Pharaoh Tutankhamun’s mummy continues to surprise
Howard Carter during the study the mummy of Tutankhamun
The discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb, the last pharaoh of the 18th dynasty of the New Kingdom, became the greatest archeological discovery of the XXth century. But almost one hundred years later, the scientists are still clarifying some peculiar details of his burial. For example, it was believed for a long time that Tutankhamun was buried in a haste and a mistake was made when his body was almost entirely covered with the spilt black paint, which self-ignited after some time and virtually burned the pharaoh’s remains. Besides, among the canopic jars – ritual vessels into which the inner organs were put after the embalmment, there was no vessel with the ruler’s heart, and in place of the heart itself the sacred scarab had not been put, contrary to what was the usual practice.
Among the strangest rituals that were performed in the pharaoh’s tomb was the discovery of his penis, embalmed at the angle of ninety degrees. Egyptologists from the American university in Cairo at the present time assert that it was presumably done in order to make the king closer to Osiris – a god of the underground world, in an attempt to intimidate religious revolutionaries. At the moment of his death – in 1323 BE, the country, according to the scientists, was on the verge of a religious revolution.
It is widely thought that Akhenaton, the father of Tutankhamun, wanted to destroy the faith in Egyptian gods and instead of them worship the sun disk under the name Aten. Tutankhamun, as he tried to suppress this revolution, broke his leg and died of infection in the wound. DNA analysis carried out in 2010 also found traces of malaria in his organism.
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During the mummification, it was decided not only to embalm the erected penis, but also to cover the king’s body with black fluid and take out the heart (by the analogy with the colour of the Osiris’s skin). Also, on the pharaoh’s body the heart scarab had not been found – the mascot, which was placed on the deceased to demonstrate their right to be admitted into the afterlife.
According to the religious texts, Osiris’s heart was taken out by his brother Seth and buried separately.
These three rituals, according to professor Salima Ikram, were performed in order for the people to think that Tutankhamun was a god of the underground world. Ikram’s hypothesis is also confirmed by the unique decorations on the king’s tomb.
«Penis in the erected condition is the most powerful means of summoning Osiris. In fact, the genital organ is the essence of the regeneration and resurrection symbols, created in honour of Osiris,» — explained Ikram in her research paper.
Tutankhamun who became a pharaoh when he was under ten years old in 1333 Before our Era, died only nine years after he came to power. He was the last ruler of the eighteenth dynasty of the New Kingdom – one of the most powerful royal houses of the Ancient Egypt