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The 4th Dynasty: the pyramid builders and their names in hieroglyphs

14 October 2026

The 4th Dynasty ruled Egypt from Memphis for a little over a century, around 2613 to 2494 BC by one common dating. Its kings built the biggest pyramids ever made: Sneferu at Meidum and Dahshur, then Khufu, Khafre and Menkaure at Giza.

Their names tell a second story. Under these kings the cartouche, the oval ring around a royal name, became the usual frame for the king's own name, and the sun god Ra moved into it. Read their cartouches in order and you can watch the change happen in a few generations.

Six kings ruled the dynasty

Each name here has a page on the site with its cartouche drawn in hieroglyphs. The dates are approximate, and books differ by decades:

Sneferu, c. 2613–2589 BC: Meidum, the Bent and Red Pyramids
Khufu, his son, c. 2589–2566 BC: the Great Pyramid of Giza
Djedefre, c. 2566–2558 BC: a pyramid at Abu Rawash
Khafre, c. 2558–2532 BC: the second Giza pyramid, probably the Sphinx
Menkaure, c. 2532–2503 BC: the third and smallest Giza pyramid
Shepseskaf, c. 2503–2498 BC: a giant stone mastaba at South Saqqara

Royal names turned to the sun god

Before this dynasty a king was known mainly by his Horus name, written in a rectangular palace frame under a falcon. Cartouches appear at the end of the 3rd Dynasty, and under Sneferu they come into regular use for the king's birth name.

The first two names are plain words, spelled mostly with alphabet signs. Then Djedefre became the first king to put Ra into his cartouche name, and the first to take the title "son of Ra", written with the pintail duck (G39) for zꜣ, "son", and the sun disc (N5). The title became a fixed part of the royal names, set just before the birth name.

Cartouche Pintail duck Sun

Each cartouche reads sign by sign

Sneferu, snfrw: the folded cloth (S29) for s, the heart and windpipe (F35) for nfr, "good, perfect", the mouth (D21) repeating the r, and the quail chick (G43) for w. The site translates it "He has perfected me". Khufu, ḫwfw: the placenta (Aa1) for ḫ, a chick, the horned viper (I9) for f, and a second chick. It is short for Khnum-Khufu, "Khnum protects me".

Djedefre, ḏd.f-rꜥ, "He endures like Ra": the sun disc (N5) at the top, the djed pillar (R11) for ḏd, "to endure", and the viper for f, "he". Khafre, ḫꜥ.f-rꜥ, "He appears like Ra", swaps the pillar for the sun rising over a hill (N28), ḫꜥ, "to appear in glory".

The two sun names are built the same way: a verb, the viper for "he", then Ra. Menkaure's mn-kꜣw-rꜥ, "Eternal are the kas of Ra", keeps the sun and adds the game board (Y5) for mn and three pairs of raised arms (D28) for the kas.

Folded cloth Heart and windpipe Mouth Quail chick Placenta Horned viper Djed pillar Sun rising over a hill Game board Raised arms

Ra is written first and read last

Ra is written first in each sun name but read last. Scribes put the god at the top out of respect, so a beginner reads "Ra-djed-ef" for Djedefre. Older books did the same, which is why Djedefre still turns up as Radjedef.

Shepseskaf breaks the pattern. His name, roughly "His ka is noble", has no Ra in it, and he built a stone mastaba, now called Mastabat al-Fir'aun, instead of a pyramid. Some scholars read this as a turn away from the priests of Ra. Others point out that "his" may mean Ra's, and that Userkaf, first king of the next dynasty, has a name of the same pattern.

The list itself has gaps. The king lists leave room for a short reign between Khafre and Menkaure, a king some identify with Manetho's Bikheris, perhaps Baka, and Manetho puts a Thamphthis after Shepseskaf. Neither is securely identified.

The cemeteries hold the hieroglyphs

The pyramids themselves are nearly bare of writing. Khufu's name survives inside the Great Pyramid only as red paint left by work gangs in the sealed chambers above the King's Chamber. The cemeteries around them hold the hieroglyphs: tombs of princes, queens and officials who wrote the king's name into their titles and estate names.

In 1925 the Harvard and Boston expedition found the burial of Queen Hetepheres I, Sneferu's wife and Khufu's mother, in a deep shaft east of the Great Pyramid. Her gilded bed, armchairs and carrying chair are in Cairo, inscribed with her titles as the king's mother. At Giza, the painted chapel of Meresankh III, Khufu's granddaughter and Khafre's queen, keeps the brightest signs on the plateau.

Every king opens onto his own page

The site's page for the dynasty lists its kings with their cartouches drawn sign by sign, each one opening onto the king's own page. Start with Sneferu's four alphabet signs, then compare Djedefre and Khafre side by side: they share the sun and the viper and differ in the verb in the middle.

Once the pattern is clear, write one of them in a cartouche yourself, with the sun at the top of the oval, ahead of the verb it follows in speech.

See the kings of the 4th Dynasty

Questions

Who built the pyramids of Giza?

Three kings of the 4th Dynasty: Khufu the Great Pyramid, Khafre the second and Menkaure the third. Djedefre, who reigned between Khufu and Khafre, chose Abu Rawash a few kilometres to the north instead.

Why is Khufu also called Cheops?

Cheops, Chephren and Mycerinus are the Greek forms of Khufu, Khafre and Menkaure, used by Herodotus in the 5th century BC. They came into European books long before anyone could read the hieroglyphs.

Is the Great Sphinx from the 4th Dynasty?

Most Egyptologists date it to Khafre's reign, since it lies beside his causeway and resembles his statues. It carries no inscription of its own time, so the date rests on its setting.

Glossary

alphabet sign: A hieroglyph that stands for one consonant, such as the horned viper for f. Egyptian has about 25 of them, used beside signs for two or three sounds.
birth name: The name a king was given at birth, written in the second cartouche after the title "son of Ra". Egyptologists also call it the nomen.
cartouche: An oval ring drawn around a royal name, a loop of rope tied at one end. Kings wrote their two main names in cartouches.
dynasty: A line of kings counted together, usually one family. Egyptologists number Egypt's kings in about 30 dynasties, following the priest Manetho.
hieroglyphs: The picture signs of ancient Egyptian writing, used from about 3200 BC to AD 394. A sign can stand for sounds, for a whole word, or for the kind of thing a word means.
Horus name: The oldest of a king's names, written in a serekh under the Horus falcon. It names the king as the god Horus on earth.
mastaba: A flat-topped tomb of mud brick or stone with sloping sides, built over a burial shaft. The name is the Arabic word for a bench.
priest: A servant of a god in a temple, who washed, dressed and fed the god's statue each day. A high priest led the staff of a great temple.
pyramid: A royal tomb with four sloping sides meeting at a point, built in the Old and Middle Kingdoms. Khufu's Great Pyramid at Giza is the largest.
scribe: A person trained to read and write, who kept accounts, wrote letters and copied texts. Few Egyptians could write, and scribes were well respected.
sphinx: A statue with the body of a lion and the head of a king, a guardian of temples and tombs. The Great Sphinx at Giza is the largest.
tomb: A burial place: a pit, a mastaba, a pyramid or rooms cut into rock. Its chapel was where the family brought offerings.