The pyramid of Ameny Qemau is an ancient Egyptian

pyramid A pyramid (from el, πυραμίς ') is a structure whose outer surfaces are triangular and converge to a single step at the top, making the shape roughly a pyramid in the geometric sense. The base of a pyramid can be trilateral, quadrilat ...

located in southern

Dahshur DahshurAlso transliterated ''Dahshour'' (in English often called ''Dashur'' ar, دهشور ' , ''Dahchur'') is a royal necropolis located in the desert on the west bank of the Nile approximately south of Cairo. It is known chiefly for several p ...

. It was constructed c. 1790 BC for

Ameny Qemau Ameny Qemau was an Egyptian pharaoh of the 13th Dynasty during the Second Intermediate Period. According to Egyptologists Kim Ryholt and Darrell Baker, he was the 5th king of the dynasty, reigning for 2 years over most of Egypt, except perhaps the ...

, the 5th king of the

13th Dynasty In music or music theory, a thirteenth is the note thirteen scale degrees from the root of a chord and also the interval between the root and the thirteenth. The interval can be also described as a compound sixth, spanning an octave p ...

during the

Second Intermediate Period The Second Intermediate Period marks a period when ancient Egypt fell into disarray for a second time, between the end of the Middle Kingdom and the start of the New Kingdom. The concept of a "Second Intermediate Period" was coined in 1942 by ...

. K.S.B. Ryholt: ''The Political Situation in Egypt during the Second Intermediate Period, c.1800-1550 BC'', Carsten Niebuhr Institute Publications, vol. 20. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 1997 The stone constituting its upper structure has been entirely robbed but the damaged substructures remain. The pyramid was discovered by Charles Arthur Musès in 1957 and excavated in 1968. The pyramid originally stood high with a base length of . The burial chamber comprised from a single colossal block of

quartzite Quartzite is a hard, non- foliated metamorphic rock which was originally pure quartz sandstone.Essentials of Geology, 3rd Edition, Stephen Marshak, p 182 Sandstone is converted into quartzite through heating and pressure usually related to tect ...

similar to that of

Amenemhat III :''See Amenemhat, for other individuals with this name.'' Amenemhat III ( Ancient Egyptian: ''Ỉmn-m-hꜣt'' meaning 'Amun is at the forefront'), also known as Amenemhet III, was a pharaoh of ancient Egypt and the sixth king of the Twelfth Dy ...

, with receptacles for the sarcophagus and the

canopic jar Canopus (, ; grc-gre, Κάνωπος, ), also known as Canobus ( grc-gre, Κάνωβος, ), was an ancient Egyptian coastal town, located in the Nile Delta. Its site is in the eastern outskirts of modern-day Alexandria, around from the cente ...

s hewn out of the interior of the block.

Discovery and excavations

The earliest known historical mention of the pyramid of Ameny Qemau is found in the book of the medieval Arab historian Taqi al-Din Ahmad Al-Maqrizi "''Geography and History of Egypt''" where Al-Maqrizi describes the "pyramids of Dashur". The pyramid of Ameny Qemau was rediscovered in 1957 by a team led by Charles Arthur Musès. Shortly after, in 1968, Vito Maragioglio and Celeste Rinaldi investigated the architecture of the pyramid. More recently, the remains of the funerary equipment of the king were published by Nabil Swelim and Aidan Dodson.Nabil Swelim, Aidan Mark Dodson: ''On the Pyramid of Ameny-Qemau and its Canopic Equipment'', Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, 1998, p. 319–334.

References

Dahshur Pyramids of the Thirteenth Dynasty of Egypt {{AncientEgypt-stub

Discovery and excavations

See also

References