Pyramid of Sahourê

The pyramid of Sahourê which is of type with smooth faces finds on the site of Abousir in the north of Saqqarah. Its ancient name was “the heart of Sahourê appears in clearness”.

Sahourê () thus chooses to build its complex funerary where its predecessor Ouserkaf made build a solar temple, thus moving the " center gravité" kingdom in this septentrional part of the capital of Memphis, transforming it into dynastic necropolis.

In spite of its ruined state, the complex of Sahourê is perfectly readable on the ground and present thus a complete whole of the various structures which constituted the royal funerary foundations of the Ancient Empire.

The funerary complex

The funerary complex is indeed composed of a low temple, or temple of the valley, with the edge of the cultivated grounds and desert of Abousir, of a roadway going up towards the funerary temple of the king who is next to the pyramid on his face is.

The provision of these various components of the royal monument is fixed from now on and become almost traditional from this reign. Indeed, all the successors of Sahourê of, but also of the following dynasty, will take again the model developed here with Abousir.

The temple of the valley is today tiny room to the state of its foundations and its basalt ground hidden under nearly five meters of alluvia of the Nile accumulated with the wire of the millenia. Its plan nevertheless could be restored and was composed of two perpendicular accesses. One, principal, in the east opened by a gantry of eight palmiform red granite columns. The other, secondary, located at the south also included/understood four columns monoliths out of granite. The unit was built on a high podium which one reached by slopes placed in the axis of the colonnades.

A part provided with two columns which one reached directly by the east since the gantry of reception and by the south by a corridor out of baffle since the secondary gantry, led to the ascending roadway which connected the two parts of the funerary temple. The unit was built out of stones of limestone cut and decorated with painted reliefs. The ceiling made up of large blocks of limestone also was painted in blue strewn with yellow stars.

The roadway of approximately 235 meters length was built on a slope which only remains today. This slope is consisted colossal blocks of limestone which, although erosion made its work, are always places from there and make perfectly visible the axis of this part of the temple which formerly formed a long corridor plunged in the darkness. Several decorative pieces could be found and indicate to us that its walls were decorated with reliefs appearing of the key moments of the reign of Sahourê like its forwardings in the the Middle East or the Pays of Pount, as well as an unusual scene probably representing populations émaciées Bedouins, victims of a famine and having come to seek help near Pharaon. Others still appear the crucial steps of the construction of its pyramid, like the routing of the pyramidion to the building site under the acclamations of the workmen. These reliefs were taken site at the 19th century and are exposed today to the Egyptian museum of Berlin and to the museum of Cairo.

The complex included/understood moreover a pyramid-satellite located at the south-east of the royal pyramid. It was framed of its own enclosure and communicated by the peribolus with the funerary temple or high temple.

Lastly, at the bottom of this complex, in the west right in front of the Pyramid, a small court was in which was drawn up the false stele carries of the king intended to facilitate the passage of sound Ka of the kingdom of Osiris in the world of the alive ones.

The funerary temple

The funerary temple although ruined present of the many vestiges and undoubtedly most significant concerning the funerary temples or high temples of the Ancient Empire. It was accessible at the same time by the roadway going up since the temple from the valley or low temple , like by an additional entry placed on the southernmost side of the temple. It comprised a gantry with two granite columns, always in place, but from which the capitals disappeared. This part was transformed later on into vault of worship of Sekhmet.

The temple consisted of part of reception, with a first anteroom whose name was preserved to us: the room of large the . It followed the roadway and gave in a large court to open sky surrounded on its four sides of gantries supported by sixteen palmiform columns red granite monoliths of Assouan. The Egyptologists think that the noble ones who accompanied the skin by the king at the time of his funeral stopped in this part of the temple and then entrusted it to the priests of the temple after the rites of purification of use. A furnace bridge probably being used with these drinkings and the deposit of the daily offerings was found in the north of this court which distributed the various intimate parts temple, i.e. reserved to the priests of the royal worship.

One can still visit this part made up of a series of stores and parts intended for the royal worship as well as the five vaults which locked up the divine and royal statues, elements which one finds a precedent in the temple of Ouserkaf to Saqqarah. As for the temple of the valley or the rising roadway, the high temple delivered very many reliefs which decorated its walls formerly and are also exposed from now on in the Egyptological museums. Religious scenes where Sahourê present of the offerings at the various major divinities of the country alternates with warlike scenes appearing the sovereign in the form of a sphinx upright embanking the enemies of the Egypt, in particular of the Libyens.

The pyramid

The pyramid culminated at the origin with nearly 47 meters height, with an angle of a little more 50° and a base of almost 79 meters. Irregular base because an error was made in the calculation of one of the faces with the result that one rather deals with slightly rectangular base than square. The pyramid was covered with a fine limestone facing of Tourah and was drawn up on the rock headland chooses by Sahourê to build its complex. Of this fact it dominated the valley and the lake of Abousir which extended downwards, where the roadway led to the temple of reception. The architecture of the pyramid is formed by a core with six degrees out of calcareous stone which is used as supports with a stone masonry cut supporting the coating what gave to the monument its form Pyramide with smooth faces.

What currently remains is especially consisted of the more or less cut hardcores which formed the blocking accumulated between regular bases of the tilted walls which formed each step. The intact unit had a great cohesion and the taking away of the facing and the first regular stone bases destabilized the unit and produces this impression of a piled up stone hill. These materials of choice were very snuffed by the Moslem carriers coptes then who almost systematically used all the pyramids as quite practical career for new constructions elsewhere… On the other hand blocking made up of stones of various kinds and a less quality was left what explains than the monument was not levelled completely.

This destabilization had deep effects on the monument and collected it so much so that the balance of the forces is not assured any more. The ceilings of the corridors and underground rooms thus crumbled. The unit became inaccessible thereafter of seisms which completed to destabilize what had been saved. The plan however could be raised when the access was still possible at last century and the device was much simpler than that of Ouserkaf with a driving corridor going down to a room of the harrows and which emerges directly in the royal vault. This one still contained the basalt sarcophagus of the king. Located plumb with the axis of the pyramid the funerary room was covered by a vault made up of three layers of blocks monoliths of limestone cut and laid out out of rafters. In this manner the architects of Pharaon wished to preserve the royal cenotaph of the extraordinary weight which it was to support.

Photographs

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