Meidum, Maydum or Maidum ( ar, ميدوم, , ) is an archaeological site in
Lower Egypt
Lower Egypt ( ar, مصر السفلى '; ) is the northernmost region of Egypt, which consists of the fertile Nile Delta between Upper Egypt and the Mediterranean Sea, from El Aiyat, south of modern-day Cairo, and Dahshur. Historically, ...
. It contains a large
pyramid
A pyramid (from el, πυραμίς ') is a structure whose outer surfaces are triangular and converge to a single step at the top, making the shape roughly a pyramid in the geometric sense. The base of a pyramid can be trilateral, quadrilat ...
and several
mudbrick
A mudbrick or mud-brick is an air-dried brick, made of a mixture of loam, mud, sand and water mixed with a binding material such as rice husks or straw. Mudbricks are known from 9000 BCE, though since 4000 BCE, bricks have also bee ...
mastaba
A mastaba (, or ), also mastabah, mastabat or pr- djt (meaning "house of stability", " house of eternity" or "eternal house" in Ancient Egyptian), is a type of ancient Egyptian tomb in the form of a flat-roofed, rectangular structure with inwar ...
s. The pyramid was Egypt's first straight-sided one, but it partially collapsed in ancient times. The area is located around south of modern
Cairo
Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the largest urban agglomeration in Africa, the Arab world and the Middle East: The Greater Cairo metro ...
.
Pyramid
![Pyramid in Medum (English labels)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8a/Pyramid_in_Medum_%28English_labels%29.png)
The pyramid at Meidum is thought to be just the second pyramid built after
Djoser
Djoser (also read as Djeser and Zoser) was an ancient Egyptian pharaoh of the 3rd Dynasty during the Old Kingdom, and was the founder of that epoch. He is also known by his Hellenized names Tosorthros (from Manetho) and Sesorthos (from Euseb ...
's and may have been originally built for
Huni
Huni (original reading unknown) was an ancient Egyptian king and the last pharaoh of the Third Dynasty of Egypt during the Old Kingdom period. Following the Turin king list, he is commonly credited with a reign of 24 years, ending c. 2613 ...
, the last pharaoh of the
Third Dynasty
The Third Dynasty of ancient Egypt (Dynasty III) is the first dynasty of the Old Kingdom. Other dynasties of the Old Kingdom include the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth. The capital during the period of the Old Kingdom was at Memphis.
Overview
Af ...
, and continued by
Sneferu
Sneferu ( snfr-wj "He has perfected me", from ''Ḥr-nb-mꜣꜥt-snfr-wj'' "Horus, Lord of Maat, has perfected me", also read Snefru or Snofru), well known under his Hellenized name Soris ( grc-koi, Σῶρις by Manetho), was the founding phar ...
. Because of its unusual appearance, the pyramid is called ''el-heram el-kaddaab'' – (''False Pyramid'') in
Egyptian Arabic
Egyptian Arabic, locally known as Colloquial Egyptian ( ar, العامية المصرية, ), or simply Masri (also Masry) (), is the most widely spoken vernacular Arabic dialect in Egypt. It is part of the Afro-Asiatic language family, and o ...
.
The second extension turned the original
step pyramid
A step pyramid or stepped pyramid is an architectural structure that uses flat platforms, or steps, receding from the ground up, to achieve a completed shape similar to a geometric pyramid. Step pyramids are structures which characterized several ...
design into a true pyramid by filling in the steps with limestone encasing. While this approach is consistent with the design of the other true pyramids, Meidum was affected by construction errors. Firstly, the outer layer was founded on sand and not on rock, like the inner layers. Secondly, the inner step pyramids had been designed as the final stage. Thus, the outer surface was polished and the platforms of the steps were not horizontal, but fell off to the outside. This severely compromised the stability and is likely to have caused the collapse of the Meidum Pyramid in a downpour while the building was still under construction.
[
]
Franck Monnier and others believe the pyramid did not collapse until the
New Kingdom
New is an adjective referring to something recently made, discovered, or created.
New or NEW may refer to:
Music
* New, singer of K-pop group The Boyz
Albums and EPs
* ''New'' (album), by Paul McCartney, 2013
* ''New'' (EP), by Regurgitator, ...
, but there are a number of facts contradicting this theory. The Meidum Pyramid seems never to have been completed. Beginning with Sneferu and to the
12th Dynasty, all pyramids had a valley temple, which is missing at Meidum. The mortuary temple, which was found under the rubble at the base of the pyramid, apparently never was finished. Walls were only partly polished. Two
stela
A stele ( ),Anglicized plural steles ( ); Greek plural stelai ( ), from Greek , ''stēlē''. The Greek plural is written , ''stēlai'', but this is only rarely encountered in English. or occasionally stela (plural ''stelas'' or ''stelæ''), whe ...
s inside, usually bearing the names of the pharaoh, are missing inscriptions. The burial chamber inside the pyramid itself is uncompleted, with raw walls and wooden supports still in place which are usually removed after construction. Affiliated mastabas were never used or completed and none of the usual burials have been found. Finally, the first examinations of the Meidum Pyramid found everything below the surface of the rubble mound fully intact. Stones from the outer cover were stolen only after they were exposed by the excavations. This makes a catastrophic collapse more probable than a gradual one. The collapse of this pyramid during the reign of Sneferu is the likely reason for the change from 54 to 43 degrees of his second pyramid at
Dahshur
DahshurAlso transliterated ''Dahshour'' (in English often called ''Dashur'' ar, دهشور ' , ''Dahchur'') is a royal necropolis located in the desert on the west bank of the Nile approximately south of Cairo. It is known chiefly for several p ...
, the
Bent Pyramid
The Bent Pyramid is an ancient Egyptian pyramid located at the royal necropolis of Dahshur, approximately 40 kilometres south of Cairo, built under the Old Kingdom Pharaoh Sneferu (c. 2600 BC). A unique example of early pyramid development in Egypt ...
.
By the time it was investigated by
Napoleon's Expedition in 1799, the Meidum Pyramid had its present three steps. It is commonly assumed the pyramid still had five steps in the fifteenth century and was gradually falling further into ruin, because
al-Maqrizi
Al-Maqrīzī or Maḳrīzī (Arabic: ), whose full name was Taqī al-Dīn Abū al-'Abbās Aḥmad ibn 'Alī ibn 'Abd al-Qādir ibn Muḥammad al-Maqrīzī (Arabic: ) (1364–1442) was a medieval Egyptian Arab historian during the Mamluk era, kn ...
described it as looking like a five-stepped mountain, but Mendelssohn claimed this might be the result of a loose translation and al-Makrizi's words would more accurately translate into "five-storied mountain",
a description which could even match the present state of the pyramid with four bands of different masonry at the base and a step on top.
File:.Pirámide escalonada de Meidum.jpg, Lantern Slide Collection: Views, Objects: Egypt. Meidum. Old Kingdom. Step Pyramid of Meidum, 4th Dyn., n.d. Brooklyn Museum Archives
File:MeidumPyramidPassage.JPG, Passageway in the Meidum Pyramid
File:Meidum Pyramid S10.08 Gizeh, image 9942.jpg, Lantern Slide Collection: Views, Objects: Egyptian – Old Kingdom. Step Pyramid of Meidum, 4th Dyn., n.d. Brooklyn Museum Archives
File:Sneferu Pyramid waste limestone block
Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms when t ...
. Hole in bottom, used as pivot block to turn heavy levers on in moving stones. 4th Dynasty. From Meidum, Egypt. The Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, London.jpg, Sneferu Pyramid waste limestone block. Hole in bottom, used as pivot block on which to turn heavy levers in moving stones. 4th Dynasty. From Meidum, Egypt. The Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, London
Excavations
![Lower Egypt-en](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c6/Lower_Egypt-en.png)
The Meidum Pyramid was excavated by
John Shae Perring in 1837,
Lepsius in 1843 and then by
Flinders Petrie
Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie ( – ), commonly known as simply Flinders Petrie, was a British Egyptologist and a pioneer of systematic methodology in archaeology and the preservation of artefacts. He held the first chair of Egypt ...
later in the nineteenth century, who located the mortuary temple, facing to the east. In 1920
Ludwig Borchardt
Ludwig may refer to:
People and fictional characters
* Ludwig (given name), including a list of people and fictional characters
* Ludwig (surname), including a list of people
* Ludwig Ahgren, or simply Ludwig, American YouTube live streamer and co ...
studied the area further, followed by
Alan Rowe in 1928 and then Ali el-Kholi in the 1970s.
In its ruined state, the structure is high, and its entrance is aligned north-south, with the entrance in the north, above present ground level. The steep descending passage long leads to a horizontal passage, just below the original ground level, that then leads to a vertical shaft high that leads to the corbelled burial chamber itself. The chamber is unlikely to have been used for any burial.
Flinders Petrie was the first
Egyptologist
Egyptology (from ''Egypt'' and Greek , '' -logia''; ar, علم المصريات) is the study of ancient Egyptian history, language, literature, religion, architecture and art from the 5th millennium BC until the end of its native religious ...
to establish the facts of its original design dimensions and proportions. In its final form it was 1100
cubit
The cubit is an ancient unit of length based on the distance from the elbow to the tip of the middle finger. It was primarily associated with the Sumerians, Egyptians, and Israelites. The term ''cubit'' is found in the Bible regarding No ...
s of 0.523 m around by 175 cubits high, thus showing the same proportions as the Great Pyramid at Giza, and therefore the same circular symbolism. Petrie wrote in the 1892 excavation report that "We see then that there is an exactly analogous theory for the dimensions of Medum
icto that of the Great Pyramid; in each the approximate ratio of 7:44 is adopted, as referred to the radius and circle ..." These proportions equated to the four outer faces sloping in by precisely 51.842° or 51°50'35", which would have been understood and expressed by the Ancient Egyptians as a
seked
Seked (or seqed) is an ancient Egyptian term describing the inclination of the triangular faces of a right pyramid. The system was based on the Egyptians' length measure known as the royal cubit. It was subdivided into seven ''palms'', each of wh ...
slope of 5 palms.
[Verner. The Pyramids. Their Archaeology and History. 2003 pp. 462]
File:Fragment of a limestone stela. Inscribed for the accountant of cattle Pahemy and his wife Iniuset. 18th Dynasty. From tomb 34 at Meidum, Egypt. The Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, London.jpg, Fragment of a limestone stela. Inscribed for the accountant of cattle Pahemy and his wife Iniuset. 18th Dynasty. From tomb 34 at Meidum, Egypt. The Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, London
File:Mortuary Temple at Meidum.jpg, Mortuary Temple of Meidum Pyramid
File:Piece of waste limestone. Accounts, in black ink, by workmen of the number of stone blocks delivered for the Meidum Pyramid. 4th Dynasty. From Pyramid waste, mastaba 17 at Meidum, Egypt. The Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, London.jpg, Piece of waste limestone. Accounts, in black ink, by workmen of the number of stone blocks delivered for the Meidum Pyramid. 4th Dynasty. From Pyramid waste, mastaba 17 at Meidum, Egypt. The Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, London
File:MeidumMastaba16SouthSide.jpg, View of the Meidum Pyramid from the Mastaba of Nefermaat
See also
*
List of ancient Egyptian sites
This is a list of ancient Egyptian sites, throughout all of Egypt and Nubia. Sites are listed by their classical name whenever possible, if not by their modern name, and lastly with their ancient name if no other is available.
Nomes
A nome ...
, including sites of temples
*
List of Egyptian pyramids
This list presents the vital statistics of the pyramids listed in chronological order, when available.
See also
* Egyptian pyramids
* Great Sphinx of Giza
* Lepsius list of pyramids
* List of Egyptian pyramidia
* List of the oldest buildings ...
References
Bibliography
*
*
*
*
*
*
Meidum: Site of the Broken Pyramid & Remnants of the First True Pyramid- Virtual-Egypt
Further reading
*Arnold, Dieter (1991). ''Building in Egypt: Pharaonic Stone Masonry''. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
*Jackson, K. & Stamp, J. (2002). ''Pyramid: Beyond Imagination. Inside the Great Pyramid of Giza''. London: BBC Worldwide.
External links
{{Authority control
Former world's tallest buildings
Pyramids of the Fourth Dynasty of Egypt
Archaeological sites in Egypt
1837 archaeological discoveries
Sneferu