According to the Greek historian Herodotus, it took a task force of 100 000 men and 20 years to
build up the Great Pyramid of Gizeh or Khufu’s Pyramid. In this work we discuss an analytical
solution obtained in the framework of basic Newtonian mechanics that allows us to check Herodotus’s
statement. Numerical estimates are compared to more detailed calculations. An estimation of the
dietary energy intake necessary to accomplish the task is also discussed.