Ta-sekhet-ma’at, translating to ‘The Great Field’, is known to us today as the Valley of the Kings. Here, on November 26th, 1922, archaeologist Howard Carter would be the first person to look upon the tomb of Tutankhamun in over 3000 years.
‘With trembling hands I made a tiny breach in the upper left-hand corner. Darkness and blank space, as far as an iron testing-rod could reach, showed that whatever lay beyond was empty, and not filled like the passage we had just cleared. Candle tests were applied as a precaution against possible foul gases, and then, widening the hole a little, I inserted the candle and peered in, Lord Carnarvon, Lady Evelyn and Callender standing anxiously beside me to hear the verdict. At first I could see nothing, the hot air escaping from the chamber causing the candle flame to flicker, but presently, as my eyes grew accustomed to the light, details of the room within emerged slowly from the mist, strange animals, statues, and gold – everywhere the glint of gold.’
Behind him stood George Herbert, 5th Earl of Carnarvon, the Earl’s daughter, Lady Evelyn Herbert and Carter’s own assistant, Arthur Callender. Lord Carnarvon had been financing the dig at the Valley for many years and had announced that this one would be the last unless a find of significance could be unearthed. With only a few weeks to spare Howard Carter had presented the Earl with a very good reason for both him and his cash to stay in Egypt.
During the following months the tomb was carefully explored and excavated, with the Burial Chamber finally being officially opened in February of 1923. (It is believed that Carter, Carnarvon and Evelyn actually used an old looters passage to enter the Burial Chamber on November 28th 1922). A media whirlwind grew around the excavation, of which Carter took advantage by selling exclusive rights to The Times in order to help fund what had become a large and complex operation. However, by doing so he managed to antagonise not only the rest of the British press, but also the Egyptian authorities and media, who too were excluded despite the historically significant find having been made in their country. And, you know, being THEIR history.
As February 1923 drew to a close Carter and Lord Carnarvon argued over how to handle the supervising Egyptian authorities (the reason for their rift has never been confirmed but this is the general belief). Their falling out led to the excavation being closed until early March 1923, when the Earl apparently apologised to Carter and reopened the site, and his wallet. Sadly, this would be Lord Carnarvon’s last decision when it came to the fate of King Tut’s tomb and its treasures. On March 19th 1923, he would suffer a nasty mosquito bite which, while in itself not life threatening, would become infected after an accidental shaving cut. George Herbert, 5th Earl of Carnarvon, passed away on April 5th 1923 in his room at the Continental-Savoy Hotel in Cairo, nine days later his wife, Almina, returned to England with his body.
Following Carnarvon’s death, Carter was permitted to continue the excavation of Tutankhamun’s tomb, but the Egyptian government took ownership of its contents, which, yes, absolutely should have been the status quo for all artifacts discovered on their land but, you know, the Empire.
So, how did one man’s untimely death that resulted from an understandable, if not also an extremely unlucky, circumstance result in the mania that would become known as King Tut’s curse?
Victorian Britain’s obsession with Egypt, known as Egyptomania, had actually begun over 120 years prior to the Earl’s death. It began around 1798, with the Napoleonic campaigns crudely excavating and collecting (i.e trespassing and pilfering) archaeological remains and sending them back to Europe to be studied. Other European ‘visitors’ would soon follow and by the mid to late 1800’s Egyptomania was in full force, with packed exhibitions and Egyptian design being incorporated into architecture, fashion and the arts. The church was also taking advantage of this ‘trend’, commissioning pieces that portrayed, among many others, Moses and the plague.
The demand for all things Egyptian continued well into the 1800’s but towards the end of the century the country became particularly valuable, both politically and financially, to the British Empire due to the ongoing construction of an overland trade route. At this time Egypt was not officially part of the British Empire but was experiencing repercussions from essentially being fought over by them and the Ottoman Empire. Understandably there was a revolution, local uprisings were reported back to the British government and it was decided that a greater military presence was needed. In 1882 Britain took unofficial occupation of Egypt, prompting a violent war and eventual victory for themselves. The British occupation would last until 1922.
It would be during the war, with horrifying tales of the revolutions, that the ‘Pharaoh’s Curse’, would really take hold of Victorian Britain. Doubt began to seep into the minds of those who were on the outside of the violence and they began to believe that the ‘Mummies’ and artifacts which sat quietly in their homes and museums were out for vengeance. People spoke of being haunted by spectres of long dead Egyptians, of suffering from mysterious illnesses and unexpectedly losing loved ones.
All of this would lead to Marie Corelli, a popular Egyptologist and Occultist novelist, sending an ‘imaginative’ letter to the New York World newspaper which documented proof that an ‘ire punishment’ would be exacted on any who intruded a sealed Egyptian tomb. The letter was published just two weeks before Lord Carnarvon’s death and it didn’t take much effort on the newspapers behalf to spark a media frenzy after his passing. More fuel was added to the fire following an interview with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle that took place on the day that news of Carnarvon’s death reached England.
Conan Doyle was already no stranger to commenting on the curse of Egyptian Mummies, having made a statement in a 1923 interview regarding the death of his friend Bertram Fletcher Robinson. Bertram had been an editor for the Daily Express and was studying a ‘mummy-board’, a painted inner coffin lid, when he fell ill and died in 1907. In the years following his death the artifact became inaccurately known as the ‘Unlucky Mummy’ (as it was not actually a Mummy) and would be attributed not just to Bertram’s death but many other tales of death, injury and disasters, including the sinking of the Titanic (with none having any basis in fact). In this interview he (Doyle) was questioned about his friend’s death and the rumours surrounding it whereby he gave this answer;
“It is impossible to say with absolute certainty if this is true. If we had proper occult powers we could determine it, but I warned Fletcher Robinson against concerning himself with the mummy at the British Museum…. I told him he was tempting fate by pursuing his inquiries, but he was fascinated and would not desist. Then he was overtaken by illness. The immediate cause of his death was typhoid fever, but that is the way in which the ‘elementals’ [curses] guarding the mummy might act.”
During the later interview, when informed of Carnarvon’s death, Conan Doyle would repeat his views on the ‘elementals’ and ‘curses’ tied to the Egyptian Mummies. The famous author was agnostic and took a great interest in the occult, mysticism and spiritualism, his beliefs reflecting that of many in society at that time. With the respected novelist and doctor seeming to have a deep belief in the curse of King Tut the mania around it only grew.
Over the next decade the people associated with, including visitors, financiers and their loved ones, were closely watched, with any unfortunate circumstance befalling them attributed to the curse. Some of the more well-known names are listed below;
- George Herbert, 5th Earl of Carnarvon; the main financier of the excavation of the tomb and the first to apparently fall foul of Tut’s curse. The date of his death being so close to the official opening of the tomb was seen to support the existence of the curse, however it has been documented that Carnarvon actually first set eyes upon Tut’s final resting place four months prior to his death rather than one. The Earl had also been suffering from long term illness, he was predisposed to lung problems and had a lowered immune system, the infected bite led to blood poisoning which then led to a severe lung infection. He was not a 100% healthy human prior to his fate. The more mystical events surrounding his death, the lights going out in his hotel (or the entirety of Cairo according to some) and the sudden death of his dog, Susie, back at his estate in England, have never been proved.
- Sir Bruce Ingham, friend of the archaeologist Howard Carter, was gifted a paperweight that consisted of a mummified hand wearing a bracelet that was rumoured to have been inscribed with the words ‘cursed be he who moves my body, to him shall come fire, water and pestilence’. Whilst he escaped death at the hands of the curse, his house burned to the ground soon after receiving the gift and once rebuilt, succumbed to flooding. It is said he gave the paperweight away before pestilence could pay him a visit.
- George Jay Gould was a wealthy American railroad executive who visited the tomb soon after it was opened. Shortly afterwards he contracted a fever and died of pneumonia four months later in France. It is rumoured that he was advised not to travel so soon after his illness.
- Audrey Herbert was Lord Carnarvon’s half-brother, and despite not ever stepping foot in Tut’s tomb it was suggested that merely his blood tie to someone who did caused him to fall victim to the curse. He would die just five months after his brother following an incredibly invasive dental surgery that resulted in sepsis. He was born with a degenerative eye condition which caused him to go blind later in life, a ‘doctor’ diagnosed the cause of his blindness being his rotten and infected teeth. Every tooth was pulled from his mouth, he did not regain his sight and instead suffered a painful death due to blood poisoning.
- Hugh Evelyn-White, a British archaeologist who visited Tut’s tomb and was rumoured to have helped excavate the site. Sadly, his story seems to have been hijacked by those who discuss King Tut’s curse. They have him hanging himself after witnessing many of his fellow workers dying from the curse and knowing what fate awaits him. There are even tales of a suicide note written in blood stating ‘I have succumbed to a curse which forces me to disappear.” According to an old newspaper article he actually shot himself in the back of a taxi whilst travelling to the inquest of Helen Nind, a music teacher who poisoned herself following his rejection of her romantically.
- Although not present at the opening of the tomb, Aaron Ember was close friends with Lord Carnarvon and others that attended. On May 31st, 1926, a fire broke out at his home, believed to have resulted from a late night party at residence the night before. When they woke to find their home already succumbing to the flames his wife, Regina, ran to save their six year old invalid son and urged her husband to rescue his current manuscript before escaping. Regina, their son, and Emma, the maid, never made it out of the house however Aaron managed to jump from a balcony. He survived his injuries for a little less than a day and was never told of the passing of his family. Whilst his friendship to Lord Carnarvon would not be enough to link his tragic story to the curse, rumours name the unfinished manuscript (translation) ‘The Book of the Dead’. No official documents of the time seem to mention this at all.
- Richard Bethell was Lord Carnarvon’s personal secretary and is said to have been amongst the first people to enter the tomb behind Howard Carter. In 1929 he was smothered to death in his room at an elite Mayfair club. At the time his tragic passing was attributed to the curse, fuelled by reports of several fires at his home during previous months. However, he could well have been targeted by a fellow member, with gentlemen’s clubs being notorious for concealing shady business dealings, political manipulation and torrid affairs. One historian has even claimed that Richard was murdered by the infamous occultist Aleister Crowley, whose own religion was based on Egyptian philosophy and would have seen the opening of the tomb as sacrilegious. Sadly just a few months later, in February of 1930, Richard’s father, of the same name and 3rd Baron of Westbury, jumped to his death from his apartment in Westminster following a long illness. Although his suicide note, that was found at the scene, suggested he had merely tired of his suffering many tried to blame King Tut’s curse.
- Famous Egyptologist James Henry Breasted, was a member of Howard Carter’s team when the tomb was first opened. He passed away shortly after returning from an expedition in 1935, at age 70, from a streptococcus infection. It was a stretch even for the media at the time to link his death to the curse, but his name is repeated often in the lore of King Tut’s curse. It is rumoured that on arriving home from the initial 1922 opening of the tomb he discovered his pet canary had been eaten by a cobra, a symbol of Egyptian monarchy. There does not seem to be any official documents confirming this or whether he in fact owned a cobra and it escaped, or it was supposed to have magically appeared in the canary’s cage.
- Whilst it is rumoured that Sir Archibald Reid, a notable radiologist, became ill after x-raying Tut’s mummy and passed away just a few days later, there are no x-ray images nor written records to prove he ever did so. One of the dangers posed to the pioneers of radiology was radiation poisoning and Archibald, like many of his peers, had not escaped unscathed. He was diagnosed with radiation dermatitis of the fingers and worked through the beginning stages of his illness before travelling to Switzerland in hopes the mountain air could aid in his recovery. Unfortunately, his condition worsened, and he would die in early 1924 following abdominal surgery. Despite being invited personally by Howard Carter to x-ray Tutankhamen, Sir Archibald Reid would never make it to Egypt.
- Ali Kamel Fahmy Bey was an Egyptian aristocrat who was shot to death by his wife Marguerite shortly after visiting the tomb in 1923. Although often tied to the curse it appears that his death more than likely resulted from a tumultuous and abusive marriage. Marguerite was tried and acquitted at the Old Bailey in September of 1923, however the Egyptian authorities refused to acknowledge the verdict and she was unable to inherit any of her late husband’s estate. Her defence relied heavily on depicting her as a victim of the ‘brutality and beastliness’ of her ‘oriental husband’, playing into the bigotry held by Victorian society at the time, but they may also have held another ace up their sleeve. Prior to marrying Bey, Marguerite had engaged in a short but passionate affair with Edward, Prince of Wales, and was in possession of a number of letters from him that she kept ‘for insurance’ until her passing in January of 1971, after which they were burnt in order to protect the Prince’s reputation.
- Surely as the leader of the expedition and someone who spent years working at the excavation site and with the recovered artifacts, Howard Carter would suffer the most from the legendary curse, right? In actual fact, Carter never fell victim to mysterious fires nor tragedy, unless you count the declining interest in him and Tutankhamun as the decade drew to a close. He never married nor had children and by the late 1920’s was living a fairly isolated existence with only a few close friends. After his passing from Hodgkin’s Disease at the age of 64, he was buried in Putney Vale Cemetery with only nine people in attendance. Whilst the attention on himself and his great excavation faded Howard never lost his love for Egypt. Inscribed upon his gravestone are words taken from the Lotus Chalice, one of the first finds to be documented by the archaeologist;
‘May your spirit live, may you spend millions of years, you who love Thebes, sitting with your face to the north wind, your eyes beholding happiness’
So, is there any truth at all in the Curse of King Tutankhamen?
Contrary to popular belief, there are only a few examples of genuine curses inscribed inside of Egyptian tombs and most of those occur during the era of the Old Kingdom, over 1000 years prior to Tut’s rule. These would most frequently appear in private tombs, rather than royal ones, and seem to be more of a warning to the Ka Priests to keep the tomb safe, rather than detailing a specific punishment for thieves. However, there are curses that have been discovered in tombs built after the Old Kingdom era and, whilst greatly lesser in number, tend to be more severe with their threat level. An example quoted by Zahi Hawass, a noted Egyptian archaeologist and government Minister, follows;
‘Cursed be those who disturb the rest of a Pharaoh. They that shall break the seal of this tomb shall meet death by a disease that no doctor can diagnose.’
This could well be the evidence needed to prove that there could indeed have been a deadly curse laid upon Tut’s tomb, except that no threatening inscription was ever found at the site. In fact, any on-site evidence for curses relating to Tutankhamen’s final resting place is so non-existent that Canadian Egyptologist and Professor, Donald Redford, labelled it as ‘unadulterated claptrap’. And it seems that almost 100 years previous Howard Carter himself agreed, dismissing it as ‘tommy-rot’.
Sceptics have put forward the undeniable fact that many others who were there for the initial discovery or who joined for later excavations went on to live healthy, tragedy-free, lives. Out of the 58 people who were present when both the tomb and, later, the sarcophagus were opened, only eight of them died within the next 12 years. Lady Evelyn Herbert herself, Lord Carnarvon’s daughter, was one of the first people to enter the tomb before the official opening and would die in 1980, 57 years later.
In recent years a more scientific view has been taken on curses related to uncovering ancient tombs, sparked by the opening of the resting place of King Casimir IV of Poland and his wife Elizabeth. The site had last been uncovered in 1505 when Elizabeth was intombed with her husband following her death, until 1973 when the Archbishop of Krakow gave permission for it to undergo conservation work. Over the following months 10 out of the 12-man team suffered premature death and the media began to make comparisons with the curse of Tutankhamun.
However, the work of microbiologist Boleslaw Smky revealed the presence of Aspergillus flavus, a type of fungus that produces toxic substances called aflatoxins, at the site. These toxins are known to be highly carcinogenic and can also cause serious health problems with regards to the liver. Reports suggested that the conservation team members inhaled the spores of the fungus as they initially opened the tomb. With these findings more reports came out stating that this fungus, or other species or viruses, could have also laid dormant in the tombs of Egypt. Whether intombed purposefully or were merely a part of the environment at the time is probably something we will never know. What seems agreed upon is that this fungus in particular was unlikely to have been present in Tutankhamun’s tomb, the number of people displaying the symptoms of the unfortunate Polish team being very few, if any at all.
The legend of Tut’s curse, if true, most definitely seems to have its roots buried firmly in spiritulasim and the supernatural. Mysterious fires, bad luck and madness are all attributed to it, whilst disease and physical ailments feature very rarely. Ultimately it is down to the discerning researcher to decide for themselves if ancient tomb builders had access to powers that we have long since forgotten or lost, or whether poisons were planted as traps or simply intombed along with the dead by chance. Whatever the scientific or supernatural reason may be, it appears that humans will continue to be fascinated with the Ancient Egyptians and their rituals, culture and society. Theirs is a world very much romanticised, with images of towering temples and pyramids, glistening gold and jewels, and powerful pharaohs and their priests. There is no doubt that films, tv shows, books and posts just like this will go on being created around their history for many more years to come.
Two Queens True Crime 
Leave a comment