labor from so many Egyptians. The kingdom developed a funerary tradition around the worship of their divine pharaohs, both living and dead. Every aspect of life was affected. The Egyptians dug a network of canals off the Nile to transport stone for the pyramids and food for the workers, and a simple, local agriculture became the force that knit together the kingdom's economy. The need to keep records of the harvest may have led to the invention of a written language. Yet after five and a half centuries this flourishing civilization collapsed, plunging Egypt into disorder. Perhaps the seeds of the collapse were planted in the soil of the civilization that, for all its grandeur, seemed obsessed with the idea that its dead rulers must live forever. The daily life of the workers constructing the pyramids was one of repetitive toil. On wooden sledges across the sands, workers hauled the giant stone the largest granite blocks weighing as much as seventy tons-that built the pyramids. Egypt created a vast agricultural empire, yet all the irrigation was done by hand. Farmers filled two heavy jars from the canals, then hung them from a yoke over their shoulders. Recent excavation of the graves of pyramid workers reveals that some were missing limbs or had damaged spines the human cost of a national compulsion to glorify gods and deify the souls of kings. Two generations after Djoser's reign, the center of the Old Kingdom moved north to the barren plateau of Giza. Three 4th dynasty pyramids were erected here, they are included among the seven wonders of the world. The norther most and the oldest of the group was built by Khufu, the second king of the 4th dynasty called the Great Pyramid, it is the largest of the three the length of each side at the base averaging 775 3/4 feet and it height being 481 2/5 feet. The middle pyramid was built by Khafre, the fourth of the eight kings of the 4th dynasty; the structure mea...
