Great Pyramid of Khufu

Great Pyramid of Khufu

The Pyramid of Khufu The Great Pyramid of Khufu is the oldest and largest of the three pyramids on the Giza plateau and the only surviving monument of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Built around 2589–2566 BCE during the reign of Pharaoh Khufu (Cheops in Greek), it originally stood 146.5 meters tall — a record it held as the world’s tallest man-made structure for 3,800 years. Today, after the loss of its outer casing stones, it stands at 138.8 meters.

The precision of the construction is extraordinary: the base is level to within 2.1 cm across its 230-meter sides, the sides are oriented to the cardinal directions with an accuracy of 0.05 degrees, and the four base sides deviate from perfect equal length by no more than 4.4 cm. The pyramid was built from approximately 2.3 million stone blocks averaging 2.5 tonnes, with some internal granite ceiling beams exceeding 80 tonnes.

The interior consists of three main chambers — the subterranean chamber cut into the bedrock, the Queen’s Chamber in the pyramid’s core, and the King’s Chamber of red Aswan granite — connected by ascending and descending corridors and the Grand Gallery, a corbelled ascending passageway 8.7 meters tall and 46.7 meters long. Ventilation shafts extend from both the Queen’s and King’s chambers toward the pyramid’s exterior faces.

Khufu was the second pharaoh of the 4th Dynasty and ruled for approximately 23–27 years. His pyramid was the largest construction project in human history to that point and represented the administrative, logistical, and technical peak of the Old Kingdom state. Evidence from the workers’ village at Giza and from administrative papyri found at Wadi al-Jarf — the world’s oldest papyri, dating to Khufu’s reign — confirm that the workforce comprised tens of thousands of skilled and rotating conscripted laborers, organized into named teams and well supplied.

The pyramid has three known chambers and was entered by Arab caliph Al-Ma’mun around 820 CE, who tunneled through the core to find the interior passages. The King’s Chamber contained only the lidless red granite sarcophagus, which is too large to have been brought through the passageways and must have been placed during construction. The chamber was certainly robbed in antiquity — the exact timing is unknown.

In 2017, scientists using muon radiography detected a previously unknown large void above the Grand Gallery — approximately 30 meters long — designated the ‘Big Void.’ Its purpose and whether it contains any chambers or artifacts remains under investigation.