Memphis and Saqqara

Memphis and Saqqara, together 30 kilometres south of Cairo, cover the necropolis of Ancient Egypt's first capital city. Memphis itself has little left above ground — a colossal statue of Ramses II in an open-air museum and a sphinx of Hatshepsut are the main survivals. But Saqqara, the hilltop necropolis above the city, contains over 3,500 years of burials.

The site is enormous: the Step Pyramid of Djoser (the world's first large stone structure), the Pyramid of Unas with its interior Pyramid Texts (the oldest religious texts in the world), tombs with painted scenes of daily Old Kingdom life, and the Serapeum — a network of underground corridors housing the giant sarcophagi of the sacred Apis bulls. A day here, combined with Dahshur, gives the deepest understanding of Ancient Egypt's early development.

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Memphis was the capital of Ancient Egypt for most of the Old Kingdom period — roughly 2700 to 2200 BCE — and at its height may have been the largest city in the world. After being abandoned and stripped of its stone for medieval Cairo's construction, almost nothing stands above ground. What remains is not the city but its necropolis: Saqqara, Dahshur, and Giza — the vast pyramid fields that mark where Memphis's rulers were buried for a thousand years.