More pyramids than many people expect
It is sometimes said that Sudan has more pyramids than Egypt. Depending on how they are counted, and whether small tombs are included, the number at the major Kushite cemeteries is in the hundreds, and the total is often stated as being greater than Egypt’s. The claim is plausible, but the exact figures vary between counts, so it is safer to say that Sudan has a very large number of pyramids, most of them small. They are not a hidden or lost wonder, since they have been known to travellers and archaeologists for two centuries, but they are less visited than the great pyramids of Egypt.
Why a Nubian kingdom built pyramids
The Egyptians built pyramids for their kings from the third millennium BCE, but the practice largely stopped by the end of the Middle Kingdom, although small pyramids were still used for private tombs. The Kushite kings of the Napatan period revived the form many centuries later. They had absorbed Egyptian religion, including belief in resurrection through Osiris, and they appear to have chosen the pyramid as an old and prestigious sign of kingship, in line with their archaizing approach to Egyptian tradition. This is why the Kushite pyramids belong to a quite different era from those at Giza, separated from them by well over a thousand years.
The three main cemeteries
El-Kurru. This is the early royal cemetery near Jebel Barkal. The first rulers were buried in tumulus-type tombs, which recall older Nubian customs. Piye is traditionally the first to have a pyramid tomb here, a small structure over a rock-cut chamber. Several later kings and queens of the Twenty-fifth Dynasty period were buried here.
Nuri. Taharqa began the cemetery at Nuri across the river, and his pyramid is the largest of the Kushite royal pyramids, with a base of roughly 50 metres. About twenty kings and many queens were buried there, until roughly the fourth century BCE. Their tombs have underground chambers reached by a stairway, and the stairways were filled in after the burial.
Meroe. After the move of the royal centre south, kings and queens were buried in cemeteries near Meroe. Here there are more than 200 pyramids in the main groups, though many are damaged. They include the royal tombs and also those of nobles and officials. The Meroe pyramids tend to be smaller than the Nuri ones, and their bases are typically in the range of a few metres to around 30 metres.
How they differ from Egyptian pyramids
The most obvious difference is the angle. Kushite pyramids are steep, with sides rising at roughly 70 degrees in many cases, whereas the Great Pyramid built for Khufu, the Khufu Great Pyramid, has a much lower slope, close to 51 or 52 degrees. A Kushite pyramid is therefore narrow and tall for its base, almost like a spire.
Other differences are:
- Size. Kushite pyramids are much smaller. The Great Pyramid was originally about 146 metres high and over 230 metres wide at the base, and the largest Kushite pyramid is a small fraction of that.
- Material. They were usually built of sandstone blocks laid in courses, often with a rubble core, and sometimes plastered and painted.
- The chapel. A small offering chapel was built against the east face, where relatives and priests made offerings. In Egypt’s Old Kingdom the main temple was a separate building near the river.
- The burial. The burial chamber was cut into the rock below, not placed inside the pyramid. The pyramid stood as a marker above it.
- The setting. Kushite cemeteries were on desert ridges, not on the Giza plateau, with groups of pyramids set close together. These were not isolated monuments of single rulers in the way of the Giza pyramid complex.
In both traditions, though, the pyramid expressed the idea of kingship, the afterlife and a link to the sun. The Kushite kings, like the pharaohs, also saw themselves as part of a world shaped by Egyptian afterlife beliefs, though the details of their rituals varied. Before their burials, the bodies were prepared; the exact method of mummification used is not always clear because of poor preservation.
Burial practices
Royal burials at Nuri and Meroe were often accompanied by shabti figures, vessels, jewellery and furniture. Some Kushite burials also kept older Nubian habits, such as laying the body on a bed. Because tomb robbers entered most of the chambers in antiquity, much of the original burial equipment is lost, and what remains is often fragmentary.
Damage and rediscovery
The pyramids were known to European visitors from the early nineteenth century. In the 1830s an Italian doctor, Giuseppe Ferlini, dismantled the top of a pyramid at Meroe, that of Queen Amanishakheto, and found a hoard of gold jewellery. His actions damaged the monument, and some pyramids lost their tops for the same reason, as treasure hunters followed. In the early twentieth century, George Reisner excavated the royal cemeteries at El-Kurru, Nuri and Meroe and published the tombs, giving the first systematic record. More recent work includes conservation, survey and restoration of some pyramids at Meroe, which UNESCO lists as a World Heritage property.
A distinct tradition
The Nubian pyramids are best understood as a Kushite tradition inspired by Egypt, not as a copy. Their steep slopes, small chapels and large number are distinctive, and they give a picture of how Kush saw its own history.