Khufu
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40 free Khufu trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Khufu ordered the largest pyramid Egypt ever built, yet almost everything else about him is a puzzle. His reign is thinly documented, most of his statues and buildings are lost, and the stories told about him centuries later range from wise ruler to heartless despot. This quiz collects the fun facts that survive. It covers his family and the relatives who ran his building works, the boat buried beside his tomb, the logbooks of the men who ferried his stone, and the single portrait that shows his face. It also looks at how Greek, Arab and modern storytellers kept reinventing him. The questions suit students working on ancient Egypt, travellers planning a trip to the pyramids, and anyone who likes a good historical mystery. Every answer comes with a short explanation.
30 of 40 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01The only largely intact statue of Khufu, builder of Egypt's largest pyramid, stands roughly how tall?
About 3 inches
About 3 inches is all that survives in one piece of the man behind Egypt's largest pyramid. The tiny seated figure was dug up at Abydos in 1903, far from Giza.
Q 02Under which Greek form of his name is Khufu, builder of the Great Pyramid, also widely known?
Cheops
Cheops is how Greek writers rendered the name, pronounced KEE-ops in English. A rarer Greek version, Suphis, comes from a different ancient historian.
Q 03How did medieval explorers find Khufu's granite sarcophagus, the only object left in the King's Chamber?
Broken open and empty
Broken open and empty is how it turned up: whatever it once held had been carried off long before. The coffer was cut from a single block, and its lid is missing too.
Q 04Greek writers blamed slaves, but who do modern finds at Giza suggest really built Khufu's pyramid?
Conscripted labourers
Conscripted labourers, thousands of them, are what the camps point to, not chained captives. The slave story came from Greek visitors writing some 2,000 years after the stones were laid.
Q 05Which son of Khufu built a Giza pyramid that looks taller than his father's because it stands on higher ground?
Khafre
Khafre set his pyramid on bedrock about 10 metres higher, so it seems to top his father's. Measured from base to tip, Khufu's is still the bigger of the two.
Q 06In what state was Khufu's 4,500-year-old ship found when its sealed pit beside the pyramid was opened in 1954?
In 1,224 separate pieces
In 1,224 separate pieces is how it lay, stacked in logical order like a kit. Rebuilding it took years, and the finished vessel is 43 metres long.
Q 07Which Greek historian, writing 2,000 years after Khufu, portrayed him as a cruel tyrant who closed Egypt's temples?
Herodotus
Herodotus told the tale in his Histories, adding that Egyptians hated to speak the king's name. Egyptologists now read it as slander: Khufu's cult was honoured in Egypt for many centuries.
Q 08Khufu's Great Pyramid, the last surviving ancient Wonder, was built from roughly how many stone blocks?
About 2.3 million
About 2.3 million blocks went into it. The finished pyramid stood as the tallest human-made structure on Earth for more than 3,700 years.
Q 09Which famous Giza monument do some Egyptologists credit to Khufu rather than to one of his sons?
The Great Sphinx
The Great Sphinx is usually given to a son of Khufu, but its face matches no royal portrait perfectly. Some scholars argue the style of its headdress points to Khufu himself.
Q 10Khufu's name was given in the 1980s to what kind of object, catalogued with the number 3362?
An asteroid
An asteroid called 3362 Khufu circles the Sun on a path that brings it close to Earth's. It was spotted in 1984 and named for the pyramid builder.
Q 11Khufu's buried ship, the world's oldest intact vessel, was built mainly from which imported wood?
Cedar
Cedar from Lebanon makes up most of the hull. The timber was so valued that Khufu sent expeditions abroad to trade copper tools and weapons for it.
Q 12The four sides of Khufu's Great Pyramid, laid out 4,500 years ago, are almost perfectly aligned with what?
The cardinal directions
The cardinal directions were matched with startling accuracy: the sides stray from true north, south, east and west by less than a tenth of a degree.
Q 13The three small pyramids standing close beside Khufu's Great Pyramid at Giza were built for whom?
Queens
Q 21Which nephew of Khufu, his vizier and overseer of royal works, is believed to have designed the Great Pyramid?
Hemiunu
Hemiunu held power second only to the king himself. A statue found in his own Giza tomb now sits in a museum in Hildesheim, Germany.
Q 22Which royal woman, thought to be Khufu's mother, had her hidden tomb found beside his pyramid in 1925?
Hetepheres I
Hetepheres I was buried with a gold-framed canopy and fine furniture but not, it turned out, her body. Her alabaster sarcophagus held nothing when the lid came off in 1927.
Q 23Which son followed Khufu as king but built his own pyramid at Abu Rawash, north of Giza?
Djedefre
Djedefre was the first king to call himself 'Son of Ra', tying the throne to the sun god. His hilltop pyramid is now a ruin.
Queens were given the three small pyramids, now labelled G1-a, G1-b and G1-c. Nearby lie the flat-topped tombs of Khufu's sons and daughters.
Q 14The only intact portrait of Khufu, found headless at Abydos in 1903, is carved from which material?
Ivory
Ivory was the carver's choice for the seated king, who wears a crown and holds a flail. The missing head turned up three weeks later, after the rubble was sieved.
Q 15The logbooks of Merer, an official who shipped stone for Khufu's pyramid, were found in 2013 on which coast?
The Red Sea
The Red Sea coast hid them, at a harbour called Wadi al-Jarf that served Khufu's ships. They are the oldest inscribed papyri ever found, written over 4,500 years ago.
Q 16Medieval Arab writers claimed Khufu built the Giza pyramids after prophets warned him of which coming disaster?
A great flood
A great flood was coming, the story went, so Khufu raised the pyramids to keep his treasures and books of wisdom safe. The best-known telling was written down in the 1400s.
Q 17Graffiti hidden in the sealed chambers above Khufu's burial room record the names of what?
The work gangs
The work gangs left their names on blocks that then stayed sealed away until 1837. One crew called itself 'Khufu excites love'.
Q 18What holds together the planks of Khufu's huge funerary ship, which was built with no keel?
Grass rope
Grass rope, twisted from halfa, lashes the planks and frames to one another. The ship has been called a masterpiece of woodcraft that could still sail if put on a river.
Q 19Khufu was the second king of which Egyptian royal line, the one that raised all three main Giza pyramids?
Fourth Dynasty
Fourth Dynasty kings ruled at the height of the pyramid age. Khufu's predecessor, one of his sons and a grandson all built giant pyramids of their own.
Q 20Which pharaoh, builder of the Bent Pyramid, ruled just before Khufu and is thought to be his father?
Sneferu
Sneferu is credited with three pyramids of his own. Some scholars suspect he was Khufu's stepfather instead, because of the titles Khufu's mother carried.
Q 24Khufu called his Great Pyramid Akhet-Khufu, an Egyptian name meaning that it was Khufu's what?
Horizon
Horizon of Khufu was the name the boatmen knew it by. The logbook of one stone-hauling crew names it again and again as the place they delivered their loads.
Q 25Khufu is the short form of a longer name asking which Egyptian creator god to protect him?
Khnum
Khnum, the ram-headed god said to shape people on a potter's wheel, supplies the missing half. The full name means 'Khnum protects me'.
Q 26Khufu sent expeditions to Wadi Maghareh in the Sinai in search of copper and which prized gemstone?
Turquoise
Turquoise drew Egyptian kings to the Sinai again and again; the site was known as the Terraces of Turquoise. A rock carving there shows Khufu striking down an enemy.
Q 27Khufu sent expeditions to which ancient Mediterranean port to trade copper tools for timber?
Byblos
Byblos took Egyptian copper tools and weapons in exchange for its wood. That timber was essential for building large funerary boats like those buried beside Khufu's pyramid.
Q 28In an ancient Egyptian tale, a magician refuses to behead a prisoner for Khufu and uses which bird instead?
A goose
A goose loses its head, then waddles off cackling once the magician's spell rejoins it to the body. The story was written down many centuries after Khufu's death.
Q 29Which English archaeologist halted his dig and offered a reward to find the missing head of a Khufu figurine?
Flinders Petrie
Flinders Petrie had the room's rubble sieved until the head appeared three weeks later. Without it, the one complete likeness of the Great Pyramid's builder would be faceless.
Q 30Only the floor survives of Khufu's mortuary temple at Giza: a pavement of which dark volcanic stone?
Basalt
Basalt slabs still lie on the east side of the pyramid. The temple's red granite pillars and white limestone ceiling have vanished, leaving only this black foundation.