cladking Wrote:
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> My guess is that all the pyramids did not serve
> the same purpose.
I’ve just finished reading the various (and all very helpful) responses to my question and I am presently minded that all of the Egyptian pyramids from Sneferu’s at Meidum through to Khafre’s at Giza served three purposes 1) job creation scheme, 2) tomb for the king/pharaoh, and 3) a monument to the king/pharaoh; and were not necessary to get the king/pharaoh to his next World.*
This, for me, does away with any need for the pyramid to be completed after the king/pharaoh died.
> The smaller and newer ones were primarily intended
> as tombs but the
> older, and particularly Khufu's pyramid, were
> intended for a diff-
> erent purpose. This probably served a ceremonial
> function chiefly for
> "launching" the ka of the king into heaven
Are you basing this primarily on the slope and direction of the entrance passage in the pyramids at Meidum, Dahshur, and Giza, and the shafts in Khufu’s pyramid?
> The amount of circumstantial evidence for greater
> availability of water
> here and toward the "west" is becoming
> overwhelming. It not only exists
> in the physical evidence, and meteorological as
> well as geological model-
> ling but in the cultural evidence as well.
Sorry, I can’t see where a “greater availability of water” comes into this.
Please could you elaborate?
Thanks.
MJ
*I’m thinking that only purposes 2) and 3) applied post Khafre.