Tutankhamun death: the verdict

[pnutchuck]

March 8, 2005 1:00 PM

Tutankhamun death: the verdict

By Amena Bakr

CAIRO (Reuters) - A three-dimensional X-ray scan of Tutankhamun's mummy has found no evidence for murder but
has failed to identify any other agreed cause of death for the pharaoh, who died in 1352 BC at the age of about 19.

Some members of the investigative team say he may have died from an infected thigh wound, but others doubt this,
according to the team's five-page report, released on Tuesday.

Some historians have speculated that the legendary ruler was killed, based on his young age and the turbulent
political and religious circumstances at that period in Egyptian history.

"We don't know how the king died, but we are now sure that it was not murder. Maybe he died on his own," said Zahi
Hawas, chairman of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities.

"The case is closed. We should not disturb the king any more," he told Reuters after the report came out.

The report said some but not all of the eight team members suggested he may have died after a serious accident in
which he broke his thigh, leaving an open wound which became infected.

"Although the break itself would not have been life-threatening, infection might have set in," the report said, citing
those members of the team. The others disagreed.

Tutankhamun came to the throne shortly after the death of Akhenaten, the maverick pharaoh who abandoned most of
Egypt's old gods and tried to imposed a monotheistic religion based on worship of the Aten, the disc of the sun.

During Tutankhamun's reign, which lasted about 10 years, advocates of the old religion were regaining control of the
country, turning their back on Akhenaten's innovations.

The report said the CT scan performed in January found no evidence of a blow to the back of Tutankhamun's head
and no other evidence of foul play.

IN GOOD HEALTH

They found that Tutankhamun had a bent spine and an elongated skull but they ruled out pathological causes. They
believe the shape of the skull to be a normal variation and the spine resulted from the way the embalmers positioned the
body.

"Judging from his bones, the king was generally in good health... There are no signs of malnutrition or infectious
disease during childhood," the report added.

Addressing the murder theory, the report noted that the king had two bone fragments loose in his skull. But it adds:
"These cannot possibly have come from an injury from before death, as they would have become stuck in the
embalming material."

The team believes the fragments were broken during the embalming process or by the team led by British
archaeologist Howard Carter, who discovered Tutankhamun's intact tomb in the Valley of the Kings in southern Egypt in
1922.

Advocates of the broken thigh theory noted that there is embalming material inside the thigh wound and no obvious
evidence that the wound healed, suggesting that the fracture took place only days before death.

But other members of the team said the fracture was the work of Carter's team when they removed the mummy from
the coffin.

"They argue that if such a fracture had been suffered in life, there would have been evidence for hemorrhage or
hematoma present in the CT scan. They believe the embalming liquid was pushed into the fracture by Carter's team,"
the report said.


Reuters


http://www.swissinfo.org/sen/swissinfo.html?siteSect=143&sid=5586381

[signmike]

1. It's taking Columbo a while to figure this one out...

3,357 years -- time for a doughnut break!

;-)

[kcwayne]

2. So if someone stuffed his head in the River Nile for 20 minutes

and drowned him, they would be able to tell that from his mummified corpse after 3500 years? Better tell Columbo to only order 1 donut, he still has work to do.

[NNadir]

3. Well if he was murdered, I hope they catch the killer before

he kills again. :-)

[onager]

4. Heh! The only problem is...

With this news, we'll have another round of idiocy like this...which was just published on Feb. 21:

Curse of King Tut haunts mourning woman

Cairo - A South African woman, owner of a piece of jewellery believed stolen from the tomb of King Tutankhamen, has asked the government in Cairo for help in breaking King Tut's curse after two members of her family suffered untimely deaths...

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1&click_id=85&art_id=qw1108983601114B221

Argh! Howard Carter himself repeatedly debunked the idea of "King Tut's Curse." (He died at age 65, some 17 years after he opened the tomb...not exactly "untimely.")

Carter had a very simple explanation for why the Curse was nonsense: the Egyptians didn't USE tomb curses. No such thing existed in the ancient Egyptian religion.

Superstitious people, psychics, and ordinary nuts...is that more than one category?...wrote to Carter all the time asking for details about the curse. He got very tired of it after a while, and complained in letters to his friends.

The other thing that irked him was the idea that he had been exposed to deadly ancient Egyptian germs. He answered that one by saying that every tomb he had entered was scientifically tested, and every one proved sterile (at least by the standards of the 1920's).

(I spent all of January in Egypt, and read a good biography of Carter while I was there.)