The Egyptian pyramids are ancient pyramid-shaped masonry structures located in Egypt.
There are 138 pyramids discovered in Egypt as of 2008. Most were built as tombs for the country’s Pharaohs and their consorts during the Old and Middle Kingdom periods.
The earliest known Egyptian pyramids are found at Saqqara, northwest of Memphis. The earliest among these is the Pyramid of Djoser (constructed 2630 BCE–2611 BCE) which was built during the third dynasty. This pyramid and its surrounding complex were designed by the architect Imhotep, and are generally considered to be the world’s oldest monumental structures constructed of dressed masonry.
The estimate of the number of workers to build the pyramids range from a few thousand, twenty thousand, and up to 100,000.
But new discovery tells us something different about how the pyramids were made;
The Great Pyramids of Egypt were built not by slaves, as is commonly believed, but by free workers of such high status that their tombs lie near the king’s. The laborers built the Khufu and Khafre pyramids, and the research made public today sheds new light on graffiti describing the workers as ” friends of Khufu, ” the chief archaeologist on the project tells Reuters.
“These tombs were built beside the king’s pyramid, which indicates that these people were not by any means slaves,” said the archaeologist. “If they were slaves, they would not have been able to build their tombs beside their king’s.”
