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30. The Great Pyramids
How the Great Pyramid was built is a question that may never be answered. Herodotus said that it would have taken 30 years and 100,000 slaves to have built it. Another theory is that it was built by peasants who were unable to work the land while the Nile flooded between July and November. They may have been paid with food for their labor. The flooded waters would have also aided in the moving of the casing stones. These stones were brought from Aswan and Tura and the water would have brought the stones right to the pyramid. This pyramid is thought to have been built between 2589 - 2566 BC. It would have taken over 2,300,000 blocks of stone with an average weight of 2.5 tons each. The total weight would have been 6,000,000 tons and a height of 482 feet (140m). It is the largest and the oldest of the Pyramids of Giza
Chephren is the son and successor of Khufu and Hensuten. Khufu's other son and also successor, Ra'djedef, started constructing his own pyramid at Abu Rawash, which is north of Giza. Chephren's pyramid is designed more modestly than Khufu's. The Chephren pyramid originally was 10 feet (3m) shorter and 48 feet (14.6m) more narrow at the base. The estimated weight of all the stones in the pyramid is 4,880,000 tons. Because it is built higher on the plateau, it looks taller from most angles than Khufu's pyramid. The slope of the angles is higher, 53 degrees compared to Khufu's 51 degrees.
The Pyramid of Menkaure' (Mycerinus) is the smallest of the three Pyramids of Giza and shows the beginning of the decline in workmanship in the Egyptian pyramid building. The attention to detail is not as it is on the earlier pyramid.