A tall, four-sided, tapering stone monument from ancient Egypt is called an obelisk.
An Egyptian obelisk is usually a single, slender stone shaft with four sides that gradually narrow toward a pyramid-shaped cap called a pyramidion. Ancient Egyptians called these monuments tekhenu; the English word obelisk comes through Greek and Latin, reflecting the descriptions of classical writers who encountered them.
Obelisks were commonly erected in pairs at temple entrances. Their polished surfaces carried inscriptions honouring pharaohs and gods, and their upward-pointing forms were linked with solar power. In Egyptian religious symbolism, an obelisk could represent a petrified ray of the sun god Ra or, during Akhenaten’s religious reforms, a ray of the Aten.
An obelisk is not a column, stele or pyramid. A column is primarily an architectural support, a stele is generally a commemorative upright slab, and a pyramid has a broad four-sided structure rather than a narrow monolithic shaft. Many famous ancient obelisks were later transported from Egypt to cities such as Rome, Paris and New York.