page_title: Pyramid of Sahure
section_title: Corridor and courtyard
hierarchical_section_title: Pyramid of Sahure / Mortuary complex / Mortuary temple / Corridor and courtyard
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Pyramidenanlage des Sahure, Blick nach West, Abu Sir, Ägypten English: Pyramid complex of Sahure, view to the west, Abu Sir, Egypt
context_page_description: The Pyramid of Sahure is a late 26th century BC to 25th century BC pyramid complex built for the Egyptian pharaoh Sahure of the Fifth Dynasty. Sahure built the inaugural pyramid in Abusir after his direct predecessor, Userkaf, built his sun temple in the same area. Sahure's successors, Neferirkare Kakai, Neferefre, and Nyuserre Ini all built their monuments in the general vicinity. The complex's early visitors, John Shae Perring, Karl Richard Lepsius and Jacques de Morgan, did not conduct a thorough investigation, perhaps they were discouraged by its ruined state. It was first properly excavated by Ludwig Borchardt between March 1907 and 1908, who penned the seminal work on the topic Das Grabdenkmal des Königs Sahu-Re between 1910 and 1913.
  The monument consists of a main pyramid, mortuary temple adjacent the east face with a cult pyramid to its south, a valley temple on Abusir Lake, and a causeway linking the complex. The layout was developed by Sahure and adopted by succeeding kings of the Fifth and Sixth Dynasty, thus representing a milestone in pyramid complex construction.
context_section_description: The corridor was paved with basalt, and its walls had a 1.57 m (5.2 ft; 3.00 cu) granite dado, above which they were decorated with colourful relief. On its north wall, scenes depict the king fishing and hunting wildfowl, while on the south wall the king is depicted hunting – antelopes, gazelles, deer and other horned animals are shepherded into an enclosure for the king to shoot with his bow and arrow, after which hound dogs seize and kill the animals, elsewhere hyenas are observed poaching, and hedgehogs and jerboa scatter into their holes – whilst his courtiers observe. A masterful depth of detail has been incorporated into the latter scene, which measured 8 m (26 ft) long by 3 m (9.8 ft) high. The sedated posture of the king's courtiers, representing order, is juxtaposed against the mass of wounded and frightened animals depicted in a variety of postures and facing various directions, representing chaos. The imposing figure that is Sahure is unrivalled in any other example, and the gruesome detail of the injured animals is unreplicated. The figure of a hyena, pawing at an arrow in its jaw, reappears frequently in the Middle and New Kingdom, an homage to the relief from Sahure's temple. Ptahhotep's tomb in Saqqara contains an abridged, and slightly less skillfully executed, copy of this hunting scene.
  The architect Mark Lehner suggests that the corridor represented the untamed wild, surrounding a clearing – the open courtyard – of which the king was guarantor. Referencing reliefs depicting ships on the east-corridor west-wall and west-corridor (transverse corridor) east-wall, the Egyptologist Dorothea Arnold contends that the courtyard and corridor form an architectural unit analogous to the Egyptian benben myth. The other reliefs present symbolize the king's role as guarantor of order and prosperity on the sacred island. Among the reliefs of this room a significant discovery was made. One of the individuals present has been modified to include a brief inscription identifying them as "Neferirkare King of Upper and Lower Egypt" (nsw-bit Nfr-jrj-k3-rˀ). From this detail, Kurt Sethe, who was responsible for compiling and preparing the scenes for publication, developed the hypothesis that Neferirkare Kakai and Sahure were brothers, and that Neferirkare had had the relief corrected after ascending to the throne.
  The open courtyard was paved with polished basalt and lined with sixteen red granite columns, supporting the roof of an ambulatory. Aside from an alabaster altar in the north-west corner decorated with scenes of sacrifice, the open courtyard is bare, though it originally had statues of the pharaoh placed between the columns, and may once also have contained statues of kneeling captives. Eleven of the original sixteen granite columns were found in the temple. Each was 6.4 m (21 ft) tall, and carved into the form of date palms, symbolising fertility and immortality, upon which the king's name and titulary was inscribed and painted in green. The Two Ladies appear on these columns as well, Nekhbet, the vulture goddess, in the south half representing Upper Egypt, and Wadjet, the cobra goddess, in the north half representing Lower Egypt. Above, a red granite architrave bore the royal titulary, and further supported the limestone ceiling. The ambulatory's blue painted ceiling was decorated with yellow stars, whilst its limestone walls were decorated with polychrome bas-reliefs, fragments of which have been preserved, depicting the king's victory over his enemies – on the north wall Asiatics, on the south Libyans – and the acquired spoils. In a particular scene, showing the capture of animals, supplementary inscriptions identify the quantities seized: "123,440 head of cattle, 223,400 asses, 232,413 deer, and 243,688 sheep". In another scene, the family of a Libyan chief beg for his life to be spared whilst the king prepares to execute him. Under the northern ambulatory, a relief of exemplary craftsmanship depicting precious oil vases and Syrian brown bears was found. The figures were given rounded edges so that they simult
caption: South corridor, which contained the hunting relief, in relation to the mortuary temple and main pyramid
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