Tutankhamun, the Egyptian Pharoah was not famous during the 11 years he lived during the time of Egypt’s New Kingdom. (The previous two eras are creatively named Old Kingdom and Middle Kingdom). He became famous about 3000 years after his death when Howard Carter discovered his intact tomb in 1922. One unanswered question that still remains is the cause of his death.
Since Jerry Bruckheimer and the CSI series were not present in 1922, investigators had to wait till 1968 when an X-ray revealed that he could have died of a blow to his head. It was suggested that he was murdered and as if coming right out of a soap opera it was also suggested that possible candidates included his wife and chariot driver.
We don’t have to wait till Tehelka conducts a sting operation on the dead chariot driver, for new studies show that it could have been a hunting accident.
“He was not murdered as many people thought. He had an accident when he was hunting in the desert. Falling from a chariot made this fracture in his left leg and this really is in my opinion how he died,” said Zahi Hawass, general secretary of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities.
Until now, many historians had assumed that he was treated as a rather fragile child who was cosseted and protected from physical danger. However, Nadia Lokma of the Cairo Museum said that a recent analysis of the chariots found in the tombs of the pharaohs indicated that they were not merely ceremonial but show signs of wear and tear. Hundreds of arrows recovered from the tomb also show evidence of having been fired and recovered. “These chariots are hunting chariots, not war chariots. You can see from the wear on them that they were actually used in life,” Dr Lokma said. [Tutankhamun died in a hunting accident]
