dailymail : King Tut 'killed by speeding chariot': Mystery of the boy pharaoh's death is solved... 3,336 years later
By Claudia Joseph.
It is one of the greatest mysteries of the ancient world – whether the Egyptian boy pharaoh Tutankhamun was murdered, contracted leprosy or even died from a snakebite.
Now, 91 years after English archaeologist Howard Carter discovered his tomb in the Valley of the Kings, there is new evidence that suggests the pharaoh died after being struck by a speeding chariot.
And it’s been discovered that after his death in 1323 BC, Tutankhamun was rapidly embalmed and buried, causing his mummified body to spontaneously combust in his sarcophagus.
The chariot discovery was made by Dr Chris Naunton, director of the Egypt Exploration Society, after reading Carter’s notes, which were never published.
Dr Naunton used the latest technology to reconstruct the death of the pharaoh, popularly known as King Tut, for a forthcoming programme on Channel 4.
He said: ‘We believe there is now a very distinct possibility that he was struck by a chariot wheel in the torso at high speed – enough to do him very serious damage. In fact, that’s what killed him.
‘His body would have been a real mess – he would not have been left a little bloodied – and that would have given the embalmers a real problem. They were used to dealing with dead bodies, not mangled ones.’
In 1968, a photographer from Liverpool University took 50 X-rays of the mummy. It was found that a chunk of Tutankhamun’s skull had floated loose, leading to four decades of murder theories. But now it is believed that the head injury was caused after his death and that the clues to his demise lie in his chest.
Not only did his skeleton have broken ribs on its left-hand side but it was lacking a sternum, or breastbone, and heart.
A fragment of the pharaoh’s flesh was also examined.
It was discovered that King Tut’s mummy was charred, suggesting that it had been burnt while sealed in its coffin. It could have spontaneously combusted because the mummification had been botched.
After discovering that Tutankhamun had not been murdered, Dr Naunton asked forensic experts to carry out further research – and it was revealed that King Tut’s injuries were consistent with being run over by a heavy, narrow wheel of the type used on chariots.
Tutankhamun: The Mystery Of The Burnt Mummy will be screened on Channel 4 on November 10.
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