Pliny the Elder (AD 23–79), whose works were universally read by the educated, wrote in withering terms that the pyramids were but vain and frivolous pieces of ostentation on the part of Egyptian monarchs (Natural History 36.16). But before the tide of works from classical authors permeated the libraries of European scholars, it was commonly thought that the pyramids were the granaries of the most holy Joseph, used for storing corn during the years of famine. As such, they were regarded as objects of reverence, and indulgences were awarded by the church to visiting pilgrims on a kind of points system. This pious belief, stoutly upheld by Sir John Mandeville, had almost evaporated by the end of the sixteenth century, when the structures were recognised as being the tombs of the ancient pharaohs.

Few monuments in Egypt have been surveyed and measured, for whatever reason, so often and with such care as the Great Pyramid of Cheops. In 1384, Simone Sigoli and his Tuscan friends Lionardo di Frescobaldi and Giorgio Gucci marvelled at the wisdom of Joseph in creating such immense storage for his bushels: ‘the width at the base, according to what we measured with the braccia, every side is 140 braccia: and each has four sides, and the corn was placed inside: just imagine the very great amount that inside would take’. Simone did not say if he climbed to the summit or ventured into the interior, though in his time a large opening had been roughly hacked into the core a little below the original entrance. According to Muslim tradition, in the latter part of the ninth century the caliph Ma'mun, son of Harun al-Rashid, had ordered this penetration as he coveted the fabled treasure rumoured to be hidden inside. Over one hundred years after the Tuscans went there, Father Francesco Suriano from Mount Sion in Jerusalem showed himself to be more intrepid. He did not reveal the date of his visit to the pyramids, but it probably took place while he was on business in Cairo in 1498 when he became acquainted with the wily Mamluk Taghribirdi (whom he called ‘Tagrebardin’ or ‘Tupolino’) who later went to Venice as the envoy of Qansuh al- Ghawri: