planning to be buried below the pyramid, what kind of funeral would he have, with men wedging themselves into the Great Pyramid's Descending passageway, dragging the body of the king down the tight, inclined shaft, where risk of slipping and dropping him was very possible. Then they’d reach a crude man-made shaft, tie a rope around his remains before lowering him down, where there are further risks of dropping him. Maybe there are more sloping corridors that go further down but even if there are, it doesn’t seem like a funeral fit for a king, it feels awkward and unlikely. So, Matt of the Ancient Architects channel looks into another option.
Logically there has to be another way down there and I actually think there is a very obvious route we are all over-looking, something now lost in a book by Jean Kerisel more than 20 years ago. His work needs to be made public again and I’m more than happy to do so.
If Khufu is buried below the pyramid, his body would be around 40 metres below its base, which is a huge number, around 131 feet. For the ancient workers, getting to this position below the Great Pyramid is surely an incredibly difficult and painstaking task, working in narrow corridors with little air and light, with many dangers and hazards all around. It feels so difficult that it feels improbable.
What people forget is that the Great Pyramid is built onto a plateau, on its north-eastern edge, an area of fairly level high ground, higher than the valley to the east and northeast. But how much higher?
Well, just 100 metres to the northeast of the Great Pyramid, that’s less than the distance between the Great Pyramid and the Khafre Pyramid, you find yourself 45 metres lower than the pyramid’s base. Keep walking to the northeast and you get lower and lower.
Therefore to get inside the bedrock below the Great Pyramid some 40 metres below its base, you only had to burrow a straight tunnel through soft limestone for 100 metres from the northeast, which is arguably one of the easiest construction projects on the Giza Plateau.
This is exactly what I think happened and how Khufu's body entered the tomb below the pyramid and I believe it is very likely that there was a second entrance into the subterranean passages of the Great Pyramid from the outside. Watch this video to learn more and please like and subscribe.
All images are taken from Google Images and the below source for educational purposes only.
Sources:
The Nile and Its Masters: Past, Present, Future: Source of Hope and Anger, J. Kerisel.
0 Comments