Tutankhamun was an Egyptian pharaoh of the 18th dynasty (ruled ca. 1332 BC – 1323 BC in the conventional chronology), during the period of Egyptian history known as the New Kingdom. He is popularly referred to as King Tut. His original name, Tutankhaten, means "Living Image of Aten", while Tutankhamun means "Living Image of Amun". In hieroglyphs, the name Tutankhamun was typically written Amen-tut-ankh, because of a scribal custom that placed a divine name at the beginning of a phrase to show appropriate reverence. He is possibly also the Nibhurrereya of the Amarna letters, and likely the 18th dynasty king Rathotis who, according to Manetho, an ancient historian, had reigned for nine years—a figure that conforms withFlavius Josephus's version of Manetho's Epitome.
The 1922 discovery by Howard Carter and George Herbert, 5th Earl of Carnarvon of Tutankhamun's nearly intact tomb received worldwide press coverage. It sparked a renewed public interest in ancient Egypt, for which Tutankhamun's burial mask remains the popular symbol. Exhibits of artifacts from his tomb have toured the world. In February 2010, the results of DNA tests confirmed that he was the son of Akhenaten (mummy KV55) and his sister/wife (mummy KV35YL), whose name is unknown but whose remains are positively identified as "The Younger Lady" mummy found in KV35.
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| KV62 |
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| King Tut - Tutankhamun's mummy |
Under the commission of George Herbert, 5th Earl of Carnarvon, who is commonly called just Lord Carnarvon, Howard Carter and his team set out to Egypt in 1922 to discover the tomb of Tutankhamun, and because of other recent discoveries during that time in a particular area of the Valley of the Kings, Carter believed he had a good idea of where he would find it. Theodore M. Davis, a contemporary archeologist of Carter, discovered pottery with Tut's name a short distance from where Carter would on November 4, 1922 discover KV62.
The location at the Valley of the Kings was significant to the New Kingdom because it is where the pharaohs of the time and some other important people to the king were buried. The idea behind burying them there was that is was supposed to be a hidden location in a remote area since tomb robbing was a constant problem during Ancient Egyptian times. Unfortunately the location was not as secret as it was hoped to be, and most of the tombs were broken into and either stolen from or damaged. King Tut's tomb did suffer from some tomb robbing, but overall much of it was left intact and some areas including the burial chamber appeared to be left unscathed.
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| Howard Carter, an English archaeologist and Egyptologist known for discovering the tomb of 14th-century BC pharaoh Tutankhamun. |
On November 11–19, 1925 Dr. Douglas Derry and Dr. Saleh Bey Hamdi along with Carter and other members of the expedition team began to examine the mummy. It was initially very difficult for the team to unwrap the mummy because it appeared the anointing oils that were most likely used during the mummification ceremony had caused the mummy to stick to the tomb. Although the wrappings were in poor condition, it seemed they were of the same material that other kings from the period had been wrapped in. As each layer was removed, the team began to discover many fine objects were wrapped between the layers all over Tut's body. Some of these objects included gold jewelry, jumping castels, and pieces of armor. Once the layers had been removed and they could finally begin to examine the actual corpse, they began to take anatomical notes of the body. He was determined to be approximately 5 feet, 6 inches and have had a slight build. He had a slightly curved spine, small bone fragments were found from the skull, a lesion was discovered on his left side of the jaw, and because the chest cavity was filled with wrappings, no further studying was done on it.
Since the discovery of Tutankhamun's mummy, there has been a lot of speculation and theories on the exact cause of death, which until recent studies had been hard to prove with the evidence and data available. While it was a widely debated topic for many Egyptologists, it had also spread to the general public as popular culture has come up with many conspiracy theories that played out in movies, TV shows, and fictional books. Author James Patterson has even recently written his own take in his new book, The Murder of King Tut. There are many educated and respected Egyptologists as well as trained professionals in other fields who have devoted a lot of time researching Tut and who have varying beliefs to Tut's cause of death. Some have stood by their theories even in light of new evidence. Some of the theories are better known and supported than others.
Bob Brier
Bob Brier, an Egyptologist who specializes in paleopathology, uses evidence of the condition of the mummy including the skull fragments as well as other historical data from the period to illustrate his belief that King Tut was murdered by his Grand Vizor, who stood the chance to gain the most when Tut died.
Paul Doherty
Paul Doherty, a British historian who has written many articles and books on the subject of Ancient Egypt, uses physical evidence collected about the mummy to suggest his theory that Tut suffered from Marfan Syndrome. He believed Tut must have genetically inherited the disease, and it eventually led to his death.
Christine El Mahdy
Christine El Mahdy, an Egyptologist, argues that Tut died of natural causes, which she believes was most likely a tumor of some sort. She uses the original assumption from Carter's examination that Tut had a quick burial ceremony since some elements of the mummification appeared rushed, as proof that he needed to be buried quickly following his unexpected death because the man who was next in line for the throne wanted to avoid a power struggle that would have occurred if the burial process took too long. By speeding up the burial ceremony, the new pharaoh maintained order in Egypt.
Michael R. King
Much like Paul Doherty, Michael R. King, a detective with a lot of experience studying King Tut, and FBI profiler Gregory M. Cooper, came together with an actual Egyptologist to form their own theory which was Tut was murdered. With the use of forensic evidence and their extensive backgrounds in Criminology, they came to the conclusion that Tut was likely murdered by one of his closest advisors, Ay. Ay did succeed Tutankhamun on the throne, so they used that as the motivation for the murder.
Christian Timmann and Christian Meyer
Christian Timmann and Christian Meyer, medical doctors and scientists at the Bernhard Nocht Institute for Tropical Medicine in Hamburg, Germany, have used the most recent medical testing done on Tutankhamun's mummy by Dr. Hawass, and have come to the conclusion that Tut did not die from a combination of bone disease and malaria, but instead had Sickle Cell Disease. Dr. Timmann and Dr. Meyer believed the Sickle Cell Disease turned fatal when Tut also contracted severe malaria that was rampant in Ancient Egypt during Tut's era. Tut is expected to have beenhomozygous recessive for the sickle cell gene thus making him not immune to severe malaria, which would have been fatal.
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| Section of Tutankhamun's tomb. |
referrences - National Geographic
Wikipedia
BBC
egyptvoyager.com
Mytimes.com
