The first named architect in history, designer of the Step Pyramid
A vizier, priest, and architect of Egypt’s Third Dynasty, the first architect in human history to leave his name, and one of the earliest polymaths. He designed and built the Step Pyramid at Saqqara for the pharaoh Djoser — the first large-scale stone structure in the world, stacking the earlier mudbrick tomb layer upon layer into a giant stone stair toward the sky. He made the idea of "building permanently in stone" a reality for the first time, deeply shaping all that followed in the age of pyramids. For his wisdom he was deified after death, one of the few mortals in Egypt raised to a god.
In life Imhotep was a vizier and architect; after death the Egyptians revered him as a god of medicine and wisdom, and the Greeks equated him with their god of healing. That an architect could be worshiped as a god is nearly unique — both because his sky-reaching Step Pyramid was so astonishing, and because the Egyptians believed a man who could defy time with stone had himself drawn near to the divine.
Below are how modern works borrow or reinterpret this name or story — not the original material. The two differ, so keep them apart.