Into the magical machine
From here, the burial cortege, priests and visitors would pass through ceremonial halls onto a causeway that ascended the desert escarpment to the mortuary temple, built against the east face of the pyramid. Here, behind a great colonnaded courtyard, lay the sanctuary in which offerings were made to the king's spirit. Either side of the mortuary temple lay a buried boat - perhaps a souvenir of a funeral flotilla, or put there to allow the king to voyage in the heavens - and to the south was a miniature pyramid. Such so-called subsidiary pyramids are of uncertain purpose: they are generally classified as 'ritual' - archaeologists' code for 'obviously important to the ancient people, but we have absolutely no idea why'.
'...it was decided that a stone sarcophagus - not previously used for kings - should be installed.'
An offering place was one of the two immutable parts of an Egyptian tomb. The other was the burial place. In the Great Pyramid - and in most other pyramids - this was reached from a narrow, low, opening in the north face. The interior of the Great Pyramid is complex, almost certainly resulting from a number of changes of plan.
At first, the burial chamber was to be placed deep underground, with a descending passage and an initial room being carved out of the living rock. It seems, however, that it was decided that a stone sarcophagus - not previously used for kings - should be installed. Such an item would not pass down the descending corridor, and since the pyramid had already risen some distance above its foundations, the only solution was to place a new burial chamber - uniquely - high up in the superstructure, where the sarcophagus could be installed before the chamber walls were built. The architects of later pyramids ensured that there was adequate access to underground chambers by using cut-and-cover techniques rather than tunnelling.
Published: 2001-09-16
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