The Great Pyramid is one of the most amazing architectural structures that has ever been built by man. The base of the pyramid covers an area of thirteen acres, or 568,500 square feet. The four sides of the pyramid are lined up with the four cardinal directions of a compass with incredible accuracy. The sides of the base are 750 feet long, with only a 7.9 inch difference between two of the sides—the southern side is the longest, and the northern side is the shortest. The four triangular-shaped sides all slope up at an angle of exactly 51 degrees 52 minutes, meeting at the top to form an apex, which was 480 feet above the ground when the pyramid was built. The Great Pyramid was made out of 2,300,000 stone blocks, and the average weight of one block was 2.5 tons. The blocks were made mostly out of limestone, although some granite was used.

There are some unique characteristics about the inside of the Great Pyramid that suggest that the pharaoh Khufu changed his decision abruptly about the location of his burial chamber a couple times. (To see a cross-section of the Great Pyramid, refer to picture 1.) The entrance to the pyramid is about fifty-five feet high in the center of the northern wall. A passage, known as the descending passage, runs for 300 feet on a downward slope from the entrance. It goes through the bottom of the pyramid and into the ground underneath it. The passage is very narrow—it is only 3.4 feet in width and 3.9 feet in height. It leads to an unfinished chamber which lies ninety feet below the surface. The chamber is very rough, and in all likelihood, Khufu changed his mind and abandoned this burial chamber for one higher up before construction of this chamber was completed.

In the ceiling of the descending passage, 65.6 feet in from the entrance, there is an ascending passage, which is hidden by a trap door. The ascending passage is also a tight fit, although not as much as the descending passage—it is 4.9 feet wide and 5.2 feet tall. The passage runs for 128 feet, with a 45 degree slope up. At the end of the ascending passage is a horizontal passage which leads into another unfinished chamber, called the “Queen’s Chamber,” even though no one was buried here. Resting almost 100 hundred feet off of the ground, it is 18.7 feet long and 17.1 feet wide, with a ceiling that is raised in the center of the room to a height of 20.1 feet. The chamber was probably meant to be the burial place of Khufu, but was never used because he had another sudden change of mind.

The ascending passage continues past the horizontal chamber at the same slope of 45 degrees. However, once the passage is past the leveling point, it is much wider and taller. This addition to the ascending passage is called the Grand Gallery, which leads to the King’s Chamber, where Khufu was buried. The Grand Gallery is 160.8 feet long, 9.8 feet wide, and 36.1 feet tall. Its walls are polished with limestone, and have notches in them that hold the ceiling up. The ceiling is slightly triangular-shaped. The Grand Gallery is so big because three or more limestone blocks were dropped into it after the pharaoh was buried, blocking entrance to the tomb.

At the end of the Grand Gallery is the King’s Chamber, which is the room where King Khufu was buried. It lies 312 feet below the apex of the Great Pyramid. One interesting note is that all three of the chambers lie directly underneath the apex of the pyramid—the Egyptians may have believed that it would lead the pharaoh into the heavens in the afterlife. The chamber is 19 feet long and 17.1 feet wide, with a ceiling that is 35.4 feet high. The walls of the room and the sarcophagus are completely lined with red granite. Because the sarcophagus is so large, and cannot fit through the doorway, it was probably put in the chamber while the pyramid was under construction. Flat granite slabs make up the ceiling, and are held by five spaces in the walls. Some of the ceiling slabs weigh as much as nine tons, and there are relief chambers above them so that they do not collapse.