[Illustration: Fig. 139.--Portcullis and passage, pyramid of Ûnas.]

The same variety of arrangement prevails in the groups of Abûsîr, and in
one part of the Sakkarah group. The great pyramid of Sakkarah is not
oriented with exactness. The north face is turned 4° 21' E. of the true
north. It is not a perfect square, but is elongated from east to west, the
sides being 395 and 351 feet. It is 196 feet high, and is formed of six
great steps with inclined faces, each retreating about seven feet; the step
nearest the ground is thirty-seven and a half feet high, and the top one is
twenty-nine feet high (fig. 137). It is built entirely of limestone,
quarried from the neighbouring hills. The blocks are small and badly cut,
and the courses are concave, according to a plan applied both to quays and
to fortresses. On examining the breaches in the masonry, it is seen that
the outer face of each step is coated with two layers, each of which has
its regular casing (Note 32). The mass is solid, the chambers being cut in
the rock below the pyramid. It has four entrances, the main one being in
the north; and the passages form a perfect labyrinth, which it is perilous
to enter. Porticoes with columns, galleries, and chambers, all end in a
kind of pit, in the bottom of which a hiding place was contrived, doubtless
intended to contain the most precious objects of the funeral furniture.
The pyramids which surround this extraordinary monument have been nearly
all built on one plan, and only differ in their proportions. The door (fig.
138, A) opens close below the first course, about the middle of the north
face, and the passage (B) descends by a gentle slope between two walls of
limestone. It is plugged up all along by large blocks (Note 33), which
needed to be broken up before the first chamber could be entered (C).
Beyond this chamber, it is carried for some way through the limestone rock;
then it passes between walls, ceiling and floor of polished syenite; after
which the limestone re-appears, and the passage opens into the vestibule