How it began
The rulers of Kush, in what is now northern Sudan, began building pyramid tombs in the 8th century BCE. The earliest stand at El-Kurru, where kings such as Kashta, Piye and Shabaka are buried, and are dated to around 751 BCE. These were the kings who conquered Egypt and ruled it for close to a century as its Twenty-fifth Dynasty.
The royal cemetery then moved upstream to Nuri, where Taharqa, who reigned from 690 to 664 BCE, built the first and largest pyramid. From the 3rd century BCE most royal burials were made at Meroe, the kingdom's later capital.
How it works
Kushite pyramids are tombs for kings, queens and other wealthy people. They are smaller and much steeper than the Old Kingdom pyramids of Egypt. The largest, Taharqa's at Nuri, measured 51.75 meters along each side and may have risen about 50 meters. The burial lay in chambers cut below the monument, and at Nuri kings were placed in huge granite sarcophagi. That of Aspelta weighed 15.5 tons, with a lid of four tons.
UNESCO describes the buildings of the Meroe region as combining structural and decorative elements from Pharaonic Egypt, Greece and Rome with those of Kush itself.
What lasted
Pyramid building continued in Kush for about a thousand years. The last was raised at Meroe around 350 CE, as the kingdom collapsed. The monuments then stood largely intact until the 19th century. In 1834 the Italian treasure hunter Giuseppe Ferlini demolished the tops of a number of pyramids at Meroe, including that of Queen Amanishakheto, in a search for gold. He is held responsible for damage to more than 40.
Scientific study followed. George Reisner of Harvard mapped more than 80 royal burials at Nuri between 1916 and 1919, and his work established the outline of Kushite royal history.
Where it stands today
More than 200 pyramids survive in Sudan. The Archaeological Sites of the Island of Meroe, which include the Meroe cemeteries, were inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2011. UNESCO notes that some pyramids have collapsed over time, that some past restorations used large-scale reconstruction with new materials, and that a highway and power line cross the Meroe site.
At Nuri, a rising water table had already flooded burial chambers when Reisner worked there. UNESCO voiced concern over floods in Sudan in 2020 and issued a call for the protection of the Island of Meroe in January 2024.
