Pyramids of Egypt : Monumental Faith in Stone
We reached the Great Pyramids of Giza at night. They were right next to our temporary residence for two days. Something loomed large in the darkness — a shade darker than the sky. With great anticipation, I planned and reached the terrace of our building before sunrise. There was the dark of the dawn and I could see three sandy black structures at a distance. Unfortunately, their famed enormity was lost on me at my first encounter. After the anti climax, we settled for breakfast and then witnessed a beautiful slow unveiling. It began with a red hue on the horizon as the sun rose from the opposite side. The black curtain of the night lifted with the first rays of the sun and the pyramids seemed to suck all the red on the horizon to reveal three red pointy hills. They looked like little stones studded in the earth trying to penetrate the vast expanse of the sky which was now blue. As the sun rose, the red changed to orange and then yellow. The stage was set. It was a perfect entrance of the main characters into the grand play that would be our tour in timeless land of Egypt.
They(The pyramids) looked like little stones studded in the earth trying to penetrate the vast expanse of the sky which was now blue.
Skylines of almost all the cities of the world are filled with unique shapes trying harder and harder to touch the sky. Man can move a mountain without breaking a sweat, sense the slightest change in his surroundings, and document the tiniest detail in an event. I am a product of modern times and I take for granted many things in my life that are eased by science and technology. As I thought about this throughout the day while visiting the ruins in the arid desert climate, all that I had read and imagined about the effort put in building the pyramids suddenly became real. I could feel the heat of the desert sun on my sunscreen-slathered face. The dry air singed my chapped lips and the very thirsty throat. There was sand everywhere in my comfortable walking shoes. Towards the end of the half day tour, as I finished the last of my drinking water, I was stripped myself of all the comforts of my daily life. That is when I found the great pyramid getting larger and larger until they reached the sky and I felt like a lump of crumbly clay, a tiny squishy bug. In time and space, the pyramids were a constant, whereas I and everything that I ever touched was a temporary variable. I do not know or own anything of my great great grandparents who lived a hundred years ago, my great grand children will not know or own any of my things. But the pyramids have stayed on, the memory of their builders is afresh, the knowledge of their times lives on — after more than 5000 years.
Towards the end of the half day tour, as I finished the last of my drinking water, I was stripped myself of all the comforts of my daily life. That is when I found the great pyramid getting larger and larger until they reached the sky and I felt like a lump of crumbly clay, a tiny squishy bug.
The glaringly obvious facet of the Pyramids that has captured the attention of the world is their size and longevity. Our immediate questions mostly pertain to exploring “the HOW?” How did the ancient Egyptians do this? After too many confusing questions, I divided the task into a series of problems that needed to be solved. We can see a narrow shaft with the burial chamber in the heart of the pyramid. The determination of the slant angle such that the inner rooms and the pyramid doesn’t implode is a mathematics, physics, and design problem. We can see enormous precision cut outer limestone slabs as well as smooth pink granite slabs in the tomb shaft. Each slab weighing between 2 to 4 tonnes, the great pyramid alone is made up of 2.3 million slabs. Egyptologists have evidence and are confident that the stone slabs have been sourced from quarries hundreds of miles away and transported using the river Nile! Now it starts becoming a logistics problem as well! If ancient documentation is to be believed that the great pyramid was built over a period of 20 years, it would mean 2.3 million/(20*365*24*60) = 0.2 slab per minute. This means one slab weighing 2 to 4 tonnes was placed every 5 minutes day and night for 20 years! Now finding the fastest way to cut and carry this is a civil engineering problem! Some historians believe that about 8 strong people are required to move a slab of about 2 tonnes. We should further note that the life expectancy of workers at that time was around 22 to 25 years. So an able bodied person would enter the workforce around 15 years of age, he would be the strongest between 15 to 20 years and then die from accidents or diseases. Finally it becomes a human resource problem.
This means one slab weighing 2 to 4 tonnes was placed every 5 minutes day and night for 20 years!
This brings me to the second facet of this ancient wonder — the human component. The success of this endeavor has to be attributed to incredible collective human effort — both mental and manual — largest of its kind in the known ancient or modern world. The design had to be meticulously documented and the execution had to be consistently coordinated. It not only requires sophistication in the knowledge and language, but also requires an efficient governance and a motivated workforce. Here the main founding principle of the Egyptian civilization shines through and we get a glimpse in the power plays of this ancient world.
Egyptian civilization developed when the nomadic tribes settled along the Nile river and named leaders amongst them. The earliest kings attracted people into their kingdoms with the promise of food and water and painted the terrors of the nomadic harsh desert life. The kings came to be associated with the providers of food and water and it was not a surprise when the belief that “King is the representative of god” became the core of ancient Egyptian beliefs. An essential step in this progression was to ensure the resurrection of the kings for the survival of everyone in the kingdom. So everyone in the kingdom was willing to participate in the efforts for the same. New evidence suggests that during the Nile floods when people could not farm, the king employed all the citizens in the construction work. The king, thus, came through upon his promise of providing livelihood throughout the year. A workforce is motivated when there is a reward system in place. Egyptologists now believe that local governances were established to oversee groups of workers, provide facilities for them, and organize competitions amongst towns. Thus, performing the best work became a matter of pride as well. The most beautiful words that stayed with me “ When Egypt was building the pyramids, the pyramids were building Egypt”. 5000 years later, they continue to do so — by providing employment in restaurants, hotels, museums, and transportation for the scores of tourists that come to see the ancient wonder.
Egyptologists now believe that local governances were established to oversee groups of workers (for the construction of pyramids), provide facilities for them, and organize competitions amongst towns….“ When Egypt was building the pyramids, the pyramids were building Egypt”. 5000 years later, they continue to do so.
The last but the most fascinating facet of the pyramids is their primitive innocence that survives all odds. The pyramids were built so as to guide the king’s soul to reach the sky and ensure his resurrection. They also marked the location of king’s final resting place that was filled with valuable treasures for the king’s life after death. It was a welcome mat for anyone wishing to rob the king! It is not a surprise that the robberies did take place, but it is definitely a surprise that it took them a thousand years to realize that the tombs with precious wealth need to be concealed. Majority of the people worked tirelessly and even lost their lives in the construction — but they continued to do so with the strong faith in the king and the architect. It feels like a collective innocence kept them going. The imagined reality of the entire kingdom was unified. Why?
It is not a surprise that the robberies did take place, but it is definitely a surprise that it took them a thousand years to realize that the tombs with precious wealth need to be concealed….Why?
It seems to me that it was still a young civilization. They were trying to understand the world through the duality of the night stars and the sun, the desert and the river Nile, the life and the death. There was little gray area in their life, everything seemed black and white. The periodicity and consistency of day-night and the annual floods formed a general agreement amongst the people about the workings of nature, the ideas of gods, and the king. Such attempts at understanding the world around us were far from the modern day scientific method, but they had started to form their hypotheses, observations, and conclusions. Just like scientific method leads us to our facts, their attempts led them to their versions of the absolute truths. Hence, they not only made up stories, they believed them with their entire heart.
The periodicity and consistency of day-night and the annual floods formed a general agreement amongst the people… they not only made up stories, they believed them with their entire heart.
They created gods inspired from nature and not in their own image. Leadership qualities and foresight of the earliest rulers was interpreted as divine conversations and they became an object of reverence. This collective experience gave rise to the largest group of people unitedly believing in the same powers and morals at the same time. Such unwavering conviction needed to be expressed in an unchangeable medium of expression. The Nile flooded every year, the sand dunes changed every day, the sun and the stars moved in the sky — but the stone was unchangeable. The Egyptians expressed their monumental faith in stone. The Pyramids are the most primitive form of this expression — their size and shape is not just a wish of the king. As observed by my life-mate, a pyramid shape is the most stable and simple structure imaginable that could be built to touch the sky. Through the Pyramids, the ancient Egyptians tell us about the reverence, the strength, and the stability of their belief systems. Later, they developed their own script to express the same message in great detail, consistency, and again in stone — where the art became language and the language became art. Ultimately, after this period of infancy, the great civilization converged with a familiar fate when it used the language as power play to manipulate the masses.
Such unwavering conviction needed to be expressed in an unchangeable medium of expression… The Egyptians expressed their monumental faith in stone. The Pyramids are the most primitive form of this expression…
Huge structures of the yesteryear were built on the whims of powerful people, so were the pyramids. As I collect my thoughts, I realise the power of our faith can prompt us to build marvels of our own. Photos, blogs, stories, movies, books may have inspired me to visit this place. What began with unimpressive views of three pointy hills, ended with the very same hills introducing me to my own potential.
References:
- The Rise and Fall of Ancient Egyptian Civilization by Toby Wilkinson
- https://www.britannica.com/topic/Pyramids-of-Giza
- https://thenewstack.io/ultimate-logistics-problem-building-great-pyramid/
