Ships
have occupied an important place in the
society and art of Nile Valley
civilizations from a remote period.
From the Old Kingdom, ancient Egypt's
first Golden Age, survives a red granite
statue of Bedjmes--a noted African
ship-builder of early Dynasty
III--holding an adze over his shoulder.
Around 2600 B.C.E., King Nae-maet
Sneferu sent a fleet of forty ships to
the city of Byblos to obtain cedar and
other valuable woods.
In the 1950s two enormous pits dug
deep into the rock and covered with
eighty-two massive limestone blocks,
each weighing eighteen tons, measuring
five to six feet and joined with thick
mortar, were discovered along the
southern side of the Great Pyramid of
Khufu. In one of the pits was a
partially disassembled cedar ship,
complete with oars, rudders and cabin.
Its detection was called the most
significant event in Egyptian
archaeology since the revelation of the
intact tomb of King Tut. A second ship
has been located in the other boat-pit
besides Khufu's pyramid but has not yet
been excavated. The first of Khufu's
ships, in the eastern pit, was restored
during a process that spanned ten
years. The restored ship, which
consisted of 1,224 pieces of wood in 651
major groups which had been partly
dismantled and stacked in thirteen
successive layers in the pit, measured
142 feet in length, more than sixteen
feet in width, with a capacity of about
forty tons. The ship was built without
any nails; the pieces of wood held
together solely by the use of tenon and
mortise joint. It was identified as the
world's oldest intact ship and has been
described as "a masterpiece of
woodcraft" that could sail today if put
into water.
