Friday, May 17, 2024

Dozens of Egyptian pyramids, some in Giza, sat along a branch of the Nile, study says

Evan Bush
Thu, May 16, 2024

The pyramids in and around Giza have presented a fascinating puzzle for millennia.

How did ancient Egyptians move limestone blocks, some weighing more than a ton, without using wheels? Why were these burial structures seemingly built in the remote and inhospitable desert?

New research — published Thursday in the journal Communications Earth & Environment — offers a possible answer, providing new evidence that an extinct branch of the Nile River once weaved through the landscape in a much wetter climate. Dozens of Egyptian pyramids across a 40-mile-long range rimmed the waterway, the study says, including the best-known complex in Giza.


The waterway allowed workers to transport stone and other materials to build the monuments, according to the study. Raised causeways stretched out horizontally, connecting the pyramids to river ports along the Nile’s bank.

Drought, in combination with seismic activity that tilted the landscape, most likely caused the river to dry up over time and ultimately fill with silt, removing most traces of it.

The research team based its conclusions on data from satellites that send radar waves to penetrate the Earth’s surface and detect hidden features. It also relied on sediment cores and maps from 1911 to uncover and trace the imprint of the ancient waterway. Such tools are helping environmental scientists map the ancient Nile, which is now covered by desert sand and agricultural fields.

Experts have suspected for decades that boats transported workers and tools to build the pyramids. Some past research has put forward hypotheses similar to the new study; the new findings solidify the theory and map a much broader area.

“The mapping of the Nile’s ancient channel system has been fragmented and isolated,” an author of the new study, Eman Ghoneim, a professor of earth and ocean sciences at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, wrote in an email. “Ancient Egyptians were using waterways for transportation more often than we thought.”

The Red Pyramid. (Eman Ghoneim )

The study looks at 31 pyramids between Lisht, a village south of Cairo, and Giza. They were constructed over roughly 1,000 years, beginning about 4,700 years ago. The pyramid complexes contained tombs for Egyptian royals. High officials were often buried nearby.

Some of the granite blocks used to construct them were sourced from locations hundreds of miles south of their sites. In some cases, the blocks could be “mammoth,” weighing several tons, said Peter Der Manuelian, a professor of Egyptology at Harvard University and the director of the Harvard Museum’s Museum of the Ancient East.

Manuelian, who was not involved in the new study, said wheels were not used to move the large blocks, which is one reason researchers have long suspected the Egyptians moved materials by water.

“It’s all sledges,” he said. “Water helps an awful lot.”

In the past, researchers have posited that the Egyptians might have carved canals to the pyramid sites.

“Canals and waterway systems have been in the consciousness for decades now,” Manuelian said. But newer theories suggest that the Nile was closer to the pyramids than researchers once thought, he added, and new tools can provide some proof.

“Archaeology has gotten more scientific, and you have ground-penetrating radar and satellite imagery,” he said.

He added that the new study helps improve maps of ancient Egypt.


A map of the water course of the ancient Ahramat Branch. (Eman Ghoneim )

The findings suggest that millennia ago, the Egyptian climate was wetter overall and the Nile carried a higher volume of water. It separated into multiple branches, one of which — the researchers call it the Ahramat Branch — was about 40 miles long.

The locations of the pyramid complexes included in the study correspond in time with estimates of the river branch’s location, according to the authors, as water levels ebbed and flowed over centuries.

In addition, several pyramid temples and causeways appear to line up horizontally with the ancient riverbed, which suggests that they were directly connected to the river and most likely used to transport building materials.

The study builds on research from 2022, which used ancient evidence of pollen grains from marsh species to suggest that a waterway once cut through the present-day desert.

Hader Sheisha, an author of that study who is now an associate professor in the natural history department at the University Museum of Bergen, said the new findings add much-needed evidence to bolster and expand the theory.

“The new study, in concordance to our study, shows that when the pyramids were built, the landscape was different from that we see today and shows how the ancient Egyptians could interact with their physical world and harness their environment to achieve their immense projects,” Sheisha said in an email.

The Step Pyramid. (Eman Ghoneim )

Ghoneim and her team explain in the study that the Ahramat Branch shifted eastward over time, a process that might have been propelled by drought about 4,050 years ago. Then it gradually dissolved, only to be covered in silt.

She said they plan to expand their map and work to detect additional buried branches of the Nile floodplain. Determining the outline and shape of the ancient river branch could help researchers locate the remains of settlements or undiscovered sites before the areas get built over.

Manuelian said that today, “housing almost goes right up to the edge of the Giza plateau. Egypt is a vast outdoor museum, and there’s more to be discovered.”

This article was originally published on NBCNews.com


Scientists may have solved mystery behind Egypt's pyramids

Malu Cursino - BBC News
Fri, May 17, 2024 

[Getty Images]


Scientists believe they may have solved the mystery of how 31 pyramids, including the world-famous Giza complex, were built in Egypt more than 4,000 years ago.

A research team from the University of North Carolina Wilmington has discovered that the pyramids are likely to have been built along a long-lost, ancient branch of the River Nile - which is now hidden under desert and farmland.

For many years, archaeologists have thought that ancient Egyptians must have used a nearby waterway to transport materials such as the stone blocks needed to build the pyramids on the river.

But up until now, "nobody was certain of the location, the shape, the size or proximity of this mega waterway to the actual pyramids site", according to one of the study's authors, Prof Eman Ghoneim.

Prof Ghoneim led the research team who made the discovery [Eman Ghoneim/UNCW]

In a cross-continental effort, the group of researchers used radar satellite imagery, historical maps, geophysical surveys, and sediment coring (a technique used by archaeologists to recover evidence from samples) to map the river branch - which they believe was buried by a major drought and sandstorms thousands of years ago.

The team were able to "penetrate the sand surface and produce images of hidden features" by using the radar technology, the study, published in the journal Communications Earth and Environment, said.

Among those features were "buried rivers and ancient structures" running at the foothills of where the "vast majority of the Ancient Egyptian pyramids lie," Prof Ghoneim said.

Researches from the US, Egypt and Australia were all involved in mapping the Ahramat branch of the River Nile [Suzanne Onstine]

Speaking to the BBC, one of the study's co-authors, Dr Suzanne Onstine, said "locating the actual [river] branch and having the data that shows there was a waterway that could be used for the transportation of heavier blocks, equipment, people, everything, really helps us explain pyramid construction".

The team found that the river branch - named the Ahramat branch, with "ahramat" meaning pyramids in Arabic - was roughly 64km (39 miles) long and between 200-700m (656-2,296 ft) wide.

And it bordered 31 pyramids, which were built between 4,700 and 3,700 years ago.

The discovery of this extinct river branch helps explain the high pyramid density between Giza and Lisht (the site of Middle Kingdom burials), in what is now an inhospitable area of the Saharan desert.

The river branch's proximity to the pyramid complexes suggests that it was "active and operational during the construction phase of these pyramids", the paper said.

Dr Onstine explained that ancient Egyptians could "use the river's energy to carry these heavy blocks, rather than human labour," adding, "it's just a lot less effort".

The River Nile was the lifeline of Ancient Egypt - and remains so to this day.

Newly mapped lost branch of the Nile could help solve long-standing pyramid mystery


Katie Hunt, CNN
Thu, May 16, 2024 

Egypt’s Great Pyramid and other ancient monuments at Giza exist on an isolated strip of land at the edge of the Sahara Desert.

The inhospitable location has long puzzled archaeologists, some of whom had found evidence that the Nile River once flowed near these pyramids in some capacity, facilitating the landmarks’ construction starting 4,700 years ago.

Using satellite imaging and analysis of cores of sediment, a new study published Thursday in the journal Communications Earth & Environment has mapped a 64-kilometer (40-mile) long, dried-up, branch of the Nile, long buried beneath farmland and desert.

“Even though many efforts to reconstruct the early Nile waterways have been conducted, they have largely been confined to soil sample collections from small sites, which has led to the mapping of only fragmented sections of the ancient Nile channel systems,” said lead study author Eman Ghoneim, a professor and director of the Space and Drone Remote Sensing Lab at the University of North Carolina Wilmington’s department of Earth and ocean sciences.

“This is the first study to provide the first map of the long-lost ancient branch of the Nile River.”

Ghoneim and her colleagues refer to this extinct branch of the Nile river as Ahramat, which is Arabic for pyramids.


Ancient Egyptians likely used the now-extinct Ahramat Branch to build many pyramids. - Eman Ghoneim et al

The ancient waterway would have been about 0.5 kilometers wide (about one-third of a mile) with a depth of at least 25 meters (82 feet) — similar to the contemporary Nile, Ghoneim said.

“The large size and extended length of the Ahramat Branch and its proximity to the 31 pyramids in the study area strongly suggests a functional waterway of great importance,” Ghoneim said.

She said the river would have played a key role in ancient Egyptians’ transportation of the enormous amount of building materials and laborers needed for the pyramids’ construction.

“Also, our research shows that many of the pyramids in the study area have (a) causeway, a ceremonial raised walkway, that runs perpendicular to the course of the Ahramat Branch and terminates directly on its riverbank.”

The Red Pyramid at the Dahshur necropolis is located near the now-defunct arm of the Nile. - Eman Ghoneim


Hidden traces of a lost waterway

Traces of the river aren’t visible in aerial photos or in imagery from optical satellites, Ghoneim said. In fact, she only spotted something unexpected while studying radar satellite data of the wider area for ancient rivers and lakes that might reveal a new source of groundwater.

“I am a geomorphologist, a paleohydrologist looking into landforms. I have this kind of trained eye,” she said.

“While working with this data, I noticed this really obvious branch or a kind of riverbank, and it didn’t make any sense because it is really far from the Nile,” she added.

Born and raised in Egypt, Ghoneim was familiar with the cluster of pyramids in this area and had always wondered why they were built there. She applied to the National Science Foundation to investigate further, and geophysical data taken at ground level with the use of ground-penetrating radar and electromagnetic tomography confirmed it was an ancient arm of the Nile. Two long cores of earth the team extracted using drilling equipment revealed sandy sediment consistent with a river channel at a depth of about 25 meters (82 feet).

It’s possible that “countless” temples might still be buried beneath the agricultural fields and desert sands along the riverbank of the Ahramat Branch, according to the study.

The researchers collected soil samples to confirm their findings. - Eman Ghoneim

Why this branch of the river dried up or disappeared is still unclear. Most likely, a period of drought and desertification swept sand into the region, silting up the river, Ghoneim said.

The study demonstrated that when the pyramids were built, the geography and riverscapes of the Nile differed significantly from those of today, said Nick Marriner, a geographer at the French National Centre for Scientific Research in Paris. He was not involved in the study but has conducted research on the fluvial history of Giza.

“The study completes an important part of the past landscape puzzle,” Marriner said. “By putting together these pieces we can gain a clearer picture of what the Nile floodplain looked like at the time of the pyramid builders and how the ancient Egyptians harnessed their environments to transport building materials for their monumental construction endeavors.”

The research team stands in front of the Unas’s Valley Temple, which would have acted as a river harbor in ancient Egypt. - Eman Ghoneim


Long-lost branch of the Nile was 'indispensable for building the pyramids,' research shows

Owen Jarus
Thu, May 16, 2024

A large pyramid made of stone with five distinct levels.


A branch of the Nile that no longer exists helped the ancient Egyptians construct 31 of their famous pyramids, including the pyramids at Giza, a new study finds.

Researchers found that this branch, called the "Ahramat" (Arabic for "pyramid"), was about 40 miles (64 kilometers) long and went close to the sites of many pyramids, making it easier to transport materials.

"Many of the pyramids, dating to the Old and Middle Kingdoms, have causeways that lead to the branch and terminate with valley temples which may have acted as river harbors," study first author Eman Ghoneim, a professor and director of the Space and Drone Remote Sensing Lab at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, told Live Science in an email.

The team used radar satellite imagery, deep soil coring and geophysical tests to find and map the remains of the Ahramat branch.

"The enormity of this branch and its proximity to the pyramid complexes, in addition to the fact that the pyramids' causeways terminate at its riverbank, all imply that this branch was active and operational during the construction phase of these pyramids," Ghoneim and colleagues wrote in the study, published Thursday (May 16) in the journal Communications Earth & Environment.

Related: How old are the Egyptian pyramids?


A map of northern Egypt that shows landmarks from the Giza Pyramids at the top to the Lisht Pyramids at the bottom. Vertically through the middle of the map, the modern Nile River cuts through, and to its left, a thinner line depicts projected and detected waterways. The Western Desert lies to the left.

The team found that the Ahramat branch shifted eastward as time went on. The Ahramat Branch was positioned further west during the Old Kingdom (circa 2649 to 2150 B.C.) and then shifted east during the Middle Kingdom (circa 2030 to 1640 B.C.), the team wrote in their paper.

Eventually, the branch dried up. "There is no exact date on when the branch come[s] to an end," Ghoneim said. But as drought condition intensified in the region, the water level of the Ahramat Branch fell, causing it to dry out, Ghonmein said.

Nowadays, the lost branch is hidden beneath farmland and desert, the researchers wrote.

Image 1 of 5

A large pyramid made of stone in the foreground with a smaller one in the background to the right. A few stones are on top of the sand to the left and a small person is in front of the pyramid.

Image 2 of 5


A pyramid made of stone in the desert. The shape is more rounded and the top is at a lower angle than the bottom, giving it a

Image 3 of 5


Five people stand around a table that has bags of soil samples on top of it. One man and woman both point to a piece of paper on top of some of the samples with photographs printed on it

Image 4 of 5

A team of seven people stands in front of a stone base with a pillar on top of it. A few palm trees are also in the background and a pyramid

Image 5 of 5

A woman stands in the foreground wearing jeans and a blue shirt with white polka dots. She holds a piece of rock and is looking at it. A pyramid, some stone structures and the Great Sphynx of Giza are all in the background

Hader Sheisha, an associate professor of natural history at the University of Bergen in Norway who wasn't involved with the study, told Live Science in an email that "these findings show clearly that the Nile hydrological [network] was indispensable for building the pyramids."

The findings did not surprise Sheisha. She was the lead author of a 2022 study that found that a branch of the Nile went close to the Great Pyramid at Giza, making it easier to transport goods and materials. Sheisha also noted that earlier studies proposed that goods were brought to pyramid sites through river branches that have since dried up.

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"The new study could be considered as a contribution to these previous hypotheses," Sheisha said.

Zahi Hawass, a former Egyptian antiquities minister, also told Live Science that the finds are not surprising. An ancient papyrus that contains the logbook of a man named Merer notes that while the Great Pyramid was being constructed, workers brought materials to it by way of a nearby harbor. Additionally, excavations conducted at Giza have revealed evidence of a harbor.

Nick Marriner, a research director at the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) who wasn't involved in the study, spoke positively of the research, as it "demonstrates that, when the pyramids were built, the geography and the riverscapes of the Nile floodplain differed significantly to those of today," Marriner told Live Science in an email. "Reconstructing how, when and where these former Nile channels evolved can help us to understand how the ancient Egyptians harnessed the natural environment, and the Nile's flood cycles, to transport building materials to the site for the construction of the pyramids."


Long-lost Nile branch may explain landlocked pyramids

Andrew Paul
Thu, May 16, 2024 

The Red Pyramid at the Dahshur necropolis, constructed during the Fourth Dynasty.


A long lost portion of the Nile may answer a mystery behind some of ancient Egypt’s most famous pyramids. According to researchers, 31 structures—including the pyramids of Giza—at one time stood near the banks of a now dry river branch, buried under sand and silt for thousands of years. If so, this could explain how builders managed to transport the monuments’ materials, as well as potentially guide researchers towards undiscovered sites in the future.

Although the roughly 40 mile stretch of Western Desert Plateau foothills is largely inhospitable terrain today, river sediment located deep underground indicates that wasn’t always the case. Eman Ghoneim and his colleagues at the University of North Carolina Wilmington believe this area was at one time a much more arable and vibrant region, particularly around 4,700 years ago when the Nile branched far more than now. This is also the era in which construction began on the area’s first pyramids.

“Monumental structures, such as pyramids and temples, would logically be built near major waterways to facilitate the transportation of their construction materials and workers,” Ghoneim and his colleagues wrote in their new paper published today in Communications Earth & Environment. “Yet, no waterway has been found near the largest pyramid field in Egypt, with the Nile River lying several kilometers away.”


The water course of the ancient Ahramat Branch borders a large number of pyramids dating from the Old Kingdom to the Second Intermediate Period, spanning between the Third Dynasty and the Thirteenth Dynasty. Credit: Eman Ghoneim et. al.

But after a detailed review of satellite imagery, remote sensing, geological data, and sediment analysis, Ghoneim’s team thinks they have located one of the Nile’s former waterways. The branch, which they suggest naming “Ahramat” (Arabic for “pyramids”), would explain why so many monumental buildings are concentrated near the ancient Egyptian capital of Memphis. The new study also bolsters similar theories proposed in recent years by other archeologists.

Also bolstering their claim are a number of causeways that begin at the pyramids and end at the theorized Ahramat riverbanks. These would lend credence to the idea that ancient Egyptians relied on the Nile to transport construction materials for pyramid projects.

Around 4,200 years ago, however, Ahramat’s luck was running dry. In reviewing the data, researchers noticed a sizable build-up of windblown sand corresponding to a major drought known to occur near that same time. Such a shift in climate could likely have been behind the branch’s receding and eventual disappearance—but those 31 pyramids weren’t going anywhere by then, of course.

Ghoneim’s team believes their potential rediscovery of the Ahramat branch not only could lead to a better understanding of Pharaonic Egypt, but also identify and protect regions for further study.

[Related: Archeologists uncover ingredients for mummy balm.]

“Revealing this extinct Nile branch can provide a more refined idea of where ancient settlements were possibly located in relation to it and prevent them from being lost to rapid urbanization. This could improve the protection measures of Egyptian cultural heritage,” the researchers write in their paper’s conclusion.

Following their methodology, the team thinks archeologists can become better equipped to prioritize locations for future excavations and investigation, as well as highlight new sites for conservation against modern urban planning projects. There’s also the possibility of discovering even more long-gone Nile river branches that could expand knowledge of society in ancient Egypt.



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