Jacob in Egypt: The Fayyum and the Fail Pyramids

AUC Downtown Campus, 8:00am. Final field trip of the semester!

We're on our way to visit several sites in the Fayyum, an oasis that is fed by an offshoot of the Nile River which ends in a salty lake, Lake Moeris (Birket Qarun in Arabic).

The first is Karanis (Kom Aushim), where the crocodile god Sobek was worshiped. The ancient Egyptians mummified crocodiles and stuck them in these slots.

Next we saw Amenemhet III's Pyramid at Hawara.

The pyramids we'll see today all have one thing in common--they're ugly. Originally they looked quite nice, but unlike the more famous Giza Pyramids, they're not in such good condition. Lots of these pyramids were made in experimental styles during the Middle Kingdom, where the pharaohs decided to improve on the existing pyramid design and made a mudbrick core containing the burial chamber. They then surrounded this core with a shell of limestone. What they didn't expect was the lack of cohesion that the mudbrick would have, though, and over time, the outer parts of the pyramids collapsed, leaving only a sad-looking mudbrick center (occasional earthquakes and building too close to the river's unstable water table didn't help).

And a closeup of the blockwork:

After this guy we visited the pyramid of Amenemhet III at Lahun, east of the Fayyum, another epic fail.

Depressed by all these disappointing mounds? We saved the best for last!
As I might have said in a previous post, the bored, boat-riding Old Kingdom pharaoh Snefru had an astonishing four pyramids dedicated to him--at Saqqara, Seila and Meidum. He constructed his pyramids entirely from limestone, but unfortunately the Meidum pyramid suffered a similar fate to the Middle Kingdom pyramids around it. As you can see, the outer layers have collapsed quite spectacularly.

Inside

In my infinite stupidity, I brought along a wool scarf to protect myself from the sun (the only scarf I had). After berating me for several minutes, Dr. Ikram, in her infinite wisdom and South Asian skill, tied it Punjabi-style.

Don't mess, Diljit.

Finally, we moved to the immense Mastaba 17 to the south of the pyramid. Mastabas were large flat mounds that were used as burial chambers for early Pharoahs. The brilliant architect Imhotep, of "The Mummy" fame, realized that by stacking mastabas of decreasing size on top of each other, you could create a pyramid. And he did just that with Djoser's pyramid at Saqqara (see previous post).

Anyway, Mastaba 17 was awesome. Below, Dr. Ikram holds a council to warn us of the impending claustrophobia that may prove too much for some.