Building materials

History Stone for eternity

Egyptians built their homes of mud brick but their temples and tombs of stone, because those were meant to last forever. Limestone came from quarries near Giza and at Tura, sandstone from Gebel el-Silsila in the south, and hard granite from Aswan.

History Tools

Stonemasons cut soft stone with copper chisels and saws. To cut hard granite they used copper saws with sand as a grinding powder, and pounded the rock with balls of even harder stone. Plumb lines and set squares helped them keep walls straight and corners square. Roofs of houses were made of palm logs, reeds and mud.

History A ramp in a quarry

In 2018, archaeologists at Hatnub, a quarry of white alabaster stone in the eastern desert, found a steep ramp with a staircase on each side and holes for wooden posts. Ropes tied around the posts could help workers haul sledges of stone up the slope. It is at least as old as the time of King Khufu, about 4,500 years ago.

Think about it

1. Why build temples of stone but houses of mud brick?
2. How do you cut a stone that is harder than your tools?
3. What are buildings near you made of?

Key words

Chisel

A tool with a sharp edge for cutting stone or wood.

Plumb line

A string with a weight, used to check that something is upright.

Granite

A very hard, speckled rock.