Vol.13.p.270

Diary Transcription:

microfilm: begin page 270

Sunday, March 1, 1925 (continued)

(5) G 7000 X and Pyramid G I-d

By 9 a.m. the extreme depth of 1500 cm. had been reached. The rock in the south wall of the pit was now quite good and at the east was improving for a little while. At 10 a.m. baskets of clean sand were alternating with clean chips and blocks of limestone. At noon 1580 cm. was touched on the south, while on the west the depth was about 1520 cm.

During the morning a large number (total now 31) of holes for scaffolding or for the levering of floor blocks in the temple of Pyramid G I-d [i.e., the distance area between G 7000 X and the cuts of the unfinished pyramid. // GAR] were found and cleared. In the afternoon almost the whole foundation of this temple [i.e. the area between G 7000 X and the cuts of the unfinished pyramid. // GAR] was cleared and swept and the east side of the southern sloped cutting for this pyramid was found and cleared. It was filled with hard white cement similar to that in G 7000 X [This was merely the eastern side of the upper cut [ILLUSTRATION] which was cleared of masons' debris (see December. 12 , 1924, No. 1 at this time.) // GAR]. Perhaps the four Dynasty 4 pots mentioned by Dr. Reisner on [December 12 in this diary. // GAR] as coming from "other cuttings" to the north may have come from here [These pots were from quarry trenches west of stairway of G 7000 X. // GAR].

The work on clearing the pit continued during the afternoon with a short interval for the last photograph of the offering shrine and for a photograph showing the bad patch of "rock" on the south wall at about 1000 cm. The final depth was from 1600-1650 cm save at [the] west where a pile of blocks still stood to height of 120 cm above this level.

Barsanti in "Annales du Service" (I. 93) gives a section of the early pyramid at Zawiyet el-Aryan which shows a strong resemblance to our "Tomb" and the pyramid to the south.

[ILLLUSTRATION]

But the whole plan is here revolved through an angle of 90 degrees. At Zawiyet el-Aryan the pyramid was never apparently used and so this pit was not blocked as out pit is. [The analogy is misleading. Both tombs are developed from the "stairway mastaba" of Dynasty 2 (northern Egypt) and Dynasty 3 (southern Egypt). // GAR] (Annals II page 93).

In vol. VII (page 257-265) Barsanti describes a large building [unfinished burial apartment of a pyramid.// GAR] at Zawiyet el-Aryan dateable from graffiti on the limestone blocks which filled the pit to the Dynasty 2 King [GLYPHS] or [GLYPHS]. [The masons' marks or quarry marks found on blocks there // GAR] are similar to those [on the blocks // GAR] in our pit. One, indeed, the star No. 50 on his page 279, is almost identical with that already found twice on our blocks. But too great a stress must yet not be laid on these resemblances for evidence at present to hand would not suggest so early a date for G 7000 X and pyramid G I-d.

microfilm: end page 270