How were the pyramids built?

The Great Pyramid

The Great Pyramid at Giza was built for King Khufu around 2560 BC. It was about 146 meters tall, the tallest building in the world for almost 4,000 years, and it is made of roughly 2.3 million stone blocks. Most of them are local limestone; the finest white limestone for its smooth outer casing came by boat from quarries across the Nile.

Who built it?

Near the pyramids, archaeologists have found the town where the builders lived, with bakeries and storehouses, and the tombs of workers buried close to the king they worked for. Their skeletons show hard work but also medical care for injuries. This evidence shows that the builders were organized, fed and paid teams of Egyptians, perhaps joined by farmers when the Nile flood covered their fields.

Moving the stones

• Sledges: tomb paintings show huge statues pulled on wooden sledges. In 2014, scientists showed that wetting the sand in front of a sledge can halve the force needed to pull it.
• Boats: in 2013, archaeologists found the oldest known papyri, the logbook of an official named Merer, which describes his crew carrying limestone by boat to Giza for Khufu's pyramid.
• Ramps: builders raised blocks up ramps of mud brick and rubble. Experts still debate whether the ramps were straight, zigzagged up one face or wrapped around the pyramid.
• Levers: wooden levers may have been used to lift and adjust blocks into their final places.

Try it in class

• Sledge test: pull a weighted box across dry sand and then wet sand with a spring scale. Which needs less force?
• Count the blocks: if a team set 20 blocks an hour, how long would 2.3 million blocks take?
• Design a ramp: build a ramp from books and card, and test which slope is easiest for a toy truck.

Questions students and teachers ask

Building pages to use with this guide

• Ancient EgyptPyramidA giant stone tomb for a pharaoh. The Great Pyramid at Giza was the tallest building on Earth for about 3,800 years.
• Ancient EgyptStone sledgeWorkers dragging a stone block on a wooden sledge, the way Egyptians moved heavy loads over land.
• Ancient EgyptBuilding materialsSandstone blocks, mud bricks, reeds and copper tools: what Egyptians built with.
• Ancient EgyptLifting leverA wooden lever with a counterweight, like the shaduf Egyptians used to lift water. Builders moved giant stones with levers, ramps and sledges.
• Ancient EgyptNile sailing boatA wooden boat with a tall sail. On the Nile, boats sailed south with the wind and floated north with the current.
• Ancient EgyptGreat SphinxA giant lion with the head of a king, carved out of the rock beside the pyramids of Giza about 4,500 years ago.