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Pyramids of Neferefre



Examined by Perring, Lepsius, De Morgan, Borchardt.

“Unfinished Pyramid”

Pyramid of Neferefre
It would appear that a mastaba tomb, however was square and not rectantulr (nor n-s arranged like mastabas. What was arranged as a pyramid turned into a seat like structure. It was just in the 1970s that it was affirmed to be a pyramid having a place with Neferefre and that he had infact been covered here.

Called "Heavenly is Neferefre's energy".

The underground pit was burrowed for the internment load and the plummeting passageway. At that point liestone squares were laid as a foundadtio, lastly the center was assembled.

Center is level layers around 1m high, with an external mantle of expansive unpleasant blcosk up to 5m long. These were staeked to make the main center stride around 7m high. Dirt mortar was utilized. Inward squares were littler. Amongst inward and oute rlayers of the center was fil of sand, rubble, dirt, and stone sections.

A roof terrace made it easy for robbers to steal the stone – they simply dug down from above, probably in the first intermediate period. Stone were used in nearby shaft tombs by the Persians. Stones continued to disappear into the 19th century.
Entrance on the north side, near ground level. Curves slightly to the se before reaching the antechamber and is lined with pink granite. The barrior block has interlocked jaws and is unique to this pyramid.

A pink granit sarcophagus was found, and four alabaster canopic containers, parts of a mummy. Most likely of a 20-23 year old man, potentially of Neferefre. Morgue sanctuary toward the east (adjusted north south) of white limestone entered by a stairway and slope on the woutheast. A radical new area was included later (amid the rule of Niuserre). An expansive number of papyrus reports (2000 pieces) were found in the new piece of the sanctuary. Southern piece of the expansion contains the principal hypostyle corridor of this age.

Encased in a block divider fortified with limestone monolisths in the corners. A slaughteryard was found before the woutheast fenced in area divider, with adjusted corner mudbrick dividers.

Hours: 8am-4pm, LE10

One of four pyramid edifices

Just a low hill remains,, an incomplete center, never encased in limestone

Authoritatively opened in 1999

Neferefre ruled gone before by Nyussere.

Abusir is a pyramid field on the west bank of the Nile to the north of Saqqara where many of the Dynasty V pharaohs chose to site their burial monuments. The Pyramid of Neferefre is at the southern end of the site. Neferefre (sometimes known as Raneferef) was the eldest son of Neferirkare and the fourth or fifth king of Dynasty V (depending where the shadowy king Sheseskare fits in). Neferefre came to the throne at a young age and had barely begun to construct his pyramid complex next to that of his father, when he died after a reign of only a few years, probably in his early 20s.

Pyramid and funeral home sanctuary of Neferefre Pyramid and morgue sanctuary of Neferefre. Until unearthings were started by the Prague University Egyptology Institute in 1974 little was known about Neferefre. At the point when his funerary sanctuary on the eastern side of the landmark was found it uncovered critical papyri from the file, giving genuinely necessary data and in addition statuary of the ruler. Other critical papyri (Abusir Papyri of Neferirkare) have been found at Abusir and it was these which gave data about Neferefre's pyramid and the way that it had been quickly finished to work as an internment landmark by the ruler's more youthful sibling, Niuserre.

Neferefre's pyramid had a construct estimation of 65m in light of each side however just the initial step of the center had been finished at the lord's demise, resembling a low mastaba and now rising just a couple meters over the leave. The pyramid appears to have been hurriedly topped with rocks and mud mortar on its level top. The entombment chamber was worked in a pit with an expansive trench driving from the northern side of the pyramid and albeit devastated, late unearthings have delivered finds proposing that the underground parts of the pyramid were finished when of the lord's internment. Pieces of a red rock sarcophagus and sections of canopic jugs have been found alongside mummy and bone parts.

Excavations of the mortuary temple on the eastern side of the pyramid have been more fruitful, revealing an extensive mudbrick structure which surrounded an original small stone building. We know that Neferefre's younger brother Niuserre completed the cult chapels in the second stage of construction which extended along the whole eastern side of the pyramid and included an early form of hypostyle hall. In a third building phase a columned courtyard was added which formed an L-shape with a structure known as the 'Sanctuary of the Knife' (a name found in texts) which was a slaughterhouse for sacrificial animals. Inside the extended area of the mortuary temple were storage magazines in which archaeologists found two wooden model funerary boats with thousands of carnelian beads. Among many other artefacts found in the mortuary temple, was a fragment of a beautiful statuette of Neferefre, sculpted in limestone and painted, depicting a young king wearing a short black wig and being embraced by a Horus falcon (now in Cairo Museum). Other discoveries included the papyri temple archive and ceramics inscribed with the king's name.

There is so far no evidence of a causeway or valley temple for Neferefre, lending further weight to the suggestion that the king's burial was completed in haste in an improvised tomb.