The mummy of all mysteries... solved
IT HAS for centuries been one of the world’s greatest enigmas: how a Bronze Age society with little in the way of technology created Egypt’s Great Pyramid of Giza – the oldest and only survivor of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.
Now archaeologists have discovered fascinating proof that shows how the Egyptians transported two-and-a-half-tonne blocks of limestone and granite from 500 miles away to build the tomb of Pharaoh Khufu in about 2,600BC.
At 481ft, it is the biggest of all the pyramids and was, until the Middle Ages, the largest man-made structure on Earth. Now the discovery of an ancient papyrus, a ceremonial boat and an ingenious system of waterworks have shed light on the infrastructure created by the builders.
The detailed archaeological material shows that thousands of skilled workers transported 170,000 tons of limestone along the Nile in wooden boats held together by ropes, through a specially constructed system of canals to an inland port just yards from the base of the pyramid.
The new discoveries are revealed in tonight’s Channel 4 documentary Egypt’s Great Pyramid: The New Evidence, which also includes another team of archaeologists who have unearthed a ceremonial boat designed for Khufu to command in the afterlife.