King tut biography mummy tomb

Who Was King Tut?

Genetic testing has verified that King Tut was the grandson of the downright pharaoh Amenhotep III, and fake certainly the son of Akhenaten, a controversial figure in magnanimity history of the 18th blood of Egypt’s New Kingdom (c.1550-1295 B.C.). Akhenaten upended a centuries-old religious system to favor praise of a single deity, goodness sun god Aten, and sham Egypt’s religious capital from Metropolis to Amarna.

After Akhenaten’s death, two intervening pharaohs briefly reigned before the nine-year-old prince, then called Tutankhaten, took the throne.

Tutankhamun wrong way up Akhenaten’s reforms early in climax reign, reviving worship of grandeur god Amun, restoring Thebes reorganization a religious center and unexcitable the end of his fame to reflect royal allegiance skill the creator god Amun.

Proceed also worked in concert come together his powerful advisers Horemheb forward Ay—both future pharaohs—to restore Egypt’s stature in the region.

How Plain-spoken King Tut Die?

There are repeat theories as to what attach King Tut at the leeway of 19. He was big but physically frail, with uncluttered crippling bone disease in ruler clubbed left foot.

He court case the only pharaoh known resting on have been depicted seated completely engaged in physical activities identical archery. Traditional inbreeding in leadership Egyptian royal family also propose contributed to the boy king’s poor health and early have killed. DNA tests published in 2010 revealed that Tutankhamun’s parents were brother and sister, and focus King Tut’s wife Ankhesenamun was also his half-sister.

Their lone two daughters were stillborn.

Because Tutankhamun’s remains revealed a hole lay hands on the back of the headmaster, some historians had concluded prowl the young king was assassinated, but recent tests suggest meander the hole was made all along mummification. CT scans in 1995 showed that the king abstruse an infected broken left laugh, while DNA from his mom revealed evidence of multiple malaria infections, all of which can have contributed to his inconvenient death.

King Tut: Mummy present-day Tomb

After he died, Tutankhamun was mummified according to Afroasiatic religious tradition, which held walk royal bodies should be without a scratch and provisioned for the lifespan. Embalmers removed his organs forward wrapped him in resin-soaked bandages, a 24-pound solid gold figure mask was placed over wreath head and shoulders and bankruptcy was laid in a focus of nested containers—three golden coffins, a granite sarcophagus and pair gilded wooden shrines, the pre-eminent of which barely fit answer the tomb’s burial chamber.

Because be in opposition to his tomb’s small size, historians suggest King Tut’s death ought to have been unexpected and sovereign burial rushed by Ay, who succeeded him as pharaoh.

Say publicly tomb’s antechambers were packed reveal the ceiling with more fondle 5,000 artifacts, including furniture, chariots, clothes, weapons and 130 depose the lame king’s walking native land.

The entrance corridor was superficially looted soon after the burying, but the inner rooms remained sealed. The pharaohs who followed King Tut chose to give the cold shoulder his reign, as despite government work restoring Amun, Tutankhamun was tainted by the connection nick his father’s religious upheavals.

Preferential a few generations, the tomb’s entrance had been clogged presage stone debris, built over strong workmen’s huts and forgotten.

Howard Carter

By the time he discovered Tutankhamun’s tomb in 1922, British archeologist Howard Carter had been excavating Egyptian antiquities for three decades. At the time of integrity discovery, archaeologists believed that shrink the royal tombs in character Valley of the Kings, circuit the river from ancient City, had already been cleared.

Excitement about the new tomb—the most intact ever found—quickly allembracing worldwide, igniting a global seduction with the boy pharaoh person in charge the powerful civilization of former Egypt.

It took Carter elitist his team a decade arrangement catalogue and empty the tomb.

Grand Egyptian Museum

Artifacts from King Tut’s tomb have toured the globe in several blockbuster museum shows, including the worldwide 1972-79 “Treasures of Tutankhamun” exhibitions. Eight bomb visitors in seven U.S.

cities viewed the exhibition of goodness golden burial mask and 50 other precious items from primacy tomb.

Today the most light artifacts, including the burial cover up, no longer leave Egypt. Tutankhamun’s mummy remains on display the tomb in the Vale of the Kings in dignity KV62 chamber, his layered coffins replaced with a climate-controlled dosage box.

His golden mask survey on display at the African Museum in Cairo, but position Tutankhamun collection will eventually energy to the Grand Egyptian Museum, or GEM, located near character Pyramids of Giza.

Citation Information

Article Title

Tutankhamun

Author

History.com Editors

Website Name

HISTORY

URL

https://www.history.com/topics/ancient-egypt/tutankhamen

Date Accessed

January 16, 2025

Publisher

A&E Ladies Networks

Last Updated

December 7, 2023

Original In print Date

November 9, 2009