Egypt to Test Tutankhamun Mummy for Cause of Death

[Mayati]

Egypt to Test Tutankhamun Mummy for Cause of Death
(http://www.reuters.co.uk/newsArticle.jhtml?type=scienceNews&storyID=6804423&section=news)

Yeah !!

[Keith]

They should dig up Howard Carter and test his remains to see if the same thing killed him after opening the tomb.

[Son of Moose]

Keith:

I seem to remember reading that he received a blow to his head. Maybe it was one of those falling bricks? :eek:

[Mayati]

They should dig up Howard Carter and test his remains to see if the same thing killed him after opening the tomb.


You're thinking of Lord Carnavon (he was the money man) ... he died not long after the opening .. Howard Carter lived for a long time afterwards... IIRC it took Carter over 10 years to empty and catalog the tomb contents.

Nowadays men do not shave when going into freshly opened tombs. They didn't know to take that safety precaution then.

There was an incident a couple of years back when a lady who went into one of the tombs in the Valley of the Kings put her face rather close to a wall and touched it (something you are NOT supposed to do). When she touched it she disturbed something that was growing there and she died within a week.

Keith:

I seem to remember reading that he received a blow to his head. Maybe it was one of those falling bricks? :eek:

Bob Brier wrote a book about it. I'll have to dig it up but there was a something else discovered that disputed that finding and Dr. Brier no longer holds to that position. That is if my memory serves me right regarding Brier's position ....

I'll see if I can find that again......

[Mayati]

I found it in my notes ..........

The paper was:

Boyer,Richard S., Ernst A. Rodin, Todd C. Grey, and R. C. Connolly.
2003. The Skull and Cervical Spine Radiographs of Tutankhamen: A
Critical Appraisal. Am J Neuroradiol 24 [June/July]:1142–1147.

The abstract for the paper is below:



Tutankhamen, the last pharaoh of the XVIIIth dynasty, died unexpectedly at approximately age 18 years. A cause of death has never been established, but theories that the young king was murdered by a blow to the head have been proposed based on skull radiographs obtained by a team from the University of Liverpool in 1968. We recently had the opportunity to evaluate the skull and cervical spine radiographs of Tutankhamen. The purpose of this study was to report our critical appraisal of the radiographs of Tutankhamen regarding the findings alleged to indicate traumatic death. METHODS: Copies of lateral, anteroposterior, and submental vertex skull radiographs of Tutankhamen were reviewed with special attention to the claims of a depressed skull fracture, intracranial bone fragments, and calcified membrane of a posterior fossa subdural hematoma. A phantom skull was radiographed to reproduce the appearance of the floor of the posterior fossa in the lateral projection. RESULTS: The skull radiographs of Tutankhamen show only postmortem artifacts that are explainable by an understanding of the methods of mummy preservation used at the time of his death. Some findings also relate to trauma inflicted by an autopsy performed in 1925. The alleged calcified membrane of a posterior fossa subdural hematoma is easily reproduced with a skull phantom. CONCLUSION: Our critical review of the skull and cervical spine radiographs of Tutankhamen does not support proposed theories of a traumatic or homicidal death.

[Son of Moose]

Mayati:

Thank you so much for the detailed and extremely interesting posts. :D

I obviously never read the follow-up reports .... newspapers generally tend to only report the sensational and ignore the mundane ... :o

[Mayati]

newspapers generally tend to only report the sensational and ignore the mundane ... :o


This is *very* true ... and sometimes twist the story to make it more sensational... there's an example I like to cite that shows this problem to its extreme ....this comes from Kent Weeks' book The Lost Tomb where he writes about speaking to a reporter about his rediscovery of Tomb KV5 in the Valley of the Kings in Egypt. While discussing the tomb, Weeks mentioned that its pillared hall was one of the largest ever found. The reporter asked Weeks if he found any colored balls. For obvious reasons Weeks was confused. The reporter then asked if billiard halls were common in ancient Egypt. Weeks tried to correct the reporter who commented: 'Billiard hall? Pillared hall? What difference does it make? Who cares? Besides, it makes a better story'.

[Son of Moose]

Mayati:

Thank you so much for this additional most interesting cautionary tale. :)

Yes --- reporters can sometimes be unbelievable in their ignorance in their desire for a "scoop". :(

[Janmeryet]

Remonds of the time I had to wage a mini war in the editorials section of our local newspaper after the "SHARK BITES SCHOOLGIRL" headline turned out to be false. "CORAL REEF SCRATCHES SCHOOLGIRL" just doesn't have that ring, does it?

[ramuhotep]

Somebody (History Channel? Discovery Channel?) did a program about the death of Tuankhamun, in which they mention that he apparently had some sort of wound on his neck/chin area, which might have been a poisoned arrow. I believe Zawi Hawass* mentioned in a later program that the so-called arrow wound could have been inflicted years, or even centuries post-mortem.

-- Ray

*An engaging rogue in his own right. Dr. Hawass frequently comes across as a comic-opera buffoon, but I doubt anyone knows Egyptology better than he does. Plus the fact that as Secretary-General of the (Egyptian) Supreme Council of Antiquities, no foreigner touches spade to earth without his permission.

[Mayati]

Hey Ray!!

The body of Tutankhamen was treated rather badly when it was discovered. The ancient Egyptians had poured so much resin in over him that when Howard Carter and his crew we trying to remove his remains they had to resort to all sorts of methods that wouldn't be allowed or even considered today.

In particular (where the arrow wound is concerned) they slide hot knives in under the mask to cut through the resin bonding his face to it .....

By the time all was said and done the body of Tutankhamen was broken into three pieces ... as if that wasn't bad enough when the body was removed again from his tomb in 1968 for the X-rays someone stole his penis!

I like and admire Hawass a lot ! But if I had to pick one Egyptologist to learn from it would be Rainer Stadelmann