Unfinished Pyramid

The unfinished pyramid of Abusir is an abandoned pyramid complex located in the necropolis of Abusir whose construction began in the Fifth Dynasty. It is speculatively assigned to Shepseskare, an ephemeral pharaoh whose brief rule is the least well documented of the Fifth Dynasty.

Exploration
The structure was discovered at the beginning of the 1980s by a Czech archaeological team led by Miroslav Verner, who noticed the levelled ground and the T shaped burial trench. Relatively little is known about the structure. It is situated between the pyramid of Sahure and the sun temple of Userkaf, and thus probably post-dates their construction. It is evidently aligned astronomically. The project was abandoned after only a few weeks, as evidenced by the presence of incomplete preparatory work.

Construction
When Shepseskare came to power, there were already three pyramids in the necropolis of Abusir. These were arranged with their northwest corners in a line, probably pointing to the obelisk of Heliopolis (the so-called “Abusir Diagonal”). To maintain this orientation, Shepseskare would have had to erect his pyramid even further into the desert than the unfinished Pyramid of Neferefre, which would have made the transport of materials difficult. Instead, he chose an area northwest of the Pyramid of Sahure, halfway to the Sun temple of Userkaf, as his building site. Shepseskare died after only a short reign, which led to the abandonment of construction. His successor Niuserre did not carry out any further work on this tomb. The location of Shepseskare’s interment is unknown, but it is assumed that he was not buried in this barely started tomb.

Pyramid
Construction of the actual pyramid structure was never begun. Only the levelling of the terrain to a flat, square area was carried out. In the middle of the levelled area is a T-shaped pit, in which the burial chamber and its entranceway would have been installed. The dimensions of the levelled area and the pit allow it to be suggested that the building would have been a similar size to the Pyramid of Neferirkare (105 m x 105 m) and thus that it was planned to be the second largest tomb at Abusir, after the pyramid of Neferirkare. The actual dimensions are not recoverable, since stonework had not yet been installed. Additionally, the slope of the sides and thus the planned height is unknowable due to the lack of cladding stones. Remains of a pyramid complex including the traditional elements of the mortuary temple, temenos wall, cult pyramid, causeway and valley temple were not found. These components were probably never begun, since they would have got in the way of the building work on the pyramid during the early stages of construction.