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Step Pyramid of Saqqara

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Step Pyramid of Saqqara and the Nearby Museum

  • January 23, 2009
  • Rated 5 of 5 by NiceGinna from Evanston, Illinois
Step Pyramid of Saqqara and the Nearby Museum

Our first stop of the day was Museum Imhotep, the architect of the earliest Step Pyramid. He was also a writer and scientist, a true Rennaisance Man, but well before the Rennaisance! Then it was on to the First Step Pyramid, built about 4600 years ago! Before the Step Pyramids, there were flat-topped burial chambers called Mastabas (Arabic for "bench"). But King Djoser asked Imhotep to create something more spectacular for him. Since the King was still living, Imhotep kept adding a new level to the tomb (he didn't want to "kill the job"), creating steps whereby Ba, the Spirit on earth could climb to join Ka, the body in heaven.

From journal An Unforgettable 10 Days in Egypt

Editor Pick

Saqqara, and the First Pyramid

Saqqara, and the First Pyramid

This is where it begins. Saqqara is a place of death, yes, but also of birth. The birth of architecture, of pyramids, and of the timeless legends that have entranced for millenia.

The pyramids of Giza are world famous, but I wanted to see where the story began, and see the first prototypes of these awe-inspiring tombs. For that you have to head south of Giza on the west bank of the Nile, where the desert still abuts Cairo and its outlying villages. Courtesy of George, the concierge at my hotel, I arranged a taxi for eight the next morning. For LE180 I would be transported to Saqqara, Dahshur, and Memphis.

A cooling breeze ruffled the tree tops as I stepped out to meet my driver the next day. Ari was a pudgy fellah in a striped shirt with more than a touch of the Omar Sharifs about him. We set off south. From the highway the pyramids of Giza, the pinnacle of pyramidology, could be seen through the murk, framed by high-rises like a glimpse into another world. I lived for four years in Cambridge, testily shoving through the crowds of gawping and camera-clicking tourists, oblivious to the history that lined my daily walk to lectures. Was it really possible for Cairenes to feel so blasé about these immense monuments, could these things ever fade unnoticed into the background, regardless of however many times you passed them? Ari just laughed at the question.

We headed first to Saqqara, about 45 minutes by road. The contrast between the lush thickets of palms, the mango orchards, and the vivid green fields that lay along the irrigation canals and the sudden onset of grey desert is brutal. The pyramid fields are literally on the very edge of dark lord Seth’s kingdom of the dead.

Saqqara sprawls over some 7km of desert, though the heart of the site is the precinct that sits around the step pyramid of King Zoser. This is open from 8am to 4pm, with an LE50 entrance charge. By the paved carpark there is a museum dedicated to Imhotep. Imhotep essentially created architecture and was the first to break away from the low mastaba ("bench" in Arabic) dwellings that had previously been the norm and dared to dream of reaching the skies. So instrumental was he, that he was still being venerated as a god a millenia after his death. The exhibits within stress his achievements: ‘the first column’, ‘the first arch’, ‘the first wall carving’ (cobras, since you ask). All these things that we take for granted, all springing from the genius of this one man, Imhotep. So, all-in-all, he deserves a bit more recognition than merely being remembered as ‘the bad guy from The Mummy’…

Switching up the slope onto the sun-baked plateau, you come across ‘the first pyramid’, built to entomb King Zoser. It is a yellow-brown brick-built structure comprised of six steps, more reminiscent of Mesoamerican step-pyramids than the smooth-sided Egyptian confections. However Saqqara pre-dates, say, Chichen Itza in Mexico by some 2700 years. The largest edifice ever built of stone at the time of its construction in the 27th century BC, today the pyramid looks somehow primeval, like a reef thrust from the seabed, like a strange rock formation in the Australian outback Atop each tier piles of sand still lie humped, as though it had just been revealed by a sandstorm. You really are back at the very dawn of history.

The precincts around the pyramid have been partially restored by Jean-Philippe Lauer who was granted an eight-month license in 1926 and ended up staying until his death in 2001. Indeed, you enter the site through a narrow restored hypostyle hall. To the north of Zoser’s pyramid a slanted cubicle is set into the sand, a serdab. Peering through the two eye-holes you can see a life-sized statue of Zoser, staring out across the desert for eternity. Following his gaze, the later pyramids of Abu Sir can be discerned on the horizon. (The original statue is now in the Egyptian Museum – what a fate!). Other tumbledown pyramids, tombs and edifices surround this central court and stretch off seemingly at random.

At LE50, entrance to the site at Saqqara might cost as much as entrance to the more famous one at Giza, but here you are spared the crowds and the hawkers (well, most of them, anyway…). At Saqqara, on the edge of the desert, the birthplace of the pyramids, with dust on your shoes, you feel like one of the very first explorers to stumble into this timeless world.

From journal Pyramids, Popes and Parallel Worlds

Editor Pick

Steppe Pyramid of Saqqara

  • August 24, 2005
  • Rated 5 of 5 by kwasiak from Tucson, Arizona
Steppe Pyramid of Saqqara

The Steppe Pyramid is the only example of what most Egyptian scholars consider the second stage towards the building of the first true pyramid of Egypt. The first stage was the mastabas, which were rectangular mounds of earth placed over the dead. They believe that is how the Steppe pyramid began, and then the architect of the pharaoh’s tomb, his son, Imhotep, decided to build mastabas on top of each other. That is how this pyramid evolved into eventually resembling six rectangles on top of each other. This structure is where the pharaoh was eventually buried.

Nearby there is a deep pit that was also a place of burial, but it was not for the pharaoh’s body. It was for the pharaoh’s internal organs. For the Ancient Egyptians, the afterlife was very important, and they believed that one could only have an afterlife if their body or internal organs remained intact. That is why the body was mummified. As a fallback plan, the internal organs were mummified separately in jars with the head of gods on top and buried in a place separate from the body. If something happened that made it impossible for the person’s spirit to return to its body, it could still have an afterlife with its organs.

My favorite thing to see here was behind the pyramid. Behind the pyramid was a small, covered room with only a few small holes. You could look in these holes and see a statue of Djoser, the owner of this pyramid. This statue is actually a copy of an original statue of him that is now at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.

There are camel jockeys here, but according to our guide, they are not very good to deal with and the terrain around the pyramid is rather dangerous to be riding on. What often happens is that they will ask a price and you will give it to them before you get on, and then they will want more before allowing you to get off.

From journal Discovering Ancient Memphis

Editor Pick

State Pyramids of Sakurra

  • July 6, 2004
  • Rated 4 of 5 by jim from Charlotte, North Carolina
State Pyramids of Sakurra

When you first get to Cairo, you will probably be in “I must see pyramids mode.” And after Giza, the next logical set of pyramids to see is the State Pyramids at Sakurra. They are located about 40 minutes past the pyramids at Giza. Although much less famous, they are actually the first pyramids built in Egypt. The pyramids were built in the 3rd Dynasty (around 3000 B.C.) by King Zoser.

You will see three pyramids at Sakurra. There is a very large pyramid, a mostly collapsed one, and a medium-sized one. The burial tombs around the pyramid have some fantastic hieroglyphics, and you can spend a decent amount of time just wandering around. It is also interesting to learn about the false tombs and tunnels that were used to deceive grave robbers.

One other striking aspect of these pyramids is the desert view contrasted with the lush valley view. To get to the pyramids, you travel through a relatively lush strip along the Nile. But when you get to the pyramids, you cross this invisible line of lushness into rocky, barren desert. It was pretty shocking how big a difference a few hundred yards could make.

I recommend you see these pyramids so that you can contrast the different styles with the pyramids of Giza. Also, the crowds are much smaller, so you can really relax and move around in a very serene environment. But I chose not to venture out to even further pyramids. I guess you could say that I was “pyramid-ed out.” As a nice pit stop on your way to Sakurra, make sure you stop by a carpet factory (see separate journal entry).

From journal A Hectic Week in Cairo

Editor Pick

Saqqara

  • May 23, 2004
  • Rated 5 of 5 by ZUIKUTIS from LONDON, United Kingdom
After visiting the Giza pyramids, we had two options how to get to other pyramids. The first option required quite a few hours of riding on a camel, horse, or a donkey and we didn’t really fancy it, so our little group (me, my husband, and his brother) decided to take the second option: hiring a cab. After long haggling, we got a cab for 70 Egyptian pounds, which took us to Saqqara, Dahashur, Memphis, and back to Cairo.

The first stop was Saqqara and Zoser’s funerary complex. Unfortunately, in a quite cramped space, we met a French tourist group (on this trip, we understood that we really hate all those big tourist groups), so it was hard to see anything. Actually, I expected more from this complex, but the magnificent step pyramid left on me a lasting impression. For my husband, as it was the first ever built pyramid, it was much more than that.

After a while, we decided to explore Saqqara on four legs instead of two. I didn’t have much choice in choosing my ride as I was terribly afraid of camels and horses didn’t look so safe to my as well. My only option was to hire a donkey. For 50 LE, we hired two camels (on which my two brave men with Arabic head gear looked really cool) and a little donkey. My husband and his brother were comfortable on their camels, but for me to ride even a donkey was the same as for my husband to sit in a plane (believe me, not the prettiest sight). The small donkey looked really sad and fragile, so I felt so big and heavy. After a few minutes of ride, I asked the boy (who was leading the donkey) if I was not too heavy for the donkey. The boy’s answer was "Yes". When I repeated my question, I got the same answer, so I just jumped on the ground and decided to walk. Well, of course I wasn’t too heavy for the donkey and because the boy’s English wasn’t good to say the least, he kept answering "Yes" to all the questions. So after seeing some nice mastabas, we left Saqqara and headed for Dahashur.

From journal Crazy Cairo

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