- ‘Virtual autopsy’ composed of more than 2,000 computer scans carried out
- Genetic analysis of Tutankhamun’s family showed his parents were brother and sister
Tutankhamun was an Egyptian King who became Pharaoh at the age of ten in 1333 BC and ruled for just nine years until his death. He was the last of the royal line from the eighteenth dynasty during the period of the New Kingdom.
King Tutankhamun was a hobbled, weak teenager with a cleft palate, buck teeth and club foot. And he probably has his parents to blame. For the mother and father of the legendary boy pharaoh were actually brother and sister. The fact that his mother and father were siblings may seem bizarre today but incest was rife among the boy king’s family as pharaohs were believed to be descended from the gods. Therefore, it was an acceptable way of retaining the sacred bloodline. King Tut’s own wife Ankhesenpaaten, was his half-sister as they shared the same father. They were married when he was just ten. But Dr Hawass’ team found generations of inbreeding took their toll on King Tut – the last of his great dynasty. The bone disease he suffered runs in families and is more likely to be passed down if two first-degree relatives marry and have children, the study published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association shows.
They described him as: ‘A young but frail king who needed canes to walk.’
This explains the presence of more than 130 canes in his tomb, which he would have needed in the afterlife.
‘A sudden leg fracture possibly introduced by a fall might have resulted in a life threatening condition when a malaria infection occurred,’ the JAMA article said.
The revelations are in stark contrast to the popular image of a graceful boy-king as portrayed by the dazzling funerary artifacts in his tomb that later introduced much of the world to the glory of ancient Egypt. The treasure in his tomb included a 24.2lb solid gold death mask encrusted with lapis lazuli and semi-precious stones.
King Tut has fascinated the world ever since his ancient tomb was unearthed by the British archaeologist Dr Howard Carter in the Valley of the Kings in 1922. Rumours of a curse arose after Dr Carter’s benefactor Lord Carnarvon died suddenly a few months after the tomb was opened, even though Dr Carter went on to live another 16 years.
The cause of King Tut’s death has long been disputed among historians, with many speculating that he was murdered. Theories that he was assassinated stemmed from the fact that he was the last ruler of his dynasty and had a hole in the back of his head. However, in 2005, Dr Hawass announced his team had found no evidence for a blow to the back of the head, and the hole was from the mummification process. Scientists think the new research points to him dying from complications from a broken leg exacerbated by malaria.