Khufu ordered the construction of the Great Pyramid as a pyramid tomb, and ordered a sarcophagus for the King's Chamber.

Khufu may or may not have been buried in the sarcophagus.

I called the the stone object in the King's Chamber a Coffer (Khufu's sarcophagus) and then Khufu's sarcophagus (Coffer) so that there is no confusion about which object we are discussing.

There is as yet no other sarcophagus belonging to Khufu with which it could be confused, but if you wish to propose an alternate name for the object in the King's Chamber then please do so.

The pole of the (northern) night sky is obviously at 30 degrees above the horizon at Giza because Giza is at a latitude of 30 degrees north of the equator. Smyth determined the latitude as 29 degrees 58 minutes 51 seconds, and I expect he was correct well within an arc minute.

The pole of the night sky is directly above when stood at the north pole, so 60 degrees further south it is at 30 degrees above the horizon.

Likewise, the sun passes over the equator at the equinox so at 30 degrees north of the equator it must be at an angle of 30 degrees from the vertical.

The foremost authority means first in time, place or importance, and I obviously meant foremost in relation to place, because it was his place to publish a book on the pyramids and to be asked to do so again and again.

I should point out that the very first chapter of 'Pyramid Studies' presented to I.E.S. Edwards was written by Jean-Philippe Lauer, which loosely translated is entitled:
'On certain modifications and extensions adding to the funeral complex of Djoser during the course of his reign.
Even Lauer looked up to Edwards. Lauer was an architect and naturally tried to reconstruct plans of what had been built as well as obviously being an expert on construction matters, but not all his ideas were mainstream.

Hermann Junker was an archaeologist who made a massive contribution to the literature of the Old Kingdom in the first half of the twentieth century, especially on Giza and the history of the Old Kingdom. It sounds like you have neglected the literature in French and German if you have placed Petrie above Lauer and Junker without thinking about these candidates for the honour of first in rank.

Just visit a few university libraries in the UK and look at the books. I visited Oxford, London, Liverpool and Durham in the early days of my research. I obtained a list of what want what supposed to be all Petrie's publications, but even found literature not on the list and went as far as examining hand written notes. Petrie was certainly a very hard worker like Smyth. I have a copy of Smyth's paper on the Great Pyramid which was rejected by the Royal Society, rightly so. It is not generally known what he wrote, but I can explain why he was right within this thread if you want to know, because it is relevant.

Petrie would not have entered the field of Egyptology but for Smyth, and Smyth would not have investigated the Great Pyramid but for John Taylor. This thread is about John Taylor, or would be if you could forget the British obsession with Petrie.

The design of the Coffer incorporates a miniature model of itself as a model of the Great Pyramid, and the miniature model is based on the formula for the area of a circle given the the Rhind Mathematical Papyrus.

You have not yet considered my hypothesis on the Coffer, so how can you reject it?

Mark