Tutankhamun: Tomb, Death, Discovery and the Curse

Tutankhamun is the most famous pharaoh in the world, yet he was not one of ancient Egypt’s most powerful kings. He ruled for only about a decade and died while still very young.

His fame comes largely from archaeology. In 1922, Howard Carter’s excavation team uncovered the entrance to Tutankhamun’s tomb in the Valley of the Kings. Unlike most royal tombs, it still contained an extraordinary quantity of burial equipment, furniture, jewelry, chariots, statues, coffins and gold objects.

The discovery transformed Tutankhamun from an obscure Eighteenth Dynasty ruler into a global symbol of ancient Egypt. But the king’s life, family and death remain more complicated than the popular stories about treasure and curses suggest.

For the wider Egyptian world in which he lived, see Life and Society in Ancient Egypt. For the traditional cults restored during his reign, explore the ancient Egyptian gods. For the engineering of Egypt’s much earlier royal monuments, see How Were the Pyramids Built?.

Who was Tutankhamun?

Tutankhamun was a pharaoh of Egypt’s Eighteenth Dynasty during the New Kingdom.

He came to the throne as a child, probably around eight or nine years old, and ruled for roughly a decade during the fourteenth century BCE.

His reign followed one of the most disruptive religious experiments in Egyptian history: the rule of Akhenaten.

Tutankhaten becomes Tutankhamun

The young king was originally named Tutankhaten, a name connected with the solar god Aten.

During Akhenaten’s reign, royal religion had elevated the Aten and reduced the prominence of major traditional cults, especially that of Amun.

Under the young king, this policy was reversed.

Tutankhaten became Tutankhamun, meaning roughly “living image of Amun,” and traditional temples and cults regained royal support.

Was Tutankhamun Akhenaten’s son?

Tutankhamun is generally associated closely with Akhenaten’s royal family.

A 2010 genetic study proposed that the mummy from tomb KV55—often identified as Akhenaten—was Tutankhamun’s father and that the mummy known as the Younger Lady was his mother.

That study attracted major attention but also criticism from specialists who questioned the reliability of some ancient-DNA conclusions and aspects of the biological diagnoses.

It is therefore reasonable to describe Tutankhamun as probably a close member of Akhenaten’s family while recognizing that some details of his exact parentage remain debated.

Who was Tutankhamun’s wife?

Tutankhamun married Ankhesenamun, a royal woman who had originally been named Ankhesenpaaten.

She was one of the daughters of Akhenaten and Nefertiti.

The marriage tied Tutankhamun directly to the ruling family of the Amarna period.

Did Tutankhamun have children?

No surviving child of Tutankhamun is known.

Two small mummified fetuses were found in his tomb.

They have often been interpreted as stillborn daughters of Tutankhamun and Ankhesenamun, although attempts to establish precise biological relationships using ancient DNA should be treated cautiously.

What did Tutankhamun actually do as pharaoh?

Because Tutankhamun was very young, senior officials likely exercised substantial influence over government.

Two particularly important figures were Ay, a high-ranking court official, and Horemheb, a powerful military commander.

The reign is best known for reversing religious policies associated with Akhenaten.

Temples were restored, traditional gods returned to prominence and the royal court moved away from Akhenaten’s purpose-built capital at Akhetaten, modern Amarna.

The Restoration Stela

An important inscription from Tutankhamun’s reign describes the restoration of temples and cults neglected during the preceding religious upheaval.

The text presents the young king as repairing disorder and restoring proper relations between Egypt and its gods.

Like many royal inscriptions, it also served political propaganda by presenting the current king as the solution to earlier chaos.

Why was Tutankhamun forgotten?

Tutankhamun died young and left no surviving heir.

He was followed by Ay and then Horemheb.

Later rulers attempted to distance the royal record from the controversial Amarna period associated with Akhenaten.

Tutankhamun’s name was omitted from some later king lists, which ironically may have helped protect his tomb from large-scale ancient robbery because later looters were less aware of him.

Where is Tutankhamun’s tomb?

Tutankhamun’s tomb is in the Valley of the Kings on the west bank of the Nile near Luxor.

It is known to archaeologists as KV62.

The tomb is relatively small for a royal burial, one reason some scholars think Tutankhamun’s sudden death may have forced officials to use or adapt a burial space that had not originally been designed for a king.

Who discovered Tutankhamun’s tomb?

The tomb was discovered by the excavation team led by British archaeologist Howard Carter and financed by George Herbert, 5th Earl of Carnarvon.

Carter had worked in Egypt for decades and had extensive archaeological experience before the discovery.

He had been searching the Valley of the Kings for evidence of Tutankhamun for several seasons.

Why was Carter searching for Tutankhamun?

Archaeologists already knew that a pharaoh named Tutankhamun had existed.

Objects bearing his name had been discovered in the Valley of the Kings, including material from an embalming cache.

Carter believed that the king’s actual tomb had not yet been located.

Previous excavators had searched much of the valley, making the remaining area near the tomb of Ramesses VI especially important.

The discovery on 4 November 1922

On 4 November 1922, workers uncovered the top of a stone step beneath ancient workmen’s huts in the Valley of the Kings.

Further clearance revealed a descending staircase leading toward a sealed doorway.

The following day, Carter could see official necropolis seals on the entrance.

He stopped major excavation and contacted Lord Carnarvon in Britain.

The sealed doorway

When Carnarvon arrived in Egypt, the team resumed work.

Sixteen steps led down to a doorway bearing Tutankhamun’s royal name.

Beyond it was a corridor filled with rubble and then another sealed entrance.

The presence of ancient resealing showed that the tomb had been entered in antiquity, but there was hope that much of its contents remained intact.

“Wonderful things”

On 26 November 1922, Carter made a small opening in the second doorway and looked inside by candlelight.

His notes describe gold, statues, strange animal forms and crowded objects filling the chamber.

When Carnarvon asked whether he could see anything, Carter later recalled replying with the famous phrase “Yes, wonderful things.”

The Griffith Institute’s surviving Carter records confirm that the scene had an extraordinary concentration of royal objects, though popular retellings often dramatize the exchange.

What was inside Tutankhamun’s tomb?

The tomb contained thousands of objects intended to equip the king for the afterlife.

They included:

• royal thrones and chairs;
• beds and couches;
• chariots;
• bows, arrows and other weapons;
• clothing and sandals;
• food and wine containers;
• statues and ritual objects;
• jewelry;
• canopic equipment;
• nested shrines and coffins;
• the famous gold funerary mask.

The tomb was not untouched, but compared with most royal burials it was extraordinarily complete.

Was Tutankhamun’s tomb robbed in antiquity?

Yes.

Carter’s team found evidence that thieves had entered the tomb in ancient times.

Some items had been disturbed, packages opened and objects moved.

Ancient officials apparently resealed the tomb afterward.

Later construction debris and workmen’s huts eventually covered the entrance area, helping the burial escape the much more thorough looting suffered by many other royal tombs.

Why was the tomb so important?

Most pharaohs’ tombs in the Valley of the Kings had been heavily robbed long before modern archaeology.

Tutankhamun’s burial offered something different: an enormous group of objects found largely in their original archaeological context.

This allowed scholars to study royal burial equipment as a complete assemblage rather than as scattered objects without context.

How long did it take to clear the tomb?

The discovery was only the beginning.

Carter and a team of specialists spent roughly a decade recording, conserving, photographing, packing and removing the objects.

The Griffith Institute preserves the excavation’s journals, object cards, conservation notes, photographs, plans and correspondence.

The careful documentation became one of the most important archaeological archives of the twentieth century.

The burial chamber

The burial chamber was opened in February 1923.

Inside, Carter’s team found enormous gilded wooden shrines surrounding a stone sarcophagus.

Within the sarcophagus were nested coffins containing the mummy of Tutankhamun.

The innermost coffin was made of gold.

Tutankhamun’s gold mask

The funerary mask covering the king’s head and shoulders became the most recognizable object from ancient Egypt.

The mask depicts an idealized royal face wearing the striped nemes headdress, with protective symbols and elaborate inlay.

It was not meant as an ordinary portrait. Like other Egyptian funerary objects, it combined the king’s identity with divine and royal imagery intended for the afterlife.

What did Tutankhamun look like?

We cannot reconstruct the king’s everyday appearance with complete certainty.

Royal Egyptian art followed conventions and idealized rulers.

His mummy and medical imaging provide information about his skeleton and body, but facial reconstructions depend partly on assumptions about soft tissue.

Ancient portraits should therefore not be read like modern photographs.

How old was Tutankhamun when he died?

Most research places his age at death at around 18 or 19 years old.

He had ruled for roughly a decade.

His early death created a succession problem because he apparently left no surviving child.

How did Tutankhamun die?

The exact cause of Tutankhamun’s death is unknown.

Many explanations have been proposed over the years, including murder, accident, infection, genetic disease and malaria.

Modern imaging and molecular studies have ruled out some older sensational theories but have not produced a universally accepted single cause.

Was Tutankhamun murdered?

For years, a damaged area at the back of the skull helped inspire theories that Tutankhamun had been murdered by a blow to the head.

Later CT examination did not support the idea of a fatal head injury.

Much of the skull damage appears more consistent with mummification or post-mortem treatment than with murder.

There is currently no strong evidence that Tutankhamun was assassinated.

The broken leg theory

Medical imaging identified a fracture in Tutankhamun’s left leg.

Researchers have debated whether the fracture happened shortly before death or whether some damage occurred after burial.

If the injury happened during life, infection or complications could theoretically have contributed to his death.

The evidence does not prove the popular image of a fatal chariot crash.

Did Tutankhamun have a clubfoot?

The 2010 JAMA study described several foot abnormalities and interpreted the left foot as having a form of clubfoot along with other bone problems.

That interpretation was challenged by other specialists, including an orthopedic surgeon who argued that the published images did not support a true clubfoot diagnosis.

This is a useful example of why medical claims about ancient mummies should not be presented as completely settled.

Did Tutankhamun have malaria?

The 2010 research reported genetic evidence consistent with Plasmodium falciparum, the parasite that causes severe malaria.

The authors proposed that malaria combined with bone problems may have contributed to Tutankhamun’s death.

Other researchers questioned whether malaria would necessarily have been fatal in a young adult living in an endemic region and raised methodological concerns about the ancient-DNA results.

Malaria remains a possible factor, not a proven single cause of death.

Did inbreeding affect Tutankhamun’s health?

Royal families in ancient Egypt sometimes married close relatives to preserve dynastic legitimacy.

The 2010 genetic reconstruction proposed that Tutankhamun’s parents were siblings.

If correct, close-kin parentage could increase the risk of some inherited disorders.

However, the exact genetic relationships reconstructed from ancient DNA have been challenged, so claims about specific inherited diseases should be made cautiously.

Why were walking sticks found in the tomb?

More than one walking stick or cane was found among Tutankhamun’s burial equipment.

Some researchers interpret these as evidence that he experienced mobility problems.

Others note that staffs and canes also carried symbolic and status meanings in Egyptian elite culture.

The objects may therefore reflect both practical use and royal symbolism.

What happened after Tutankhamun died?

Tutankhamun was succeeded by Ay, an elderly court official who had already been influential during the young king’s reign.

Ay ruled only briefly.

He was followed by Horemheb, a military commander who had also served under Tutankhamun.

Horemheb further erased traces of the Amarna royal family and presented himself as a restorer of political order.

What was the “curse of Tutankhamun”?

The idea of a mummy’s curse became famous after the tomb’s discovery.

Newspapers reported stories suggesting that people connected with the excavation were dying mysteriously after disturbing the king’s burial.

The death of Lord Carnarvon in April 1923 gave the story enormous publicity.

How did Lord Carnarvon die?

Carnarvon died in Cairo several months after the tomb was opened.

His death followed an infected mosquito bite and serious illness.

Because he had financed the excavation and died soon after the discovery, newspapers quickly connected the event with supernatural punishment.

Was there an inscription threatening death?

Popular stories often claim that Carter’s team found a warning such as “death shall come on swift wings” at the tomb entrance.

No such famous curse inscription was documented on the sealed entrance.

Egyptian tombs did sometimes contain protective or threatening formulas, but the modern Tutankhamun curse story largely grew through journalism, rumor and later popular culture.

Did the curse kill the archaeologists?

There is no convincing evidence for a supernatural curse.

Howard Carter himself lived until 1939, more than sixteen years after discovering the tomb.

Many other people connected with the excavation also lived for years or decades afterward.

The “curse” became a successful media narrative because it combined sudden death, ancient Egypt and an extraordinary archaeological discovery.

Why did Tutankhamun become so famous?

The timing of the discovery mattered.

By the 1920s, newspapers, photography, cinema and global mass media could spread images and stories rapidly.

The tomb’s gold objects appeared at exactly the moment when the modern public could consume archaeology as international celebrity news.

This produced a wave of “Tutmania” influencing fashion, jewelry, design, film and popular culture.

Who really deserves credit for the discovery?

Howard Carter became the public face of the excavation, but archaeology was a team effort.

Egyptian excavation workers discovered and cleared the site, though early publications often failed to record their names and roles adequately.

Specialists such as photographer Harry Burton, conservator Alfred Lucas and archaeologist Arthur Mace were also crucial to documenting and preserving the tomb.

Modern accounts increasingly recognize that the famous discovery was not the achievement of one man alone.

Why does colonial history matter?

The excavation took place while Egypt was navigating British political domination and its own struggle for sovereignty.

Questions about who controlled antiquities, who received excavation rights and where objects would be displayed were politically important.

Unlike many earlier Egyptian discoveries divided between foreign excavators and Egyptian collections, Tutankhamun’s tomb contents remained in Egypt.

The discovery therefore became entangled with both archaeology and Egyptian national identity.

Were all the treasures removed from the tomb?

Most movable burial goods were transferred into Egyptian state collections after excavation and conservation.

Tutankhamun’s mummy remained in the Valley of the Kings.

The objects have become among the most important holdings in Egypt’s national archaeological collections.

Why is the tomb so small?

KV62 is modest compared with the monumental tombs of some other New Kingdom pharaohs.

Tutankhamun’s sudden death may have left insufficient time to complete a large royal tomb.

Some scholars have therefore suggested that a smaller tomb intended for another person may have been adapted for the king.

The exact planning history remains debated.

Was Nefertiti buried behind Tutankhamun’s tomb?

Modern scanning projects have prompted speculation that hidden chambers might exist near Tutankhamun’s burial chamber and could contain another royal burial, sometimes proposed to be Nefertiti.

Claims of a confirmed hidden tomb have not been established.

The possibility has attracted enormous media attention, but it should be treated as an unresolved archaeological question rather than a discovery.

Tutankhamun timeline

• c. 14th century BCE: Tutankhamun is born into the Eighteenth Dynasty royal family.
• Childhood: he is originally known as Tutankhaten.
• c. age 8–9: becomes pharaoh.
• Early reign: name changes to Tutankhamun as traditional cults are restored.
• c. age 18–19: Tutankhamun dies and is buried in KV62.
• 1907: material connected with his embalming is discovered in the Valley of the Kings.
• 4 November 1922: Carter’s team discovers the first step leading to KV62.
• 26 November 1922: Carter looks into the antechamber.
• 16 February 1923: the burial chamber is formally opened.
• 1920s–1930s: the tomb is documented, conserved and cleared over multiple seasons.

Tutankhamun myths and reality

Myth: Tutankhamun was one of Egypt’s greatest conquerors

His reign was relatively short, and his modern fame comes primarily from his tomb rather than major military or political achievements.

Myth: the tomb had never been entered before Carter

Ancient robbers had entered it, but officials resealed the tomb and much of the burial equipment remained.

Myth: Tutankhamun was definitely murdered

Modern CT studies do not support the old theory of a fatal blow to the back of the head.

Myth: science has proved exactly how he died

Malaria, bone disease and a leg injury have all been discussed, but no single cause is universally accepted.

Myth: everyone who opened the tomb died from a curse

Many members of the excavation team survived for years or decades. There is no scientific evidence for a supernatural curse.

Tutankhamun FAQ

What does Tutankhamun mean?

The name is usually translated approximately as “living image of Amun.” His earlier name, Tutankhaten, referred instead to the Aten.

How old was Tutankhamun when he became king?

He was probably around eight or nine years old.

How old was Tutankhamun when he died?

Most estimates place him at about eighteen or nineteen.

Who discovered King Tut’s tomb?

The excavation team led by Howard Carter discovered the entrance in November 1922. Lord Carnarvon financed the work.

What year was Tutankhamun’s tomb discovered?

The first step leading to the tomb was found on 4 November 1922.

Was Tutankhamun’s tomb intact?

Not completely. Ancient thieves had entered it, but most of the burial equipment remained, making it exceptionally well preserved compared with other royal tombs.

How did King Tut die?

The exact cause remains uncertain. Malaria, a leg fracture and other health problems have been proposed, but none is proven as the single cause.

Is the mummy’s curse real?

No evidence demonstrates a supernatural curse associated with the tomb.

Sources and further reading

• University of Oxford, Griffith Institute — Tutankhamun Spatial Archive
• Griffith Institute — First Excavation Season, 1922–1923
• The Metropolitan Museum of Art — Tutankhamun’s World
• JAMA — Ancestry and Pathology in King Tutankhamun’s Family
• JAMA correspondence questioning aspects of the ancient-DNA analysis
• Howard Carter and A. C. Mace, The Tomb of Tut.ankh.Amen.