The Great Pyramid: What Archaeology Tells Us About Its Builders

For centuries the Great Pyramid of Giza has been the subject of fringe theories, popular myth, and speculative fiction. But modern archaeology, bioarchaeology, and epigraphy have revealed a vastly more nuanced picture of the people who created this extraordinary monument. Over the last four decades, excavation at the Lost City, the worker cemeteries, and the Red Sea harbor of Wadi al-Jarf have completely overturned received wisdom about the Great Pyramid. It was not built by slaves, but by a highly skilled, organized, and well-fed labor force of permanent royal engineers, master craftsmen, and seasonal national conscripts.

I. The Settlement Evidence: The Lost City of the Builders

Excavated by Dr. Mark Lehner and the Ancient Egypt Research Associates (AERA), the archaeological remains of this 2000 year old city complex lie just to the south of the Great Sphinx and the Pyramids themselves. Known as Heit el-Ghurab ("the Wall of the Crow"), it is one of the most important finds in all of Egyptology. This sprawling complex housed thousands of the workers who built the Great Pyramid, and its excavated features provide tantalizing clues to their lives.

A. Barracks, Galleries, and Who Lived Here

The layout of the Lost City provides a tantalizing glimpse of a state-run organization built to house a rotating workforce of thousands:

The Gallery Complexes: These long mudbrick galleries, up to 34 meters in length, could have accommodated 40-50 men each in a block divided into individual rooms. Excavations have uncovered numerous such barracks complexes that together could house thousands of seasonal workers at any given time.

Administrative Manors: Larger complexes of multiple rooms housed the powerful state administrators, scribes, overseers, and royal stewards who managed the day-to-day logistics of the construction effort.

Processing Centers: The city complex also contains bakeries, breweries, and workshops for working metals and stone.

B. The Zooarchaeology of the Lost City

The bones of animals found discarded in the middens (trash pits) of the Lost City complex provide a fascinating look into dietary patterns and subsistence practices of the people who lived here:

A Diet of Beef and Bread: Hundreds of thousands of cattle, sheep, and goat bones have been excavated in the city complex. Notably, most of the cattle bones belong to young males under two years old, animals which would have provided large amounts of tender meat. These were luxury foods fit only for the state.

Caloric Requirements of the Workforce: Examination of the bone fragments suggests that the workers consumed several thousand pounds of meat every day, in addition to prodigious amounts of emmer wheat bread and malt beer. This diet of high-protein calories could only have been supplied by the Egyptian state, which viewed the labor force as its prized possession.

II. Bioarchaeology and Social Standing: The Workers' Cemetery

This cemetery complex, discovered in 1990 by local horse riders and excavated later by Dr. Zahi Hawass, lies buried in the desert slopes right above the Lost City. Hundreds of tombs lie scattered throughout the complex, ranging from humble dirt burials to impressive mastaba tombs carved directly into the bedrock. The finds from the workers' cemetery provide a fascinating look into the social organization and health of the people who built the Great Pyramid.

A. Social Standing and Honor

The workers' cemetery complex provides crucial evidence against the theory that the Great Pyramid was constructed by slaves:

Close Proximity to the Pharaoh: It was strictly forbidden for slaves to be buried anywhere near the royal tomb, but the workers' graves at Giza are actually located right next to the Great Pyramid itself. The labor force that built the Great Pyramid was treated like royalty, and its members were allowed to share in the divine afterlife of King Khufu.

Housing and Burial Customs: Vaulted mudbrick tombs, topped with miniature pyramids and decorated with small stelae, were the simple burial sites for unskilled laborers. Meanwhile, the overseers, supervisors, and skilled workers were interred in rock-cut mastaba tombs bearing their official titles.

B. Physical Health and Medical Care

An examination of the hundreds of sets of skeletal remains recovered from the workers' cemetery provides a fascinating look at the physical toll of pyramid-building as well as the medical care available to the labor force during the Fourth Dynasty:

Degenerative Diseases: Many of the workers suffered from severe arthritis in the spine, knees, and ankles, likely caused by years of carrying heavy loads and hauling granite across rough ground.

Highly Advanced Medical Treatment: Several of the workers' bones show the unmistakable marks of emergency surgery. Dozens of fractures were carefully set and reset until they healed properly, a technique that might well have saved a life. Examinations of skulls even show evidence of successful brain surgery (trepanation). Additionally, several workers were found to have survived limb amputations and continued to live for many years afterward.

III. State Administration: National Service and the Phyle System

The people who built the Great Pyramid were not corvées pressed into service by local governors or even the king himself. Instead they were professional laborers who served the royal state and worked on an annual rotational basis, dividing themselves into competitive work gangs that took turns hauling massive stone blocks and constructing the great temples, tombs, and monuments of ancient Egypt.

A. The Corvée System and Tax Exemptions

Ancient Egypt had a system of national service known as corvée, in which peasant farmers were conscripted into the army or labor force for a fixed period of time each year. During the summer inundation (Akhet) the men were exempt from taxes and received generous food rations, fine clothing, and even state-sponsored religious devotion in return for their service to the king.

B. Building Teams: The Gangs and Phyles

There is compelling evidence from inside the Great Pyramid itself that the labor force was organized into work gangs, or zaas, of about 1000-2000 men each, which in turn were divided into smaller phyles of about 200 men and twenty-man squads:

The Gang Paintings: In the relieving chambers above the King's Chamber in the Great Pyramid, nineteenth-century archaeologists discovered curious red ochre paint markings on the chamber walls. These were the workmen's graffiti, left behind by the laborers who had hauled the stone blocks up the great ramps to construct the pyramid. The markings identified different work gangs, whose names were proudly painted in the style of the contemporary Pharaonic art. "The Friends of Khufu," "The Drunkards of Khufu," and "The Strong Ones of the White Crown" were just three of many gangs who competed with each other to see whose workers could haul the heaviest blocks.

IV. The Diary of Merer and the Wadi al-Jarf Papyri

In 2013 a French archaeological team led by Pierre Tallet uncovered a series of papyri near the ancient Red Sea harbor of Wadi al-Jarf. Dating to the 27 th year of King Khufu's reign, these documents represent the oldest known written papyri in all of Egypt.

A. A First-Person Account of Pyramid Construction

The papyrus was written by a certain Merer, a middle-ranking inspector who commanded a work-party of about 200 elite sailors and quarry workers who hauled white Tura limestone blocks up the Nile to the Giza Plateau:

Logistical Instructions: Written in the form of a daily logbook, Merer's account describes the transport operations taking place at the height of the inundation season. Using large wooden cargo ships Merer and his men transported the prized white limestone blocks to Giza, making two or three round trips every ten days.

Administrative Responsibility: Merer's papyrus specifically names Ankhhaf, the half-brother of King Khufu and the Supreme Vizier of Egypt, as the director of the Great Pyramid works during the final months of its construction.

V. Conclusion

The Great Pyramid of Giza has long since been freed from the shackles of conspiracy theories and pop myth. Archaeology, bioarchaeology, and epigraphy have revealed a vastly more nuanced picture of the people who built this great monument. This labor force was made up of skilled craftsman, proud national workers, and master builders who received a bountiful diet of meat and high-quality bread, and who lived and died in a manner befitting of the king's chosen agents.