went on to become ruler of the underworld and judge of the dead. By associating himself with Osiris, Tutankhamun hoped to share his fate of resurrection, before joining Ra on his journey through the heavens.
On the second floor of today’s Cairo museum is a side room with black-painted walls and a dusty, arched window, through which you can see the city’s rooftops and hear the bustle of nearby Tahrir Square. This is where Tutankhamun’s most precious treasures are now held. In the middle of the room, displayed at eye height on a dramatically lit pedestal, is his mask. It is without doubt the most recognizable image of this king; as a symbol of Egypt, it is rivaled only by the Great Pyramids.
And yet, when you look into this iconic face, the familiarity fades away—as do the urgent honks of gridlock traffic. It’s truly beautiful, with a well-proportioned nose, gorgeous full lips, and the eternal blackness of those obsidian eyes, which stare right through you with placid resolve. I don’t know if it’s the rare experience of staring at so much solid gold, or the serene, exquisitely crafted features, but suddenly it’s not so hard to believe in Tutankhamun as a god, still riding through the sky each day with the sun.
Back in 1925, though, it wasn’t at all clear that the mask would ever make it to Cairo. During Tutankhamun’s funeral, bucketfuls of sticky anointing resin had been poured over the mummy, which over the centuries congealed into a black, rock-hard mass. Thanks to this extremely effective glue, the mummy and mask were stuck fast inside the innermost gold coffin, which was in turn stuck inside the second coffin. The coffins and their contents were immovable. They might as well have been encased in a block of cement.
So Carter’s next challenge was how on earth to get the mummy out. Lucas experimented on the black material in his lab but couldn’t find anything that dissolved it easily; then he discovered that it melted with heat. It was time for Tutankhamun to fulfill his wish and come face to face with Ra. The workmen carried the two glued-together coffins up the tomb’s sloping corridor, and left the whole lot in the blazing sun.
Safe underground, the mummy had enjoyed a constant environment of around 80°F for millennia. Now, its temperature soared to a roasting 150°F, atoms jangling in the heat. But Tutankhamun wasn’t so keen on leaving his golden home. After several hours, the glue hadn’t softened at all. It seemed there was only one way that the mummy was going to leave its coffin: in pieces.
_____________
* But not always: a Sixth-Dynasty official, Meni, warned any potential tomb violator that the crocodile will be against him in the water, and the snake on land. This punishment was to come from the gods, though, not Meni himself.
* Ironically, the word “sarcophagus” derives from the Greek for “flesh-eater,” after a kind of limestone that the Greeks believed would consume or decompose the flesh of a corpse interred within it, and hence was used for coffins.
† As described in a private letter from the anatomist Douglas Derry, who later carried out an autopsy on the mummy, to his son Hugh.
* The gods are described in ancient Egyptian inscriptions as having golden flesh.
* In his 2010 book Egyptian Mummies, John Taylor, a specialist in ancient Egyptian funerary archaeology at the British Museum in London, argues that an Egyptian mummy’s coffins were endowed with powerful symbolic meaning that helped the occupant to be resurrected and to flourish in the life after death. They provided a sacred environment for the eternal life of the occupant—a dwelling, shrine, body of the mother-goddess Nut, and even a miniature replica of the entire cosmos.
CHAPTER FIVE
A BRUTAL POSTMORTEM
IT WASN’T YOUR AVERAGE AUTOPSY. Laid out in the dark, narrow entrance corridor to the tomb of Seti II, the subject was tightly glued inside his coffins, overlooked by impressively carved religious
On the second floor of today’s Cairo museum is a side room with black-painted walls and a dusty, arched window, through which you can see the city’s rooftops and hear the bustle of nearby Tahrir Square. This is where Tutankhamun’s most precious treasures are now held. In the middle of the room, displayed at eye height on a dramatically lit pedestal, is his mask. It is without doubt the most recognizable image of this king; as a symbol of Egypt, it is rivaled only by the Great Pyramids.
And yet, when you look into this iconic face, the familiarity fades away—as do the urgent honks of gridlock traffic. It’s truly beautiful, with a well-proportioned nose, gorgeous full lips, and the eternal blackness of those obsidian eyes, which stare right through you with placid resolve. I don’t know if it’s the rare experience of staring at so much solid gold, or the serene, exquisitely crafted features, but suddenly it’s not so hard to believe in Tutankhamun as a god, still riding through the sky each day with the sun.
Back in 1925, though, it wasn’t at all clear that the mask would ever make it to Cairo. During Tutankhamun’s funeral, bucketfuls of sticky anointing resin had been poured over the mummy, which over the centuries congealed into a black, rock-hard mass. Thanks to this extremely effective glue, the mummy and mask were stuck fast inside the innermost gold coffin, which was in turn stuck inside the second coffin. The coffins and their contents were immovable. They might as well have been encased in a block of cement.
So Carter’s next challenge was how on earth to get the mummy out. Lucas experimented on the black material in his lab but couldn’t find anything that dissolved it easily; then he discovered that it melted with heat. It was time for Tutankhamun to fulfill his wish and come face to face with Ra. The workmen carried the two glued-together coffins up the tomb’s sloping corridor, and left the whole lot in the blazing sun.
Safe underground, the mummy had enjoyed a constant environment of around 80°F for millennia. Now, its temperature soared to a roasting 150°F, atoms jangling in the heat. But Tutankhamun wasn’t so keen on leaving his golden home. After several hours, the glue hadn’t softened at all. It seemed there was only one way that the mummy was going to leave its coffin: in pieces.
_____________
* But not always: a Sixth-Dynasty official, Meni, warned any potential tomb violator that the crocodile will be against him in the water, and the snake on land. This punishment was to come from the gods, though, not Meni himself.
* Ironically, the word “sarcophagus” derives from the Greek for “flesh-eater,” after a kind of limestone that the Greeks believed would consume or decompose the flesh of a corpse interred within it, and hence was used for coffins.
† As described in a private letter from the anatomist Douglas Derry, who later carried out an autopsy on the mummy, to his son Hugh.
* The gods are described in ancient Egyptian inscriptions as having golden flesh.
* In his 2010 book Egyptian Mummies, John Taylor, a specialist in ancient Egyptian funerary archaeology at the British Museum in London, argues that an Egyptian mummy’s coffins were endowed with powerful symbolic meaning that helped the occupant to be resurrected and to flourish in the life after death. They provided a sacred environment for the eternal life of the occupant—a dwelling, shrine, body of the mother-goddess Nut, and even a miniature replica of the entire cosmos.
CHAPTER FIVE
A BRUTAL POSTMORTEM
IT WASN’T YOUR AVERAGE AUTOPSY. Laid out in the dark, narrow entrance corridor to the tomb of Seti II, the subject was tightly glued inside his coffins, overlooked by impressively carved religious
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