Word: pyramids
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Lord Keynes recognized that the Pharaohs had a great deal to teach 20th century political economists. In his General Theory Keynes wrote: "Ancient Egypt was doubly fortunate ... in that it possessed two activities, namely, pyramid building as well as the search for precious metals . . . We have no such easy escape from the sufferings of unemployment." How about an Egyptologist on the Council of Economic Advisers...
Giant Rockslide. That observation indicated that the damage had been caused by an accident rather than vandalism. Built at a time when the kingdoms of Upper and Lower Egypt were just merging, the Medûm project represented an obvious attempt by the early pyramid builders to improve upon their first effort, the Step Pyramid at nearby Saqqara. Rather than settling for the stepped inner structure, as they had done at Saqqara, they covered the Medûm pyramid with a smooth mantle that on each of the four sides ascended at a steep 52° angle. But, Mendelssohn says...
...disaster at Medûm, Mendelssohn is convinced, caused consternation 30 miles away at Dahshûr, the site of the so-called Bent Pyramid. Some scholars have suggested that the Bent Pyramid's strange shape (its sides start up at an angle of 52°, but halfway to the top the slope changes abruptly to a more gentle 43½°) was brought about by the premature death of the pharaoh, which forced the workers to hasten completion of the pyramid. Mendelssohn, however, believes that the builders at Dahshûr, hearing of the avalanche...
Economic Necessity. If two pyramids were actually being built during the lifetime of one pharaoh, it was for reasons beyond his desire for immortality. Those reasons, says Mendelssohn, were economic. Most historians agree that a huge labor force of perhaps 100,000 men, a large part of the Egyptian population, worked at pyramid building during the three-month-long Nile flood, when farming was at a standstill. Mendelssohn points out, however, that far fewer workers would be required when a pyramid was nearing completion. After that, none would be needed until the coming of the next pharaoh. No economy...
...maintain full employment, Mendelssohn says, the Egyptian rulers staggered construction starts; as work on one pyramid tapered off, another was begun. Pyramid building soon turned into an economic necessity, whether or not there was a pharaoh to be buried. Until that time, Egyptian society had consisted of loosely connected tribal units, each with its own god and social structure. By organizing enormous numbers of people into such a unifying task, writes Mendelssohn, the leaders of Egypt quickly and ingeniously achieved economic control over the populace. "In fact," he writes, "they invented the state, a form of centralized and efficient organization...