Essay One:

By Amanda Sikirica

The Great Pyramid is one of the seven greatest wonders of the world, and yet, we really know very little about it. Or any of the pyramids. Who built the pyramids? Why? And what drove these people who haven't even started to use the wheel to build these massive and magnificent structures? And how can we begin to understand the people that did build the pyramids?

The first question, and perhaps one of the most interesting, is who built the pyramids and why. Many people believe that Jewish slaves built the pyramids, however most ancient historians now believe that that is not true. The pyramids were built in the Old Kingdom, and the Jews weren't enslaved until thousands of years later, during the New Kingdom. Besides the unlikely Jewish slaves, no one is absolutely certain who built the pyramids. However, there has been much evidence to suggest that Egyptian workers did the job. Archaeologists have uncovered villages that the pyramid builders lived in, the remains of women and children, and hieroglyphics that talk or work gangs with names such as "Perfection" and "Friends of Khufu"*. None of this really sounds like slavery. Slaves wouldn't have proper housing, nor women and children. Slavers would only capture or buy men that could work on the pyramid. Why get women and children too? However, if it was Egyptians that were the pyramid builders, they would live with their family. Also, what slaves would name themselves "Friends of Khufu", after the man that had enslaved them. Whoever built the pyramids were almost certainly not slaves, but Egyptians, willing and happy to work for their pharaoh. 

But how could the pyramid builders have built such a massive monument with such difficult labor required? One answer to this question could be competition. Competition is an amazing power that makes people push their limits to come out on top. As mentioned previously, there were work gangs, which were a group of workers that labored together, like a team. They would have names, such as "Perfection" and compete against other work gangs for who could lay the most stones, who could do it faster, etc. Another component could possibly have been love and affection for their pharaoh, Khufu, that made them work so hard for him. There are hieroglyphs that talk of love and affection in tombs of some of the pyramid builders. Lastly, religion could be a powerful motivating factor. Egypt was a theocracy, where religion and government were extremely tight knit. Egyptians believed that the pharaoh was a god in human form, and that by helping him, they can earn a good life in the afterlife.

But how do we know this, and is the information that we have really true? There are many different hieroglyphics that have been interpreted, and many have been interpreted in different ways. Take line 1650c of Utterance 599 of the Pyramid Texts** translated from hieroglyphs.

Translation One:

"You shall have your souls, you shall have power."

Translation Two:

"It is they (the pyramid builders) who will have the Soul and it is they who will have the Power"

Translation Three:

"They shall become spiritually strong, they shall become physically strong."

All of the translations say the same thing, but there are differences in words and styles. This leaves much room for miscommunication and confusion. The only real way to know for your self is to learn hieroglyphs and interpret them for yourself. Otherwise, you will have to rely on other people's interpretation.

In the end, there are no real answers for the questions that are posed. There is a lot of evidences for theories, but no one can ever be sure. What we can do is listen to the facts, and come to our own conclusions.

 

*=Khufu was the pharaoh that built the Great Pyramid

**=The Utterances are part of the Pyramid texts, which are the hieroglyphics in the Pyramids. This is a link to one translation of them.  http://www.sacred-texts.com/egy/pyt/index.htm