Pyramid of Khafre

29.9764°N, 31.1308°E.

Second-largest pyramid at Giza, attributed to the fourth-dynasty pharaoh Khafre (~2532 BCE), son of Khufu. Original height: 143.5 metres, only 3.2 metres shorter than the Great Pyramid; current height: 136.4 metres. Base 215.25 metres per side at a 53° slope — steeper than the Great Pyramid. The summit retains a large area of the original polished Tura limestone casing, the only pyramid at Giza to do so visibly; the casing's preserved upper third gives the pyramid the appearance of being taller than its neighbor when viewed from the eastern approach, an illusion reinforced by Khafre's choice of a slightly higher bedrock platform. Khafre's mortuary temple, valley temple, and the Great Sphinx (carved from a single limestone outcrop) form a unified causeway complex. The Great Sphinx is conventionally dated to Khafre's reign on the basis of association rather than direct inscriptional evidence.

Khafre built the pyramid that looks taller without being taller, and the lion that has guarded his causeway for forty-five centuries does not bear his name.