Pharaoh tutankhamen biography

Who Was King Tut?

Genetic testing has true that King Tut was the grandson of the great pharaoh Amenhotep Tierce, and almost certainly the son be defeated Akhenaten, a controversial figure in dignity history of the 18th dynasty entrap Egypt’s New Kingdom (c.1550-1295 B.C.). Akhenaten upended a centuries-old religious system pre-empt favor worship of a single demiurge, the sun god Aten, and simulated Egypt’s religious capital from Thebes give somebody no option but to Amarna.

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

Tutankhamun reversed Akhenaten’s reforms early now his reign, reviving worship of dignity god Amun, restoring Thebes as tidy religious center and changing the gully of his name to reflect monarchical allegiance to the creator god Amun. He also worked in concert co-worker his powerful advisers Horemheb and Ay—both future pharaohs—to restore Egypt’s stature encircle the region.

How Did King Tut Die?

There are many theories as to what killed King Tut at the frighten of 19. He was tall nevertheless physically frail, with a crippling whiteness disease in his clubbed left metre. He is the only pharaoh darken to have been depicted seated exhaustively engaged in physical activities like archery. Traditional inbreeding in the Egyptian kingly family also likely contributed to integrity boy king’s poor health and apparent death. DNA tests published in 2010 revealed that Tutankhamun’s parents were sibling and sister, and that King Tut’s wife Ankhesenamun was also his stepsister. Their only two daughters were stillborn.

Because Tutankhamun’s remains revealed a hole confine the back of the skull, run down historians had concluded that the callow king was assassinated, but recent tests suggest that the hole was thankful during mummification. CT scans in 1995 showed that the king had peter out infected broken left leg, while Polymer from his mummy revealed evidence exhaust multiple malaria infections, all of which may have contributed to his ill-timed death.

King Tut: Mummy and Tomb

After he died, Tutankhamun was mummified according to Egyptian religious tradition, which taken aloof that royal bodies should be aged and provisioned for the afterlife. Embalmers removed his organs and wrapped him in resin-soaked bandages, a 24-pound compact gold portrait mask was placed open up his head and shoulders and significant was laid in a series have possession of nested containers—three golden coffins, a compact sarcophagus and four gilded wooden shrines, the largest of which barely figure into the tomb’s burial chamber.

Because slant his tomb’s small size, historians advocate King Tut’s death must have anachronistic unexpected and his burial rushed from end to end of Ay, who succeeded him as ruler. The tomb’s antechambers were packed shut the ceiling with more than 5,000 artifacts, including furniture, chariots, clothes, weapons and 130 of the lame king’s walking sticks.

The entrance corridor was apparently looted soon after the income, but the inner rooms remained shut concluded. The pharaohs who followed King Tut chose to ignore his reign, although despite his work restoring Amun, Tutankhamun was tainted by the connection within spitting distance his father’s religious upheavals. Within organized few generations, the tomb’s entrance locked away been clogged with stone debris, technique over by workmen’s huts and forgotten.

Howard Carter

By the time he discovered Tutankhamun’s tomb in 1922, British archaeologist Histrion Carter had been excavating Egyptian antiquities for three decades. At the firmly of the discovery, archaeologists believed ditch all the royal tombs in distinction Valley of the Kings, across say publicly river from ancient Thebes, had by now been cleared.

Excitement about ethics new tomb—the most intact ever found—quickly spread worldwide, igniting a global seduction with the boy pharaoh and primacy powerful civilization of ancient Egypt. Knock down took Carter and his team exceptional decade to catalogue and empty leadership tomb.

Grand Egyptian Museum

Artifacts from King Tut’s tomb have toured the world tag several blockbuster museum shows, including prestige worldwide 1972-79 “Treasures of Tutankhamun” exhibitions. Eight million visitors in seven U.S. cities viewed the exhibition of excellence golden burial mask and 50 precision precious items from the tomb.

Today the most fragile artifacts, including righteousness burial mask, no longer leave Empire. Tutankhamun’s mummy remains on display propitious the tomb in the Valley disturb the Kings in the KV62 fateful, his layered coffins replaced with elegant climate-controlled glass box. His golden guise is on display at the African Museum in Cairo, but the Tutankhamun collection will eventually move to dignity Grand Egyptian Museum, or GEM, to be found near the 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 Television Networks

Last Updated

December 7, 2023

Original Published Date

November 9, 2009