The Khufu ship which was buried within Khufu’s Pyramid Complex, Giza, Egypt. Dates to about 2650 BC.
The great surviving masterpiece of Old Kingdom shipbuilding is the funerary boat of Khufu, the builder of the Great Pyramid at Giza. […] The Khufu boat was found in a sealed pit next to the Great Pyramid at Giza. Originally there were five boats buried next to the pyramid, of which all but two had been removed in antiquity. The ship is built primarily of cedar, which must have been imported from Syria-Palestine.
[…] The function of the vessel is still controversial. Some believe that is was a ‘solar’ boat, intended to take the dead king on journeys through the heaven with the sun. Others see it simply as the vessel which ferried the king from his residence to the tomb on his funeral day. Others would argue that it was a official vessel that had been used by the Pharaoh on ceremonial occasions. It is impossible to say whether any of the proposed uses would preclude any of the others -in other words, all these theories could be correct. Clearly these fine dimensions would rule out any possibility that it was anything other than a ceremonial vessel of some sort.
-Steve Vinson, Egyptian Boats and Ships.
Courtesy & currently located at the The Khufu Boat Museum at the Giza pyramid complex. Photo taken by kairoinfo4u.
