Tutankhamun’s Curse
If you tuned into our series on Kincaid’s Cave, you’ll know that for decades America was gripped by a sort of Egyptomania. The mythology, culture, and remains were rabidly consumed by the American public. During this time, something else began to rise to the surface: curses.
The curse of the pharaohs has many stories and a long line of alleged victims in their history. It was said that pharaohs’ tombs were cursed to prevent them from ever being opened and potentially disturbing the pharaoh in the afterlife. One of the most interesting and notorious curses is Tutankhamun’s.
Despite murmurings of a curse, Howard Carter and his team were not deterred and wanted desperately to enter the tomb. Carter did not believe in the curse and him, and his 50+ person team opened the sarcophagus without much worry. However, the rumors of the curse began to spread when April 5th, 1923 (just months after the tomb as opened) Lord Carnarvon, the financial backer of Carter’s expedition, died due to an infected mosquito bite. It was said that this was Tutankhamun’s first victim. Shortly after the Lord’s death, there was a widespread blackout in Cairo.
The newspapers went wild with this initial death (and the 7 additional deaths of the team that would follow in the next decade or so) and the curse of Tutankhamun. In fact, the news was so prominent that even Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the author behind Sherlock, commented that he was convinced that Caranvron really had been killed by the pharaoh's curse.
Carter himself died young, at the age of 64, of lymphoma.
Why were rumors of the curses prevalent? The easiest answer is, of course, as a safeguard to protect the tombs and final resting places of Egypt’s pharaohs. However, another theory is that many who illegally opened tombs released air heavy with fungus and soon grew sick. So, it wasn’t a curse that was killing them...but what was in the tomb. In fact, scientists tested some unopened sarcophaguses and found, by drilling a hole to test air quality, dangerously high levels of hydrogen sulfide, ammonia, and formaldehyde.
Was this simply a way for the press to tap further into Egyptomania and sell more papers?
Or, was there truly a curse?
Thanks to Charlie the Corgi for the Blogstonishing suggestion!
The blog image is from Harry Burton (1879-1940) - Harry Burton: Tutankhamun tomb photographs: a photographic record in 5 albums containing 490 original photographic prints ; representing the excavations of the tomb of Tutankhamun and its contents. Vol. 4, ca. 1923, (Online). It is licensed in the Public Domain.