Egypt’s oldest pyramid may have been built using a hydraulic lift

The honor of Egypt’s oldest necropolis belongs to Pharaoh Djoser, a ruler who ushered in the Third Dynasty of the Old Kingdom in the 27th century BC. The six-story, four-sided step pyramid of Djoser, built around 2680 BCE at Saqqara, northwest of the ruins of Memphis, stood amid a large courtyard full of decorative ceremonial structures. And while the ancient Egyptians relied on a number of tools to help build the roughly 200-foot-tall structure, a new study points to at least one previously unknown tool: a hydraulic lift system that taps into a nearby, long-gone lake.

The evidence was made available on August 5 by an interdisciplinary team from France’s CEA Paleotechnic Institute, writing in the journal PLOS One. After combining satellite images, geospatial data analysis, watershed information and other techniques, the researchers hypothesize that a previously unexplained structure near the Step Pyramid likely functioned as a “check dam” to trap water and sediment. An ancient engineering structure dating back thousands of years, check dams are relatively simple designs used to interrupt and slow the flows of water.

In the case of the Pyramid of Djoser, a water source appears to have been channeled through multiple compartments, allowing the sediment to settle as it passes through each successive chamber. After traveling through the compartments, some of the water likely flowed into pyramid shafts built to help builders lift massive building blocks to the desired position. What is especially interesting is that although many societies did not use check dams for filtration, it appears that the pyramids also served as a water treatment plant. Furthermore, the dam of the Pyramid of Djoser predates some of the earliest known examples hundreds, if not thousands of years.

To illustrate the concept, researchers described a simple example of how the ancient Egyptians could operate such a hydraulic dam system. Based on their analysis, the team believes that the lift’s floating platform reached a maximum height of approximately 17.5 meters, but may have made adjustments to rise even higher using collapsible extension structures. After the elevator platform reached the top of the pyramid, it may also have functioned as a counterweight through the use of pulley-and-rope systems. Combined with additional construction methods such as ramps and dike systems, the hydraulic lift may have been used only occasionally when sufficient water was available. Still, researchers emphasized that the elevator’s potential existence fundamentally changes what experts think the ancient Egyptians were capable of creating.

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“The hydraulic lift mechanism appears to be revolutionary for building stone structures and has no parallel in our civilization,” they write in their article, adding that its usefulness “is so great that it seems to go beyond just building the Step Pyramid.” Combined with the water treatment capabilities, the architects’ planning would also “reflect their foresight in meeting various civilian needs,” such as making the Saqqara region hospitable to permanent settlement, including agriculture, access to water and long-term shelter.

The team claims that their findings also raise the possibility that ancient Egyptians used similar systems in other pyramids of the Old Kingdom, and perhaps even earlier. However, the only way to know for sure is to continue exploring and analyzing these ruins.