Great Pyramid of Giza part2

Entrance

Today, tourists enter the Great Pyramid via a forced tunnel dug by the Caliph Al-Ma'mum and his men around 820 AD. The tunnel continues for approximately 30 meters and eventually meets up with the Descending Passage which at the time was found to have been blocked by a series of massive granite plugs. Unable to remove the blocks, the workmen tunneled around the plugs discovering the Ascending Passage which leads to the Grand Gallery and interior chambers only to find them empty. The original entrance, which was apparently unknown at the time, can be seen today several meters directly above the forced entry and would have also been blocked by the granite plugs.

King's Chamber

At the end of the lengthy series of entrance ways leading into the interior is the structure's main chamber, the King's Chamber. This granite room was originally 10 × 20 × 11.4 cubits, or about 5.235 m × 10.47 m × 5.974 m, comprising a double 10 × 10 cubit square floor, and a height equal to half the double square's diagonal. Some believed that the height was consistent with the geometric methods for determining the Golden Ratio φ (phi) as the height is approximately phi times the width minus ½, while phi can be derived from other dimensions of the pyramid but evidence from Petrie’s surveys and later conclusions drawn by others shows that it was in fact the circular proportions that were deliberately incorporated into the internal and external designs of the Great Pyramid by its architects and builders, for symbolic reasons.

The reason for the inadvertent inclusion is that phi, the golden ratio, has a naturally occurring mathematical relation to the circular ratio pi that is unrelated to the architecture or geometry, and which was unknown to the pyramid's builders. Petrie confirmed that the King’s Chamber was a triumph of Egyptian geometry, the ratio of its length to the circuit of the side wall being the same as the ratio of 1 to pi, and that the exterior of the pyramid had been built to the same proportions


The sarcophagus of the King's Chamber was hollowed out of a single piece of Red Aswan granite and has been found to be too large to fit through the passageway leading to the chamber. Whether the sarcophagus was ever intended to house a body is unknown, and no lid has ever been found. The King's Chamber contains two small shafts that ascend out of the pyramid. Despite being originally discovered closed off at both ends, these shafts were once thought by Egyptologists to have been used as "ventilation shafts", but this idea was eventually abandoned, leaving them to conclude they were instead used for ceremonial purposes. It is now thought that they were to allow the Pharaoh's spirit to rise up and out to heaven. 

Queen's Chamber

The Queen's Chamber is the middle and the smallest, measuring approximately 5.74 by 5.23 meters, and 4.57 meters in height. The chamber is lined with fine limestone blocks and the pented roof is made of large limestone slabs. Its eastern wall has a large angular doorway or niche. Egyptologist Mark Lehner believes that the Queen's chamber was intended as a serdab, a structure found in several other Egyptian pyramids, and that the niche would have contained a statue of the interred. The Ancient Egyptians believed that the statue would serve as a "back up" vessel for the Ka of the Pharaoh, should the original mummified body be destroyed. The true purpose of the chamber, however, remains uncertain. The Queens Chamber has a pair of shafts similar to those in the King's Chamber, which were explored using a robot, Upuaut 2, created by the German engineer Rudolf Gantenbrink. In 1992, Upuaut 2 discovered that these shafts were blocked by limestone "doors" with two eroded copper handles.

Unfinished chamber

The "unfinished chamber" lies 27.5 meters below ground level and is rough-hewn, lacking the precision of the other chambers. Egyptologists suggest the chamber was intended to be the original burial chamber, but that King Khufu later changed his mind and wanted it to be higher up in the pyramid. Egyptologist Bob Brier believes it was an insurance policy in case Khufu died early. When he was still alive and healthy after about 5 years of construction, the second (Queen's) chamber was begun. Sometime around the fifteenth year this chamber was also abandoned unfinished and the last or King's Chamber was built high up in the center of the pyramid.