Memphis and its pyramids · Old Kingdom, Middle Kingdom
Dahshur
Sneferu's Bent Pyramid and Red Pyramid, where Egypt learned to build a true pyramid.
Where
The desert edge about 10 km south of Saqqara
When
The 4th Dynasty (Sneferu, c. 2613–2589 BC), and again in the 12th Dynasty
Built by
Sneferu, father of Khufu; later Amenemhat II, Senusret III and Amenemhat III
Sizes
Bent Pyramid about 105 m high; Red Pyramid 104 m high and 220 m on a side
Who built what
Sneferu, the first king of the 4th Dynasty, built more pyramids than any other king. At Dahshur he started the Bent Pyramid with steep sides of about 54°, but partway up the builders changed to a gentler slope of about 43°, probably because the structure was settling and cracking. He then built the Red Pyramid, named for the color of its stone, at about 43° all the way up: the first smooth-sided pyramid to be finished, and the model for his son Khufu's at Giza.
Six centuries later the kings of the 12th Dynasty came back to Dahshur and built pyramids of mud brick cased with stone. The Black Pyramid of Amenemhat III cracked as it sank into the soft ground, and he built another at Hawara.
What survives
The Bent Pyramid keeps more of its original casing than any other pyramid. The Red Pyramid can be entered; its chambers have high corbelled roofs. Dahshur was inside a military zone for decades and opened to visitors in 1996, so it is far quieter than Giza.
The granite capstone (pyramidion) of the Black Pyramid, inscribed for Amenemhat III, was found in 1900 and is in the Egyptian Museum, Cairo.
Sneferu's two pyramids at Dahshur beside his son Khufu's, to scale.
Inscriptions
2 short, well-known texts from Dahshur, each with its transliteration (the Egyptian sounds in Latin letters) and a translation. Tap Sign by sign to see what each sign is and how it is read. Royal names are drawn in their cartouches.
"King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Sneferu"
Transliteration
nsw-bjt snfrw
Translation
“The King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Sneferu”
Where: On the reliefs of the Bent Pyramid's valley temple and on the stelae beside its small satellite pyramid.
The sedge (the king of the south) and the bee (the king of the north) form the title nsw-bjt, which stands before the king's cartouche. Sneferu is one of the first kings to write his name in a cartouche.
Sign by sign
Reading: The standard reading (Gardiner, Egyptian Grammar (3rd ed., 1957), Excursus A on the royal titulary); the Wikipedia article "Sneferu", which gives this spelling.
A builders' date on the Red Pyramid
The marks are in hieratic, a handwriting form of hieroglyphs that the site's font does not draw, so the line is given in transliteration only, in its usual reading.
Transliteration
rnpt zp 24 (ṯnwt)
Translation
“The year of the 24th time (of the count)”
Where: Written quickly in red paint on blocks of the Red Pyramid, in the cursive hieratic script.
Old Kingdom years were counted by the census of the cattle, which was held every two years, or sometimes more often (how often is debated). Marks like this, on blocks from different levels of the pyramid, help estimate how long it took to build. One names Sneferu's 24th count.
Reading: The usual Old Kingdom dating formula; the marks were published by Rainer Stadelmann, and the Wikipedia article "Sneferu" mentions the one of the 24th count.
Dates follow Shaw, ed., The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt (2000); before 664 BC they are approximate. Readings are the standard ones in the sources named under each inscription; translations are Teddy Rook Book's own. The hieroglyphs are drawn in the site's font, TRB Hieroglyphs, so their shapes are simplified; where an inscription's arrangement or signs can't be shown faithfully, the card says so.