Ancient Egyptian royal ships

Several ancient Egyptian solar ships and boat pits were found in many ancient Egyptian sites. The most famous is the Khufu ship, which is now preserved in the Grand Egyptian Museum. The full-sized ships or boats were buried near ancient Egyptian pyramids or temples at many sites. The history and function of the ships are not precisely known. They are most commonly created as a "solar barge", a ritual vessel to carry the resurrected king with the sun god Ra across the heavens. This is a common theme in the Pyramid Texts, and these buried boats might be a real-life equivalent of solar barges. Similarly, another explanation behind these boats is that they were built for past kings to carry them to the afterlife. Because of these ships' association with the sun, they are often found in an east-west orientation in order to follow the path of the sun.

Many of these boats are found in either a planked form or as a boat-like structure. For example, many of the well-known solar ships like the Khufu ship are found as an intact boat or as boat remains. However, other evidence of ancient Egyptian boats comes from what are known as "boat pits" or "boat graves", which are pits that are in the shape of a boat. These boat pits are often found near pyramids or tombs and are thus assumed to be associated with solar ships. Some examples of these include Niuserre's solar ship and the Djedefre solar ship.