In this video, I take a look at a handful of structures on the Giza Plateau in Egypt that must be pre-fourth dynasty.
The Great Sphinx and its Enclosure for one, but also the bedrock pathway or road beneath the Khafre causeway, the Valley Temple, the Sphinx Temple, the Khafre mortuary temple, as well as the first phase of the Tomb of Khentkawes and the Tomb of Kai.
The later two both display the palace façade style of decoration that we don’t see on the other 4th dynasty monuments at Giza. These two structures could certainly hark back to early dynastic history.
The relationship between the Sphinx Temple and Valley Temple show that the Valley Temple came first and because the Sphinx Temple was made from blocks that were quarried from the Sphinx enclosure, this means that the Valley Temple and the ancient roadway beneath the Khafre causeway came before the Sphinx was carved from the bedrock.
We all know about the weathering on the walls of the Sphinx enclosure but there is a key piece of information often over-looked but pointed out by researcher Colin Reader, that before Khafre built his pyramid causeway, he levelled the ancient roadway it sits upon, which surely proves that these structures to the east of the pyramids all pre-date the 4th dynasty, maybe by hundreds, if not thousands of years.