Egypt 3: Giza

 The most famous pyramids and Sphinx are at Giza, not far from Saqqara.  The  Great Pyramid was built by Khufu (AKA Cheops) around 2580 B.C.E. It has about 2.3 million stones.

 

 

 

That picture on the right shows the entrance into the Great Pyramid. Some people climbed up there.  I didn't. 

 

There are two more pyramids at the Giza complex, built by Khufu's successors, Khafre, and Menkaure.

 

This ditch lies next to the Great Pyramid, and is one of five.  Each held a long ship.  No one is sure if the ships were everyday boats, or specially created to move the Pharoah's corpse, or purely symbolic for transporting his soul to the afterlife.  We saw one of the boats in the GEM. 
 

 

After seeing the big three pyramids we got back in the bus and Naiel pointed to the Sphinx as we went by. There were shouts of protest  from some of us who thought we were just going to drive past.  We didn't.

 

The Sphinx is one of those things that absolutely live up to the hype.  Carved out of solid bedrock more than 4,000 years ago, it is like nothing else on Earth.

 

 Khafre, Khufu's successor,  probably built the Sphinx as well, and seems to have been the model for its face. 

 

Between his front paws stands the Dream Stele (a stele is a flat stone carved with an announcement). It dates from approximately 1400 B.C.E.  and explains that the author had dreamed that the Sphinx told him it was suffocating under the sand.  Clean the sand away, Sphinxy assured him, and I'll make you the Pharoah.  He had it done and became Pharoah Thutmose IV.

 

This tale is convenient for Thutmose since he was not the legitimate heir, and needed all the oomph he could get. The carving seems later than his time, which suggests it was copied by priests of the Sphinx as testimony for how powerful their boss was.

Next: 4 Grand Egyptian Museum