Red Pyramid

29.8089°N, 31.2061°E.

Third and largest pyramid of Sneferu, at Dahshur, the world's first successfully built smooth-sided pyramid (~2590 BCE). Original height: 105 metres on a 220-metre square base, at a uniform 43° slope; current height: 104 metres after the loss of the casing stones. The interior contains three nested corbelled chambers, the largest with a 12-metre vault. The Red Pyramid is named for the red limestone of its core, exposed where the white casing was stripped in medieval times for use in Cairo. The pyramid contains an estimated 1.7 million blocks averaging 1.3 tonnes each — close to the volume of Khufu's later Great Pyramid. Sneferu was buried in this pyramid; the second of his three pyramids (the Bent) shares his cartouche, and the third (Meidum) was begun by him and finished a different way.

Sneferu built three pyramids before he died — and is the only pharaoh in Egypt who lies under one he built himself.