Friday, December 12, 2008

The Curse of King Tut

King Tut died in about 1332 B.C when he was about eighteen or nineteen. When he died, his son Aye took over all of his responsibility before he even got the throne of Egypt officially. Remember the curses that were put in King Tut's tomb? Ya those started showing up in about that 5th Dynasty. Even though nobody had gone into King Tut's tomb, I guess he was still not very happy with Egypt. People were getting sick and becoming paralyzed just out of nowhere! Even people who just went to explore Egypt way after King Tut ruled could be hit by sickness and just die! This is why I'm not planning on going to Egypt for a vacation. I mean I wouldn't sacrifice my life just to see some giant pyramid that I could find a picture of online or watch it on TV!

King Tut's Undisturbed Tomb

OK so really King Tut isn't all that important. He is just another pharaoh of Egypt that just so happened to restore order to Ancient Egypt even though he was only nine years old. The real thing that made King Tut well known was that his tomb in The Valley Of the Kings was the only one that was found undisturbed by grave robbers. Grave robbers would break into any tomb and steal everything including the mummy himself. I don't know about you but I think that is really creepy. When Howard Carter discovered his tomb, it was totally undisturbed so no creepers had gotten in there and stolen King Tut. Howard found a tablet in his tomb that had a curse on it. The curse read "Death shall slay with wings whoever might disturb the peace of the pharaoh." Another curse was carved into a statue that said " It is I who drive back the robbers of the tomb with the flames of the desert. I am the protector of Tutankhamen's grave." I can see why his tomb was undisturbed because if I was interested in grave robbing, which I wouldn't be, I would stay far away from a tomb that has two curses that promise death on it.

The Affect King Tut Had On Egypt

King Tut started ruling when he was nine years old. I don't know how he did it because if I had to rule an empire when I was nine, I wouldn't do a very good job. I know that if we had a nine year old president in the United States, people would have a problem with it. I guess it was just different in Ancient Egypt. King Tut's dad was ruler before and he made everything go out of wack. Ancient Egypt is a polytheistic empire but his dad decided that he wanted to be a monotheistic empire for who knows what reason. He promoted the worship of only Ra, the sun god, leaving a big mess for King Tut to clean up. King Tut restored the worship of multiple gods and Egypt grew strong again. It was said that "celebration is throughout the whole land and good conditions have come to pass" which I'm guessing is a good thing.

The Mystery of King Tut's Death

Along with the whole undisturbed tomb thing, there is another mystery about King Tut. It is the fact that he died when he was eighteen or nineteen and nobody really knows why. There are a few theories but they all have something wrong with them. It's really weird. One belief is that King Tut committed suicide. That could be a logical idea but apparently he was really enjoying his role as pharaoh and was only nineteen so it doesn't really seem like that would be right. Some people believe that it was just and accident because he liked to race chariots and stuff so he could have gotten a major head injury or something like that. Some people think that it was just natural causes but royalty in Ancient Egypt had the best living conditions. I'm talking like gold crazy up in his place so it's probably not because of natural causes but you never know. The last theory is that he was murdered which is probably the most likely. He didn't seem to be mummified properly and he was really young so he could be a good target. But I don't know who would kill a pharaoh that did so much good for Egypt. Some people are just plain crazy I guess.

Thursday, December 11, 2008

King Tut's Burial

When King Tut's tomb was discovered, it seemed like his tomb and how he was buried was different than other pharaohs or just other people in general. Apparently he wasn't mummified right for starters. When you walked in the tomb, the smell was really strong because he had started decomposing! I don't care how cool his tomb was, if there was some nasty smell in there then I would be waiting outside. Also, he had a death mask that covered his face and his shoulders. It was made out of gold and was freaking awesome and seriously lifelike. Opening up his sarcophagus and seeing some gold face has got to be scary. He had a note too at his handle that said that he hunted in Heliopolis. Plus there were a lot of things with scenes of him killing people in battle but people don't think they are for real. I don't understand why you would want scenes of you doing things that you never did in your tomb. Maybe he thought that he would be cooler if people thought that he killed lots of people.

How did King Tut have an impact on Egypt?

Was King Tut liked by the people of Egypt?

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