By focusing on the giant Old Kingdom pyramids in considering the question ‘how were the pyramids built?’ we overlook the very different methods used later. Middle Kingdom pyramids have produced a wealth of information, both about the unique design of each, and about masonry techniques that were standard to alt pyramids.
When Amenemhet I began a pyramid at Lisht, no large royal pyramid had been built for 190 years, and so expertise may have been lost and experience forgotten. The core of his pyramid was composed of small rough blocks of limestone with a loose fill of sand, debris and mudbrick. Senwosret I’s innovation was an internal framework of walls with stone slabs set in steps in the compartments between. Backing stones rested on the steps and were in turn covered by the casing. Amenemhet Il’s builders also used a masonry frame as did Senwosret IPs, though the compartments of the latter were filled with mudbrick, which was also used for the upper pyramid core. Mudbrick was used for the cores of all subsequent Middle Kingdom pyramids.
Dieter Arnold’s intensive study of Amenemhet Ill’s Dahshur pyramid allowed him to estimate the size of the workforce needed to build a mudbrick pyramid. The total, rounded up to 5,000, is the same
As Barry Kemp’s estimate of the maximum year!;, grain rations stored in the large houses of Senv “-ret ll’s pyramid town of Illahun (p. 231).
Middle Kingdom masons used dovetail cramp-to join structurally important blocks to compensart-for the lack of the extraordinarily fine joins charai teristic of Old Kingdom casing blocks. Arnold esn mates that 12,000 wooden cramps were used :r, Senwosret I’s pyramid complex, each inscribt'c with the king’s name. Numerous patches and cracks in the preserved casing of the pyramids ' - i Senwosret I, Senwosret III and Amenemhet III a!> evidence of problems that seem to have plagued Middle Kingdom pyramid builders - settling and subsidence. At the pyramids of Senwosret! and Amenemhet 111 at Dahshur these problems werr exacerbated by the fact that they were built over an open shaft or extensive chambers and passages in soft ground - 320 m (1,050 ft) of tunnels and 27 rooms under Amenemhet Ill’s. The substructure < ; his Hawara pyramid - of which an architectV model was found in his Dahshur pyramid - was an attempt to remedy these weaknesses and set tht-pattern for later pyramids, (p. 181). Weaknesses in. the foundations were another source of instability The foot of Senwosret I’s pyramid sloped directs;, to a 15-cm (6-in) step down, while Amenemhet! Dahshur foundation of three limestone course-was retained only by tafia clay and mudbrick.
More transport roads, remains of ramps and stone dressing stations have been found at Lisht than s. t any other pyramid site in Egypt. They tell the stop, of how this landscape was organized for building pyramids. Arnold was able to ascertain the loot tions of the quarries, landing quays and acces.-wadis for Senwosret I’s pyramid.
World History
