The gaze of this Pharaoh defies time.
Across the centuries.
his impassive face delivers the message
of a civilisation haunted by the beyond.
Tutankhamen's mysterious smile reminds us of the riches of ancient Egypt.
but his empty eyes speak of death.
ln 1 922. the world was recovering from the Great War.
Archaeologists were getting back to work in their long-delayed digs.
ln Egypt. a darkness intended for eternity
was pierced by the flickering light of a candle.
The silence was broken in a tomb where no one had set foot in almost 5000 years.
Howard Carter astonished the world.
After years of searching without success.
he had uncovered. in the heart of the Valley of the Kings.
the fabulous tomb of Tutankhamen.
Overnight. the treasures in the young Pharaoh's tomb
cast their spell on the Western world.
ln the public mind. Egypt became the country of mysteries.
the land where humanity must seek out the keys to its past.
Has anyone not dreamed of the riches of Egypt?
Or visited the pyramids without being moved?
Today. it seems everything has been discovered.
Hordes of tourists hurry past.
taking pictures of everything they can't commit to memory.
But modern Egypt offers a vision of a land suspended between past and present.
a land where many mysteries remain intact.
The history of civilisation in this part of the world
is above all the history of a giant river - the Nile.
lts legendary course will guide us on a journey through time.
The green ribbon of the Nile Valley has always held a fascination.
Ancient Greek explorers. accustomed to rivers that flowed from north to south.
saw the Nile as a thwarted force of nature.
And what a force!
lt stretches for 667 1 kilometres.
The power of the Nile seems irresistible.
Nomadic hunters were the first humans to appear in the Nile Valley.
4000 years before Christ.
they fled arid lands and built camps of reed huts beside the Nile.
There. over the next 2000 years.
an empire grew and prospered.
But what role did the Nile actually play in the foundation of this society?
(Speaks French ) lf you look at a satellite photo of Northeast Africa
and see the million square kilometres of Egypt.
you see that the green ribbon of the valley and the Delta
are only there because of the river.
lt s obvious that in this desert. the easternmost Sahara.
there would be nothing without water.
The Nile is therefore life itself to Egypt.
The Egyptians recorded that very well
because when you see purification scenes
where Pharaoh is purified by gods on each side
who pour streaming water across the king s body
in the form of life-signs falling one after the other...
Water is life.
The source of that life is in the mountains of Ethiopia.
2200 kilometres from the Delta.
The headwaters of the Blue Nile form a vast lake between the mountains.
almost an inland sea.
Lake Tana. as it is called. covers 3500 square kilometres.
Between June and September.
storms rage over the high Ethiopian plateau.
Water streams down the slopes.
With the coming of the monsoon. the lake overflows
and the water of the Nile begins its journey down to the plains.
Plunging through the "smoking water" of the Tisisat Falls.
it takes a month to cross Ethiopia and Sudan.
The clear waters of Lake Tana become a mighty. rushing torrent.
For several kilometres.
this raging tide tears whole blocks of sediment out of the mountains.
ln some years. it carries no less than 50 tonnes of silt
all the way to the mouth of the river.
ln July. when the vast flood reaches Egypt. the scene changes.
The Nile is now between 8 and 1 0 metres deep
and it spreads out across several kilometres of the plain.
ln the four months from July to October.
the Nile floods the arable land. and turns villages into islands.
Every year. the Nile widens enormously.
at the same time depositing layers of silt that push back the desert.
The ancient Egyptians tried to keep a record of the recurrent floods.
They tried to detect the first signs of the flood
by building nilometers to measure increases in the water level.
The moods of the Nile were part of daily life.
The Egyptians soon realised that the floods could never be controlled.
They would have to adapt their sowing and harvesting to the floods' rhythm.
lmagine their wonder
when vast stretches of water covered everything.
The flood was of course an important source of wealth and prosperity.
but the Nile also had a magical character.
How did the men and women of ancient Egypt see the river?
What place did it have in their world?
As the Nile was Egypt s waterway
and as this mighty mass of water turned into a sea during the flood.
the importance of the Nile was felt everywhere.
lt took on a huge religious role.
The gods travelled on barges.
During the day the sun moved on a barge.
then moved to an underground island on a night barge.
The Nile generated an incredible number of images.
including the cosmogonies. the theories of Creation.
Every year. before their very eyes.
they had this vast stretch of water covering everything.
which inspired the idea of the primordial ocean.
The mighty Nile. a wonder of nature. swept across Egypt's scorched earth.
The flood was not a scourge. but a godsend.
lt spread its blessings all along the river.
Modern Egypt has inherited this natural treasure.
lt too is sustained by the Nile.
6000 years ago. the banks of the Nile saw the birth of early agriculture.
As new techniques developed. so did Egyptian civilisation.
Production increased.
Egyptian farmers grew barley. wheat and flax.
They produced the wine and beer they loved.
They were goatherds and cowherds.
3000 years before Christ. Upper and Lower Egypt were united.
From then on. all the peasants shared the same culture.
There were not yet any large cities.
but the emergence of ceramics and pottery and of large ceremonial centres
reflects the influence of a centralised government.
Thousands of villages appeared in the valley.
At the same time. the spoken word was recorded
in inscriptions invoking the gods.
Writing. born out of worship. was spread by commerce along the Nile.
the natural route for travellers and traders.
4500 years ago.
the first royal tombs appeared on the edge of the desert.
They were mastabas. simple burial chambers
beneath flat-roofed rectangular buildings of mud brick.
ln them. the kings lay isolated in the silence of the dunes.
surrounded by their wealth.
But these displays of opulence reveal the anxieties of the ancient Egyptians.
A whole people had begun a quest for immortality.
4600 years ago.
Pharaoh was deemed the son of Ra. the sun god.
He could be proud of his divine descent. His power was immense.
He reigned over two million people.
His last resting place soared toward the heavens.
lt consorted with the sun. lt was a symbol of perfection.
This was the golden age of ancient Egypt.
Today. it's hard to imagine the wonder of the scholars
who accompanied Napoleon to Egypt in 1 798.
That campaign led to the Western world's rediscovery
of these extraordinary monuments.
Around the campfire at night. the questions would have been endless.
Who built these gigantic pyramids?
What were they used for?
And above all. what was inside them?
lf they were to unlock the secrets of this vanished civilisation.
all these questions would have to be answered.
Small parties of surveyors. architects and mathematicians.
wearing high boots and woollen uniforms with gold buttons.
ventured deep into the suffocating heat of the largest pyramid.
With only candles to light their way.
it took them hours to work their way through the immense labyrinth.
But they came up with the first answers to the puzzles of the pyramids.
According to Napoleon's engineers.
the largest of the three pyramids was 230 metres long.
lt was 1 47 metres high.
the equivalent of a 40-storey building.
Construction of the mausoleum had required great technical precision.
The angles at the base were exactly 90 degrees
and the four sides were exactly aligned with the four points of the compass.
To build it. the ancient Egyptians were clearly not only architects and engineers.
they must also have been excellent astronomers.
The pyramid was built with three million blocks of stone.
each weighing over 21/2 tonnes.
and it stood on a base of carved granite.
Two chambers. one above the other. lay in its centre.
Legend had it that the larger was the king's.
After following narrow passageways for 40 metres.
the surveyors climbed to the larger chamber via a 54-metre staircase.
one seemingly made for giants.
Here. the carved blocks fitted perfectly. without the slightest gap.
At the end of this passageway lay the king's chamber.
lnside was the granite sarcophagus where his body was once laid.
But all other traces of the past had vanished.
Nothing remained of the ancient splendour.
The pyramid. bare of all ornamentation.
had nothing to offer seekers after treasure.
Yet there can be no doubt that the rooms in which the Pharaoh was laid to rest
must have been magnificent.
For a long time. no one suspected
that just over the heads of visitors to the royal tomb
there were discharge chambers
supporting the weight of the tonnes of stone.
The logistics involved in the construction of this room are staggering.
lt used 9-metre slabs. each weighing several tonnes.
Amid the graffiti left by the earliest modern visitors.
an inscription in red catches the eye.
Here. in the very heart of the pyramid.
workmen inscribed in red ink the name of their master.
the man who had the pyramid built -
Cheops. one of the last rulers of the Third Dynasty.
Were the pyramids the Pharaoh's houses of eternity?
Did they represent the stairs the dead king had to climb
to reach Ra. the sun god?
How do we explain the construction of the pyramids 4600 years ago?
Who were the people who accomplished this amazing feat?
The image of the pyramid as the acme of what was...
perhaps the golden age of Egyptian civilisation.
at least on its Pharaonic side...
Because by then. Pharaoh had become a god.
He had a divine essence.
Of course we long ago discarded the image
of an enslaved. whip-driven people that we see in the movies.
Some show very fine wheels
when the wheel only appeared centuries later.
The king was sacred. Touching him. even inadvertently.
was punishable by death.
The cult of Pharaoh was probably more intense then
than any time in the 3000 years of the Egyptian civilisation.
lf the builders of the pyramids were not slaves.
who were they?
For a long time. modern archaeologists have been trying to find out.
Egypt still holds surprises.
even with millions of tourists visiting every year.
She toys with us and. when it suits her.
she reveals just a little of her true face.
ln 1 991 . a tourist admiring the view was thrown from his horse.
His mount had stumbled against the remains of a low brick wall
that had begun to emerge from the sand.
Archaeologists flocked to begin excavations.
and dozens of tombs were uncovered at the very foot of the pyramids.
Supervised by the site conservator. Zahi Hawass.
these digs radically changed our understanding of ancient Egypt.
Among the many bones uncovered were objects used in everyday life.
and among them were tools that were probably used in building the pyramids.
The archaeologists' brushes also uncover touching relics.
Here. almost 4600 years ago.
men and women prayed for a glorious life in the next world. after their deaths.
The echo of that prayer is now being raised from the sand.
(Speaks English ) This is the new tombs that we found.
Very interesting tombs. you never see tombs like this.
only in Aswan. at Qubbet el-Hawa.
But this is very interesting because this is the first time
that we know something about the common people
the ordinary Egyptians who built the pyramid.
This is why this discovery is amazing
because from each bone. and from each stone.
you can know something about the people.
Every day. the excavations yield something new.
Since 1 991 .
600 tombs and over 1 000 skeletons have been found here.
The task is enormous. but the archaeologists are in no hurry.
They don't want to miss any messages from the past.
As they work among the tombs. they maintain a respectful silence.
The dig quickly uncovered some amazing. almost miraculous. finds.
They include the tombs of administrators. public servants and ordinary labourers
who built the pyramid for Cheops 4600 years ago.
But what can these human remains teach us?
Modern Cairo goes about its business oblivious of the fact
that the history of mankind is slowly being reconstructed at its heart.
Here. at the National Research Centre.
the bones exhumed at the foot of the pyramids are analysed.
For Professor Azza Saary El-Din.
these bones are tangible proof that the pyramid builders were not slaves.
Each skull and each bone help her reconstruct lives
from thousands of years ago.
For example. her painstaking autopsies reveal signs of ancient surgery.
(Speaks Arabic) lt could have been a surgical intervention
by the doctors of the time.
They could have tried to intervene
to relieve the pressure inside the skull
or something like that. to treat the condition.
The investigation reaches back in time.
Cancerous cells were eating away at this skull.
The only way an ancient surgeon could deal with them was...
to cut them out.
With patient detective work.
the anthropologists reconstruct what happened to the bones.
This arm bone suffered multiple fractures.
lt still shows the signs of a procedure to put it back together.
The patient not only had to wear a splint.
he also needed a graft to help the bones re-knit.
X-rays confirm the diagnosis.
5000 years ago.
this man underwent a long and complex surgical procedure.
He could well have been a worker
who was taken to the doctor after a slab fell on his arm.
Would a slave have got that kind of care?
Another discovery revealed new information
when archaeologists exhumed the remains of a mother
and her young child.
At the foot of the pyramids.
craftsmen. stonecutters and masons lived and died near their work.
We initially expected to find a group just of men.
who would be doing the work.
But the first skeleton discovered was a woman s.
That made us change our approach completely
and start looking at the ratio of women to men
and at whether they were a settled community
or had only come for the work.
For centuries. historians supported the slavery theory
to explain the monumental constructions of ancient Egypt.
They were mistaken. The workmen were not slaves.
ln fact. a whole village was built at the foot of the pyramids.
Large families - men. women and children - lived in it.
When we discovered their skeletons
we found skeletons for women. men and children.
We did not find only men.
With slaves. theyd have brought a few males
to do the work and go back home.
But these men settled in the area.
They were living a settled life with their women and children.
They were surely not slaves.
The British Museum. in London.
Researchers here have delved even deeper.
By piecing together and translating texts from the era.
they have recreated part of the daily lives of these men and women.
WOMAN: There s not many sheet joins on here.
MAN: l think it s a fairly good quality papyrus.
They might be just long sheets.
Yes... good. good.
And the hieroglyphs line up beautifully.
lt doesn t want to go on that one either. does it?
The museum archives hold a rare treasure.
The sands of Egypt recently yielded up a perfectly flat piece of stone
that lists the names of certain workers.
lt is an attendance record 5000 years old
and it records. day by day.
the date and the reason for each workman's absence.
lt is inscribed on both sides
and contains records of about 40 names of workmen.
l think this kind of document is particularly interesting
because it is a document of the ordinary people of ancient Egypt.
The scribe's stylus faithfully recorded. in black ink. the name of each worker.
Underneath. he inscribed the date of absence. also in black.
The cause of absence was recorded in red.
ln half the cases. the main reason given was illness.
This incomparable document takes us right into the world of ancient Egypt.
2500 years before Christ.
a young man called Sebah was away from work for one day.
What reason did he give for his absence?
ln the case of a worker called Sebah.
whose name is written at the beginning of this line.
he was off for one day because he was bitten by a scorpion.
This is the kind of accident which could have happened
even in the house in the village.
The village where these workers lived was situated on the desert
where scorpions are quite common.
ln the case of the worker called Consu. whose name is written here.
he was absent firstly because he was ill for some days here.
but then more interestingly. later on.
we are told he is at his festival. at this point.
And this may be a family or personal celebration
such as a birthday. for example.
The pyramid workers had a wide variety of reasons.
Pusair left the workers' village when he heard that his young son was sick.
From the details of the life of these workers on this record
we can see that they were free people.
They had their own lives. which were reasonably pleasant for the time.
They had their own possessions.
lt was a hierarchical society.
There s no escape from the fact
that there were people at various levels of society.
But having said that.
it was a much freer and equal society than certain others.
The names on the stone are like a mirror of the past.
Nepherub left. in mourning. to have his brother embalmed.
Death was everywhere. an inescapable part of life.
ln ancient Egypt we find the paradox
that what appears to be an obsession with death
is in fact the desire to live on in the afterlife.
Likewise. nothing speaks more strongly of daily life
than the decoration and furnishing of the tombs.
The point of it was not storytelling
but to give the people buried in the tombs
everything that could recreate.
through the creative power of images and writing.
the life theyd led. which they wanted to continue in the afterlife.
The tombs of the Pharaoh's servants show us an Egypt that no longer exists.
lmages of papyrus and lotus blossoms are seen alongside sacred animals
that are now extinct.
ln the fields. men and women sow wheat and harvest crops.
while the frescoes' explosion of colour reflects their zest for life.
At the centre of it all. the Nile sets the rhythms of everyday life
and the winegrowers appear delighted at the quality of the grapes.
The family was very important.
Family statues were taken right into the tomb.
This loving father faces eternity with his two daughters.
At the gates of an eternity they had constructed for themselves.
the Pharaoh's subjects seemed to be obsessed with life.
The obsession with life.
leading to the obsession with eternity.
this notion of eternity that seems to be
the most Egyptian component of all this imaginary life.
is truly obsessional.
When you look at even the smallest figurine
showing a deceased couple. for instance.
one their son has dedicated with a tiny inscription.
perhaps with only three signs.
it will say "From their son. that their name may live. "
What matters is to continue living in the afterworld.
As a corollary. there s also the harpist s song
that entices you to enjoy life
because no one s ever come back
to tell us that life goes on in the afterlife.
ln other words. it says
"Enjoy life. spend a wonderful day
"with the woman you love sitting by your side
"until the day you have to go aboard... "
There s this wonderful image of going on a barge
to be taken to the other side.
lt s a great metaphor for death.
Until that day comes. life has to be enjoyed.
They ll do everything they can.
they ll represent the life they led.
make all the necessary offerings...
in the simplest form. 1 000 beer jugs. 1 000 loaves.
1 000 pieces of fabric. etc... 1 000 head of cattle.
That s fine. everything will be put in the tomb
but "Make the most of it. because no one s ever come back. "
To accept the idea of death.
the Egyptians built tombs that looked like houses.
They preserved the image of a sunny universe
and so paid tribute to Ra. the sun god.
Yet how do we explain the fact
that hundreds of thousands of men and women worked to build a monument
that may never have been occupied?
Were the pyramids the triumph of life over primeval chaos.
or did they represent something more symbolic. more esoteric?
2500 years before Christ. in what would become Europe.
populations of hunters lived in primitive wooden huts.
ln Giza. at the same time.
hundreds of thousands of workers were beginning their gigantic task.
This was Egypt's golden age.
Her merchants ventured into the Mediterranean.
their caravans journeyed as far south as Sudan.
and all along these routes. trade flourished.
Pharaoh held absolute power.
Were the pyramids the symbol of this unequalled power?
When his officers decided to climb the pyramids at Giza.
Napoleon calculated that the three together contained enough stone
to build a wall 3 metres high and 30 centimetres wide.
right around France.
How long did these huge projects go on for?
For the last 200 years there have been many theories.
but we still don't have an answer.
Given the scorching desert heat. why did free men agree to build them?
The pyramids are still an enigma.
Every day. as they catch the last rays of the sun.
their giant shadows blot out our questions.
What we are sure of is that to get the raw materials to the pyramid site
the Egyptians had to wait for the flood.
From July to October. the barges were berthed on the edge of the desert.
The entire valley was covered in water during those months.
and the peasants had to wait for it to recede.
During this long period of idleness.
the Pharaoh's servants had an extremely large labour force available to them.
During digs at the burial sites beside the pyramids.
Zahi Hawass worked out how the builders were recruited.
This is our most recent discovery. a tomb that was found.
This is the tomb of Kai. who was a priest.
And this tomb dated to Dynasty Four. about 4600 years ago.
The Pharaohs' priests were excellent administrators.
On the walls of the tomb of Kai. who served Cheops.
the whole peasant population walks in procession.
lnscriptions in Kai's tomb tell us precisely when they joined the building site.
And it s telling us here
that he paid them beer and bread.
And he made them to make an offer
and say that they re very happy. they re satisfied.
That they... about this payment.
They re saying they swore that they were satisfied.
They said "By the name of God. we are very happy. "
ln exchange for their labour.
Egyptian workmen received the basic necessities of life.
They were grateful to the Pharaoh and devoted to him.
The construction of the pyramids was made possible
by this contract of mutual assistance that they had with their sovereign.
Modern Giza now lives and dies in the shadow of the pyramids.
They are testimonials in stone
to the social organisation of ancient Egypt.
But can we believe that the pyramids were built
only to occupy the Egyptian people during the four months of flood time?
Zahi Hawass argues
that the building program had another. much stronger purpose -
a symbolic one.
The pyramid is their national project. Then all of them. they unite. all of them.
King. noblemen. official. workmen. farmers.
all of them together work to help the king to be a god.
And that s why my idea that the pyramid was a national project.
lt is the most important thing to the mind of the Egyptian.
Without this help. the king would never have built this pyramid.
And is this why the pyramid was the symbol
of unification of the two countries. Upper and Lower Egypt.
So. part of the veil has now been lifted.
For over 2000 years. the Egyptians united to accomplish a common project.
a symbol of their strength and unity.
From the stone mastabas to the Giza site.
almost 1 00 pyramids were built in Egypt.
They were the first stone monuments in the history of mankind.
The Egyptians built a symbol of the power of their nation
in the heart of their land.
ln this land. the pyramid. the king's house for eternity.
rose like a drop of radiant light toward the heavens.
ln the history of ancient Egypt. the Nile was all.
lts course tells us more than any epic.
lt was the frontier between life and death.
the path to the sun and the stars.
lt was more than a river.
lt was a god whose will was carved in stone.
The untameable Nile was an integral part of ancient Egypt.
( EXPLOSlON )
Yet the Nile was tamed.
ln 1 961 . under President Nasser. construction of the Aswan Dam began.
lt took ten years to complete.
ten years of hard labour to control the annual flood.
The Nile is no longer a god.
lt has become a tame. quiet river.
( SHlP'S HORN )
The Nile. like the pyramids.
had to pay tribute to the modernisation of Egypt.
To harness its energy.
modern-day Egyptians had to give up some of its benefits.
Today. the land of the valley is no longer fertilised by silt
borne away from the mountains of Ethiopia.
Fertiliser has replaced the flood.
What became of the legacy of ancient Egypt?
What do the pyramids stand for today?
lve often felt that today s Egypt is rather cut off from its past.
that the past is just another great resource.
that the monuments obviously attract people.
making tourism one of Egypt s main resources.
This was something that Champollion. a pioneer. understood
because when he left Egypt at the end of his journey in 1 829.
he left Mohamed Alia note on the protection of monuments.
He listed the monuments to be protected.
Before the word even existed.
he understood what tourism would be
with its economic dimension. the spending of money.
He said "It will attract educated people
"who will benefit the country with the money they ll spend. "
This mass of stones is probably the most obvious symbol.
the most obvious image that we have
when we talk about ancient Egypt
with obelisks. sphinxes and such-like words
that fill us with fantasies and dreams.
Ancient Egypt gave way to a cosmopolitan nation.
Turkish. then Arab. a land of explorers.
Egypt will benefit from its heritage for a long time to come
because much still lies beneath the desert sands.
Today. Cairo has become a megalopolis.
stretching along a quiet river.
Modern Egyptians are builders too.
4600 years ago.
the Pharaohs' subjects left us proofs of their prestige.
their technical prowess. their grandeur.
With the help of the Nile.
the Egyptian civilisation united men and women
in a community of enormous achievement.
On the edge of the desert.
three sacred mountains remind us of the destiny of a people
born on the banks of the Nile.
The pyramids have remained the symbol. throughout the ages.
of our fear of death.
They rise like beams of light pointing to the hereafter.
When we look at them.
we are reminded that they will always keep the secret of eternal life.
Subtitles SBS Australia 2007