Pyramid of Neferirkare

Description

Type of resource	three dimensional object

Creators/Contributors

Creator	Sullivan, Elaine A.

Bibliographic information

Contained on project page	Title Model Metadata: Dynasty 5
ORIGINAL OWNER OR SPONSOR OF STRUCTURE (Owner/Builder)	Title Neferirkare
TYPE OF MONUMENT (Type)	Title Pyramid, Temple
TEMPORAL PERIOD OF ORIGINAL CONSTRUCTION (First Period)	Title Old Kingdom
DYNASTY OF ORIGINAL CONSTRUCTION (First Dynasty)	Title Dynasty 5
ROYAL REIGN OF ORIGINAL CONSTRUCTION (First King)	Title Neferirkare
SITE	Title Abusir
MODERN SCHOLAR/EXPLORER FIRST DOCUMENTING STRUCTURE (Discoverer)	Title Perring
YEAR OF REDISCOVERY IN MODERN TIMES (Years)	Title 1838.0
TYPE OF STRUCTURE (3D Model Type)	Title Custom model
DATE OF MODEL CONSTRUCTION OR UPDATE (3D Model Date)	Title 2016.0
NAME OF 3D MODELER	Title Elaine Sullivan
SOFTWARE USED FOR MODEL BUILD	Title SketchUp Pro
COPYRIGHT (Copyright)	Title UC Regents, 3D Saqqara Project
SOURCES/REFERENCES FOR 2D BASE DATA (Citation)	Title Polygon data from Bresciani and Giammarusti (2003) added to and emended by GIS Supervisor and Senior Surveyor Emanuele Brienza (2010)
BASEMAPS/IMAGERY UTILIZED FOR GEO-REFERENCING 2D BASE DATA (Maps Used)	Title Geo-referenced on MHR Le Caire map H21
DESCRIPTION – ORIGINAL HEIGHT OF STRUCTURE IN METERS (Height Original(m))	Title 72 (as planned, second phase)
DESCRIPTION – ORIGINAL LENGTH OF STRUCTURE IN METERS (Length Original(m))	Title 105.0
DESCRIPTION – ORIGINAL WIDTH OF STRUCTURE IN METERS (Width Original(m))	Title 105.0
SOURCES/REFERENCE USED AS BASIS FOR 3D MODEL CONSTRUCTION (3D Data Source)	Title Mark Lehner, The Complete Pyramids (London: Thames and Hudson, 1997); Miroslav Verner, The Pyramids: The Mystery, Culture, and Science of Egypt’s Great Monuments (New York: Grove Press, 2001)
DESCRIPTION – ORIGINAL EXTERIOR MATERIAL (3D Texture)	Title StoneVerner (2001: 292-297) described the pyramid (which was enlarged and the original white limestone casing covered in a second phase of construction) as remaining incomplete and without the final casing, although one (incomplete) row of pink granite blocks suggested that it was meant to have a granite base, so the model includes one line of pink granite stones at lowest level, followed by courses of rough limestone blocking with a yellowish color chosen based on modern photographs at the site
UNCERTAINTY LEVEL FOR 3D MODEL CONSTRUCTION	Title 3.0
Elevation - placement in model ASL	Title 50.4
Discussion of virtual reconstruction and interpretative choices	Title Scholars disagree on the ancient appearance of this monument; Verner (2001: 292-293, 297) described the pyramid as intentionally enlarged, and intended to be transformed into a true pyramid from a step pyramid core, but suggested that Neferirkare’s successor (Niuserre) had to complete work on this pyramid (as it was not finished at the king's death), and the casing was left incomplete and a causeway and valley temple were never added; Krejci (2010: 124) noted that the height to which the casing for the “true” pyramid sides actually reached remains unknown, and it may have appeared as a step-pyramid; Lehner’s pyramid dimensions were utilized (with a slope of 54 degrees) were utilized for the visualization of the completed straight-sided (albeit without casing stones) pyramid (1997: 17, 144-145); The pyramid’s step core had eight steps, measuring ~56m high, and the second (alternative) version of the model (not shown in the web-viewer) is based on the Verner drawing of the stepped core (Verner 2001: 292)A simple pyramid form (without any additional structures) was added to the model to represent the visual impact of large monuments at Abusir from the core Saqqara area; no additional details (including the brick perimeter wall which enclosed the mortuary temple and pyramid, or the wooden boat burials) were added to the modelThe pyramid form (in concert with all the Dynasty 4-6 pyramids in the model) alters to a deflating ‘ruin’ in the 3D model at the time-slide to Dynasty 18 (1548 BCE), approximately 1000 years after its construction in Dynasty 5; this does not correspond with a single destruction event in reality, but represents a general marker to the reader that many of the stone monuments of the Old Kingdom may have been naturally deflating or intentionally reused or their stone repurposed during the New Kingdom, see: Jaromir Málek, “A meeting of the old and new: Saqqara during the New Kingdom,” in Studies in Pharaonic religion and society: in honour of J. Gwyn Griffiths, ed. Alan B Lloyd (London: Egypt Exploration Society, 1992), 60, 65-73; inscribed blocks from the Unas causeway and other Old Kingdom monuments have been identified as reused in the New Kingdom temple tombs by their recent excavators (see Section 2)
Part of publication	Title Sullivan, Elaine A. Constructing the Sacred: Visibility and Ritual Landscape at the Egyptian Necropolis at Saqqara, Redwood City: Stanford University Press 2020, http://doi.org/10.21627/2020cts
Location	https://purl.stanford.edu/fg223vh9256

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Use and reproduction

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons license. The material is made available for non-commercial, research purposes. Any third party material may need to be permissioned separately for reuse.

Copyright

Stanford University, 2019.

License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial No Derivatives 4.0 International license (CC BY-NC-ND).

Collection

Constructing the Sacred Archive

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