Friday, May 3, 2013

First Wonder of the World!


            Now we have arrived in Egypt. Because Egypt was one of the world's oldest Civilization, it has always fascinated me  on the living styles of such early civilizations. My attention has been drawn towards the Great Pyramid Of Giza! Just by the looks of the structure dazzles me. It looks really old and ready to crumble at the touch of it but it actually very sturdy and wouldn't break unless it was forced to. This Pyramid is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of The World. It is also the biggest and early built than the other three Pyramids in its family. This wonderful structure is located in El Giza, Egypt and has been there ever since 2560 BCE. That's a really long time ago! I am surprised it has been kept so well that it hasn't collapsed over time like other structures built several thousand years ago.
            Many Archaeologist believe that this Pyramid was built in dedication to the Pharaoh of the Fourth Dynasty, Pharaoh Khufu. Because this structure was made so very long ago there is no real way of telling who was the actual constructor of this pyramid. Many historians have said to believe that Khufu's vizier, Hemiunu was the engineer of the tomb. Because the pyramid has gone through such a long time span, people have said that originally it was suppose to be taller but due to natural causes, it has shrunk to its present day size. This exact pyramid had been the tallest man made structure in over 3,800 years! Pretty neat for a civilization that was fairly new to living.
            This pyramid is pretty much made up granite, mortar, limestone and casing stone. Just a lot of stones! So many tones of materials were used to build this thing I wonder how strong the people had to be in order to lift it up to the top of the pyramids to place the stones there! Once all the limestones were in place, the Egyptians added another layer of casing stones for the pyramid to give of a little shine. But as time went on many of the casing stones eroded away leaving only the limestone layers for us to see nowadays. Many historians and archeologist fought over the facts about how the Pyramid was actually constructed. People have said that the blocks were dragged, lifted, or rolled into their places by many workers while others think Egyptians used slaves to help build this structure. Around 40,000 workers at maximum came to aid the construction and almost 15,000 people were the average amount who stayed to work on it. That is a very large number of workers consisted their civilization was new and life was pretty much new to everyone. I am surprised that there are so many skilled workers available to help build such a thing.
            I need to go visit Egypt and see this Pyramid myself because the artwork really intrigues me. I have always been fond of ancient civilizations and this is definitely one of my favorite civilization to study along with Greeks and Romans.
   

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