Sadd-el-Kafara
29.79551899055631.432037Koordinaten: 29 ° 47 ' 44 "N, 31 ° 25' 55" E
The dam Sadd -el- Kafara ( dam of the Gentiles ) was built about 2600-2500 BC in Wadi Garawi in Egypt. Other information speak 2950-2750 BC
The building was a kind of rockfill dam with external staircase-shaped stones and boulders, gravel and debris inside. From the other hand the structure is referred to as gravity dam due to the external up to 24 m thick walls. It should most likely serve the regulation of floods and irrigation.
Construction and dimensions
The dimensions of the structure are given differently in different sources. The dam had a height of about 14 m and the length of the dam was 113 m, a base length of 81 m, a top width of 56 m and a bottom width of 98 m. The slope angles were approximately 1:1.7 and 1:1.3 at the water side to the air side. The storage volume was 465000-620000 cubic meters, depending on how high was dammed and had the river basin covers an area of 185 km ².
Remains of a bottom outlet or spillway are not recognizable. Either these were in the destroyed part of the dam, or they were not there. The dam core is made of rubble, gravel and weathered material, while the slopes are covered on both sides with riprap. On the water side there is a layer of limestone blocks, which rest on the stair-like riprap. The construction period is assumed to be 10 to 12 years.
History
The dam was built in the 3rd or 4th Dynasty of the Old Kingdom probably within 10 to 12 years. On the Palermostein is under King Sneferu of the "Year after the 6th time the count " from building a "wall Upper and Lower Egypt " reports. Maybe so therefore the dam Sadd -el- Kafara is meant. Since the Wadi Garawi is located directly opposite of the city on the west bank of the Nile necropolis of Dahshur, the dam could have served as a bulwark for the necropolis. For an equation of the mentioned in Palermostein construction with the dam speak ceramic finds that have been made in its ruins and its construction clearly dated to the 3rd-4th Dynasty.
The dam was possibly never completed. From the fact that there is no sediment in the reservoir, it is concluded that the dam has been destroyed before or shortly after its completion by an extraordinary flood. This resulted in the areas of the site downstream in the flow direction to a flood disaster, as there was no redirection for this amount of water. The disaster was apparently so great that the dam was not rebuilt. At least 800 years, perhaps thousands of years the Egyptians built no more dams.
The remains of the dam and the dam on the east bank of the Nile at Helwan, 30 kilometers south of Cairo, were rediscovered in 1885 by Georg Schweinfurth ( 1836-1925 ) and can be visited together with a recognizable gap of 46 meters width today.
Robert B. Jansen called in " Dams from the Beginning" as a possible construction, the reign of Khufu ( pharaoh about 2900 to 2877 BC). Khufu is actually but Cheops and reigned from 2620 to 2580 BC