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Storage Rooms Discovered in Ancient Egyptian Pyramid at Abusir

Egypt Sahure Pyramid RoomsWÜRZBURG, GERMANY—According to a statement released by the University of Würzburg (JMU), a team of Egyptian and German researchers working on a conservation and restoration project in Abusir uncovered several undocumented storage rooms at the pyramid of Sahure, the second king of the Fifth Dynasty, who ruled from about 2458 to 2446 B.C. The team members, led by Mohamed Ismail Khaled of JMU, focused on creating a 3-D survey of the pyramid’s corridors and chambers, cleaning its rooms, stabilizing the structure from the inside, and securing the burial chambers, which had been inaccessible. A possible passage spotted by a British Egyptologist in the early nineteenth century was also uncovered. Khaled and his colleagues found that that passage led to at least eight badly damaged storerooms where just traces of the original walls and parts of the floor remain. The study is expected to help Egyptologists understand the development of pyramid structures. For more on Sahure's pyramid, go to "In the Reign of the Sun Kings."