The Kahun

At the north end of the larger of Sesostris II’s funerary temples, Petrie discovered another building, which he believed was a porter’s lodge. It had a large room, in which a stone trough was let into the ground, with sloping stone slabs around it so that water could run down. Other similar troughs were found in the town of Kahun, and
Petrie believed that they were provided for daily ablutions. To the north of this temple lay the pyramid work-men’s town known as Kahun. A bay about 402 m across, formed by the sweep of the high ground, occupied the area north of the temple, and here the town was built. The buildings all lay in a slight hollow, and were enclosed on three sides by a thick wall. This ran northwards from the end of the north side of the temple for about 402 m; it followed the edge of the bay and then fell down into the desert behind it. Then, it turned eastwards at right angles to enclose the town and then turned southwards for a short way. Thus, the town wall extended along the north, west and partly along the east sides, but on the south side, the site lay open to the Nile Valley. However, at the east wall, Petrie discovered the remains of a gateway, and this led him to the conclusion that, although the site now lay open to the south and along part of the eastern end the wall was also missing, originally
Kahun had been completely walled on four sides. However, the south wall and over half of the east wall had since been entirely lost. Within the town, an area of high ground was cut back to form an elevated platform. This area, called The Acropolis’ by Petrie,
was used to accommodate an important building.