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The pyramids of Giza today in late afternoon light, seen from the desert to the south-west: Menkaure with three small queens' pyramids in front, Khafre in the middle, the Great Pyramid behind.

Go back 4,600 years and watch the Great Pyramid go up.

It was white once.

Earthquakes hit in the 1300s. Then workers stripped its white stone to build Cairo.

Three kings, about 80 years.

Khufu, Khafre and Menkaure built all three great pyramids.

2,300,000 blocks

Set one course at a time, on bare leveled rock.

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Scene one of twelve.

Next, the green Nile that carried the white stone to Giza.

The whole Egypt build is free in the AI Builds community.

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Fields of young wheat and bare soil below the white Great Pyramid, the Nile shrunk to one channel, a loaded barge on the bank, the bow of a wooden boat on the mud in front.

The white stone came by boat.

It was cut at Tura and shipped to Giza on the Nile.

Every summer, the Nile flooded.

Water covered the fields. Boats could reach a harbor at the foot of Giza.

200 blocks a month

One crew's logbook counts the trips. It is the oldest papyrus with writing on it.

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Scene two of twelve.

Next, the Sphinx that sand buried again and again.

The whole Egypt build is free in the AI Builds community.

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The Great Sphinx of Giza today: a worn limestone lion with a human head, its nose missing, a small pyramid behind it.

Carved from the hill itself.

The Sphinx is one piece of bedrock, cut where it stands.

Buried again and again.

In 1817 sand still covered its chest. Digging went on into the 1930s.

The nose went in 1378.

A medieval historian, al-Maqrizi, named the man who broke it off.

c. 2550 BC

New, and painted. Red still clings to its face today.

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Scene three of twelve.

Next, the crews who hauled the stone up from the river.

The whole Egypt build is free in the AI Builds community.

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Eight workers haul a stone block on a wooden sledge across the sand below the white Great Pyramid while a man pours water in front of the runners.

Paid in bread and beer.

Egyptian crews built it, not slaves. A day's pay was ten loaves and a jug of beer.

Water halved the work.

Wet sand stops heaping up in front of the sledge. Half the crew can pull it.

2 to 3 tonnes

The weight of each block off the barges. People hauled every one.

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Scene four of twelve.

Next, a sealed tomb and the gold behind its door.

The whole Egypt build is free in the AI Builds community.

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Tutankhamun's antechamber by candlelight: gilded beds with lion, cow and hippo heads, stacked chests, a chariot and two black guardian statues.

Can you see anything?

26 November 1922. Howard Carter held a candle to a small hole in a sealed doorway.

Wonderful things.

Gold beds, chests and statues, sealed for more than 3,000 years.

5,398 objects

Robbers broke in twice long ago. They left most of it behind.

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Scene five of twelve.

Next, the 70 days that made a king ready for the afterlife.

The whole Egypt build is free in the AI Builds community.

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