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International Journal of Engineering and Techniques – Volume6 Issue3 May 2020RESEARCH ARTICLEOPEN ACCESSMechanical Engineering in Ancient Egypt, Part 88: Great PyramidProject ManagementGalal Ali HassaanDepartment of Mechanical Design & Production, Faculty of Engineering,Cairo University, Giza, EgyptEmail: galalhassaan@ymail.comAbstract:The ancient Egyptians succeeded to establish an amazing civilization sustained for thousands of years and left humantreasures still surviving to our present days. This included the construction of the Great pyramid of Khufu at Giza, one of theSeven Wonders of the World. This is the research paper number 88 in a series trying to explore the evolution of MechanicalEngineering in ancient Egypt. It discusses and presents how the ancient Egyptians managed the construction of the greatpyramid with their available primitive tools. It presents how the ancient Egyptians could apply concepts related to projectmanagements such as objectives, planning and design, construction, logistics, quality and documentation.Keywords — Mechanical Engineering history, Ancient Egypt, Great pyramid, project management.I. INTRODUCTIONAny one visiting Egypt will be faced by verylarge stone-based-structures such as the threepyramids at Giza, the colossal stone-statues inEgypt and outside Egypt, the Egyptian obelisks inAfrica, Asia, Europe and America, the temples andtombs at Egypt and the huge stone-boxes in theSerapeom at Saqqara. Each item mentioned abovecan be considered as a great project needs to bestudied in details to know how the ancientEgyptians managed to construct it with very highlevels of quality control. This is what I am going tohighlight in some of the research papers of thisseries about Mechanical Engineering in ancientEgypt.Strudwick (1985) in his book about theadministration of Egypt in the Old Kingdompresented six high administrative titles of the OldKingdom, the Overseers of the great mansions, theOverseers of the Scribes of the King'sdocumentation, the Overseers of Works, theOverseers of Granaries, the Overseers of Treasuriesand the Viziers [1]. El-Marashly (1990) in hisarticle about project management as perceived fromancient Egyptian projects outlined that the keys ofpyramid design and construction were manpowerand superior management provided by the geniusISSN: 2395-1303architect Imhotep. He presented the opinion of Mr.Gutch that the history of project managementstarted by the time of the ancient Egyptians duringbuilding the three Giza pyramids during the 4thDynasty [2].Ezzamel (2004) in his paper about workorganization in the Middle Kingdom of Egyptexplored the roles of accounting and administrativepractices in rendering the form and functioning ofwork organization and labour discipline during theMiddle Kingdom. He outlined also that the visiblehand of administration planed a crucial role in thecivilization of ancient Egypt. He mentioned thatname lists were used extensively as in the papyrusof King Senusret I where 300 workers and foremenwere listed for a building project [3]. Oppenheim(2005) studied the decorative programs in thepyramid complexes of the 3rd and 4th Dynasties. Hisstudy revealed interesting patterns in the decorationof the monument and showed the gradualdevelopment towards more complex iconographicand scenes with greater coverage of temple walls.He presented a number of reliefs found reused inthe pyramid complex of Amenemhat I at Lisht.(which may be taken from Khufu, Khafre andUserkaf pyramid complexes) [4].Paulson (2005) in his article about surveying inancient Egypt outlined that Egypt was the home ofthe first known surveyors and surveyors alsohttp://www.ijetjournal.orgPage 1

International Journal of Engineering and Techniques – Volume6 Issue3 May 2020performed construction surveys. He presentedcolored scenes authorizing surveying works fromtomb of Menna. He outlined that ancient works forone of the Queen's pyramid adjacent to the GreatPyramid of Khufu was found. He presented the planof Pharaoh Ramses IV tomb in a papyrus in TurinMuseum where the dimensions of various shaftsand chambers were listed [5]. Clarke (2009)explored the role of the 'Overseer' in theadministration of Upper Egypt to the end of the OldKingdom. He positioned the role within the OldKingdom bureaucracy, explored the responsibilityof the role and discussed the different changes inresponsibilities occurred over time [6].Holland (2011) in his paper about building thecase for historical project management presentedthe historical project of building the Giza pyramidduring the era 2550-2530 BC. He stated that theproject had enormous technical challenges from thecreation of a perfectly level base to building theburial chambers to completing its last third andmounting a cap stone. He outlined that this projectemployed a workforce of up to 20,000 at any time.The work force had to be supplied with materials,tools, food, refreshments, clothing, housing, healthcare and entertainment [7].Pelletier (2013)investigated how the ancient Egyptians utilizedlogistics. Based on archaeological evidence hestated that ancient Egyptians were skilled indesigning logistical systems. He stated also that thecore goals of logistics found in ancient Egypt havelargely remained the same in modern businesslogistics [8].Barta (2013) described the development of theadministration through the examination of Kings,Viziers, Courtiers and administrators of lower rankin ancient Egypt. He studied the administrationduring the 1st, 2ndand 3rd Dynasties, the 4th, 5thDynasties down to the reign of Nyuserra, Late 5thand 6th Dynasties [9]. Brovarski (2013) in his paperabout overseers of Upper Egypt in Old and MiddleKingdoms outlined that 85 overseers of UpperEgypt were known in the period from Old toMiddle Kingdom. He provided an inventory of theholders of the 'Overseer' title, their dating and thesignificance of their titles [10]. Saatci (2014) statedthat the management concept showed itself as earlyas thousands of years BC in the form ofISSN: 2395-1303administration. He discussed in details theorganization, human resources management andreporting examples from ancient Egypt. He statedthat ancient Egypt saw the introduction of the 'Bookof Dead' as the first documented quality systemwith detailed procedure needed to prepare the bodyand soul for the afterlife. He presented theattendance list of labours from Reisner I papyrus[11].Driaux (2016) stated that the water supply of theinhabitants of ancient Egypt was completelymanaged by the state through the localadministration charged to bring water from ruralareas into towns and cities and redistribute it to theinhabitants. He referred to the stela of Pepi I, the 3rdKing of the 5th Dynasty including his Decreementioning the location and kind of installationswhere water was drawn from pyramid town of KingSneferu at Dahshur. He presented also a stela fromthe reign of Senusret I, the 2nd King of the 12thDynasty recording that he made a watering placefor his city [12]. Hassaan (2017) in his paper aboutfarming tools in ancient Egypt presented evidencesfrom ancient Egypt showing their great interest inplanting fruit-trees, looking after different types ofother trees and designing gardens with central pools.He presented also colored scenes showing how theancient Egyptians dug water channels and plantedtrees and plants around them [13].Hagen and Soliman (2018) in their chapterabout archives in ancient Egypt during theperiod 2500 to 1000 BC studied the ancientEgyptian archiving during the mentioned periodthrough papyri, ostraca and clay tablets. Theyoutlined that the earliest archive ofadministrative papyri consisted of the papyri ofan Official Merer involved in the building of theGreat Pyramid of Khufu at Giza [14].II. PROJECT OBJECTIVESThe ancient Egyptians built pyramids as a naturalevolution followingpit graves and mastabas [15].The development of pyramid tombs was simply tobuild a huge structure over the tomb(s) in the shapeof a stone pyramid with heavy blocks and internaldesign that can save the body of the disease againstrobbers attack. Regarding the Great Pyramid ofhttp://www.ijetjournal.orgPage 2

International Journal of Engineering and Techniques – Volume6 Issue3 May 2020King Khufu who ruled during the period 2589 to2566BC during the 4th Dynasty of the Old Kingdom,We can say that the objectives of the Great Pyramidproject were as follows:- Building a burial chamber for the King abovethe ground level.- Building another two chambers one above theground level and the other under the groundlevel inside the rock deck may be forcamouflage purposes to defend the King'sbody against tomb robbers.- ReflectingEarth,mathematicalandAstronomical sciences on one buildingstructure.- Satisfying outstanding new characteristics forthe Great Pyramid of King Khufu.LocationWhen the ancient Egyptians decided to build aGreat Pyramid, the first question is where to locatethe pyramid? They decided to locate it at the centreof the land mass of the earth such that the two lines(North-South and East-West) intersect at thecapstone of the pyramid as shown in Fig.1 [16].A.Fig.1 Location of the Great Pyramid at thecentre of Earth land [16].BaseThe base of the pyramid was chosen to be asquare base facing the four main directions: East,West, North and South with high degree ofprecision [17]. The length of each side of the basewas chosen to be the number of days in a solar year(365.24 Royal Cubit) [18].B.HeightThe height of the Great Pyramid was assigned byits designer to equal the radius of a circle having aC.ISSN: 2395-1303circumference equal to the perimeter of the pyramidbase [19]. Mathematically this will lead to definingthe value of pi (π).In this context, somebody said that the GreatPyramid was intended to represent the Earth. Itsheight corresponds to the radius from the Earth'scentre to the North Pole. While base perimetercorresponds to the Earth's circumference at theEquator [20].Location of the King's ChamberChristopher Bertlett presented an analysis leadingto the location of the King's chamber inside theGreat Pyramid of Khufu simulating the 'navel'location in sitting and standing human reliefs in theancient Egyptian art as depicted in Fig.2 [19].Using the proportions in Fig.2 reveals the followingcharacteristics for the Great Pyramid: The base length /height ratio is 1.6(approximately the Golden Ratio ϕ). The pyramid angle between the side andbase is 51.8428 degrees. The offset chamber of the King is exactly invertical alignment with the navel of thestanding relief in Fig.2 [19]. The line through the navel of the sittingrelief intersects with the line through thenavel of the standing relief to fix thelocation of the King's chamber (Fig.2).D.III.GREAT PYRAMID PLANNING ANDDESIGNThe Great Pyramid was a complex structurehaving many internal details. It was not just a tombfor King Khufu of the 4th Dynasty. Here are someof the features that had to exist in the final structureof the pyramid:- They planned the location of the King'schamber to simulate location of the King'snavel as depicted from Fig.2 [19].- They planned the King's chamber to have 20Royal Cubit East-West , 10 Royal CubitsNorth-West, 25 Royal Cubits major diagonaland 52 degrees sides inclination with base (1Royal Cubit 0.5234 m) [21,22,23].http://www.ijetjournal.orgPage 3