Duy Tran
SP 111
August 10, 2012
PYRAMID

I. Introduction: Nowadays, when we look at the huge and modern builiding around us, we often admire to know the way architects created them. Each building has their own features and very diversified in their shapes. Looking at how beautiful they are, we can image that the constructions need a lot of efforts from the architects and workers, and they may use many advanced and modern facilities to bring them the best work. Besides, if we think about the past, without technology, there would be impossible for the ancient people build anything amazing like these. But that is not true, and you will be surprised when you see how mighty the pyramids are. Especially, the Great Pyramid of Giza is the only one of the seven ancient wonders still remaining to our days and one of the most famous tourist attractions in the modern world.

II. Body: 1) What is pyramid? + Pyramid is a structure whose shape is triangular and converges to a single point at the top. The base of a pyramid can be trilateral, quadrilateral, or any polygon shape, and the square pyramid is a common version. + Most of Pyramids represent for the tomb of Pharoahs, kings of acient Egypt, who believed that they could take their bodies and worldly possessions to the next world by burying inside the pyramid. Usually, they started construction on their pyramid many years before their death.

2) How to build a pyramid? + The estimate of the number of workers to build the pyramids range from a few thousand, twenty thousand. Especilly, It's believed to have taken 100,000 laborers about 20 years to build the the Great Pyramid of Giza, using an estimated 2.3 million blocks weighing around 2.5 tons went into the construction. (An article on website: cnn.com) + The interesting thing is until now we don’t know exactly how they was built completely, which still remain a big question for all archaeologists nowaydas. There were some theories about this secret such as;
_ Greek historian Herodotus mentions there was a large long straight ramp used to drag the stone up on sleds or rolled on logs. (Website: talkingpyramids.com)
_ Chris Massey had created a theory about using the waters of the mighty Nile to their advantage to make pyramid building much easier. (Book: The Pyramids of Egypt: How Were They Really Built?)
_ People beileve that the alien came to help Egyptians building those pyramids.

3) How to compare the pyramid to our construction today? + We can use the Great Pyramid of Giza to compare to our constructions such as Effel Tower (in Paris, France), Statue of Liberty (in New York Harbor, the US), Big Ben (in central London, England), and Learning Tower of Pisa (in Pisa, Italy).

III. Conclusion: + The more we study about pyramid, the more we admire the acient people and the way how to create pyramids. Although they lacked of modern technology and powerful machinces, they still created the amazing and beautiful constructions which still remained untill now. + By studying about pyramid, we can realize that there were many misteries exist around us and need to be discovered. Therefore, as a student always stays interested and tries to find out everything around us will lead us to the most valuable treasure, knowledge.