In her latest book, archaeologist Minna Silver, who is well versed in the Middle East, presents what modern science has to say about Tutankhamun and ancient Egypt. Time has brought new interpretations.
As you know, this true story might not be enough for a centenary story, but there is even more basis in what happened then.
Over the following weeks, months and years, thousands of objects were documented little by little from the chambers at the end of the stairs, and finally the mummy of its owner in its nested coffins, the last of which was forged from pure gold.
The boy pharaoh who lived 3,300 years ago did not have time to be very significant as a ruler. Thanks to his tomb, however, he is undoubtedly the one that would come to mind for most people in Finland too, if they were asked to name one pharaoh.
Although the tomb was small and modest for the pharaoh’s final resting place, it is unique because it was the only place where the grave robbers never got beyond the beginning. That’s why a lot is known about ancient Egypt and the wider world that would otherwise have been lost to the flow of time.
Silver’s book, The Secrets of Tutankhamun, an archaeological journey to ancient Egypt, published this fall, is a giant package about the search and discovery of the tomb, studies and interpretations, and about ancient Egypt and the world at that time in general.
Petrie was Britain’s first professor of Egyptology. Carter, who began his excavations as a draftsman, learned the systematic archaeological methodology he created.
For the development of archeology as a discipline, both the grave discovery itself and Carter’s professionalism were lucky strikes. The interest pointed the way for new researchers and also attracted financiers.
– It certainly raised the profile of archeology quite a lot, specifically the archeology of the Middle East. It was seen that such discoveries could be made and that they are of great importance in terms of human history, says Minna Silver.
What if the archaeologists working in Egypt were to come across an equally staggering set of discoveries? Would their methods defeat Carter?
Minna Silver poses a counter-question: What is the entity that would finance such a huge scientific work today?
Lady Almina, who funded the research even after the death of her husband Lord Carnarvon, had inexhaustible funds. With them, the project could be completed.
Silver sees a small deficiency in Carter’s work compared to current practices in that the stairs and corridor leading to the tomb were poorly documented. He criticizes the harsh treatment of the mummy the most.
– I don’t know why it was so violent. Carter should have hit the brakes at that point, says Silver.
The embalming fluids had glued the mummy to the coffin. An attempt was made to remove it by placing the coffin in the sunlight. When that didn’t help, and neither did other tricks, I resorted to brute force, and among other things, the mummy’s arms were cut off so that the jewelry could be taken from them.
When the deceased had been exposed from his shrouds, the body was examined to determine the cause of death. It remained unsolved, and even today it is not certain where the 18- or 19-year-old Tutankhamun died.
The basic tools of field archaeologists haven’t changed much in a hundred years. Carter would still be familiar with shovels and spades, but what research methods would he be surprised by if he came to see the work of his colleagues now?
– From tachometers, laser scanners, digital cameras, GPS, radiocarbon dating, DNA analyses, Minna Silver lists the arsenal that has increasingly come to help archaeology.
However, DNA studies confirmed Carter and Derry’s conclusion with a 90 percent probability of being correct. However, Egyptologists are still suspected, says Silver.
– Linguists have a slightly different point of view. They know calligraphy really well. I can’t read them. They, on the other hand, have overlooked the original sources from the 20th century, according to which the unopened mummy wrappings of Akhnaton read \”Ekhnaton\”.
One thing Howard Carter was ahead of his time in was taking food samples from the grave to UCL University in London. The recent seed analyzes there have given new accurate information about food items: beans, lentils, melons, bread, Minna Silver says.
It is known from ancient times that Tutankhamun brought with him plenty of wine and mummified meat, including nine ducks and selected pieces of beef, but the usual twinkling fish are missing. Researchers have speculated that they were considered too ordinary food for the eternal journey.
Textile finds have also been analyzed in recent decades. The textiles were forgotten in the Cairo museum when Carter died in the late 1930s and did not have time to finish all his research. Unpreserved, the textiles were in poor condition.
– I don’t know if the methods of the time would have been able to open those blankets and see what kind of robes they had been, Silver thinks.
Robes and a faux leopard cape made at the Borås textile school and museum in Sweden are currently on display at the Carter exhibition at Stockholm’s Mediterranean Museum, says Minna Silver. The clerical cloak is cloth but embroidered to look like leopard fur, with a golden leopard or cougar head as a buckle.
– Faux leopard is not just the fur fashion of our time, Tutankhamun already had one, Silver laughs.
If Howard Carter was an archaeologist up to this day, then as a person he was also an adult of his time. Attitudes have changed in a hundred years so that one thing is certain: the labor force in excavations would be different now.
– Under no circumstances would child labor be used! The photos show that most of them were children then. Moni must have been from the nearby village of Kurna to buy tea for the family, thinks Minna Silver.
Colonialism was also in force, even though the British Empire was rapidly disintegrating. Egypt had declared independence a few months before the discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb.
Is the legacy of colonialism and orientalism still visible in interpretations of ancient Egypt? In Orientalism, the West viewed the \”exotic East\” from the point of view of difference, partly with admiration, partly with fear.
– Back then, the world was looked at with completely different glasses. When I was at the ASOR meeting last year, they were thinking about a new name for Egyptology. It also has a big ballast due to colonialism. Would the new name be, for example, Ancient studies of the Nile Valley? ponders Silver.
ASOR, The American Society of Overseas Research, is an organization founded in 1900 whose mission is to promote research and knowledge of the history and culture of the Middle East and the Mediterranean region. ASOR dropped the orientalism from its name some years ago.
The corresponding decision of the Faculty of Oriental Studies at the University of Oxford is quite recent: since August, the name has been the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies.
At the time of Carter and his partners, the established idea was that no high culture could have arisen in Africa. It hardly occurred to them that they were investigating just such a thing.
– I must say that I was a prisoner of that point of view throughout my youth: I did not understand that Tutankhamun was an African ruler! confesses Minna Silver.
Of course, he knew that Egypt was located in Africa, but in the studies, Egypt was separated into its own entity, which was emphasized as the source of Western culture, and Africa was not even mentioned. The great river valleys of Egypt were the source of our culture, says Silver.
Are such attitudes still alive? That Africanness is still not particularly publicized, Silver answers.
Tutankhamun is the most famous pharaoh because of his tomb. The robbers visited the first two chambers to loot their objects, but never reached the actual burial chamber. If the pharaohs were known in order of their achievements, who would be number one?
Tutankhamun’s father Ekhnaton, on the other hand, revolutionized the religion and culture of his country by switching from polytheism to worshiping only the god Aten.
– Tutankhamun had a bit of an extension, but then he returned to polytheism. However, Aton was still among the gods and probably very personal to Tutankhamun. On his mummy’s head is a helmet with the symbols of Aten.
Tutankhamun died as a teenager and it has been argued that he did not have time to have his own will and real power, especially since he was also considered physically weak and sickly.
Had there even been a murder? Eje had many motives, points out SIlver. Perhaps the research methods will develop so that Tutankhamun’s real cause of death can be found out.
In Minna Silver’s opinion, the gold and other objects in Tutankhamun’s tomb are not the only reason that the young man who lived long ago still fascinates people.
Perhaps also in the case of Tutankhamun, his young age makes him think about what he would have done if he had been allowed to live another 30 years, for example. Minna Silver laughs that as a representative of science, she is reluctant to speculate, but agrees anyway.
– We have perhaps had the wrong kind of glasses in that Tutankhamun has been thought of as a puppet ruler. I don’t believe that. Yes, he had his own will.
According to Silver, Tutankhamun seems to have identified with and idolized his grandfather, Amenhotep III.
– If you ask what kind of ruler Tutankhamun would have been 30 years from now, he would probably have done many of the same types of things as his grandfather.
Amenhoptep III’s Egypt was a great power that lived a great period of peace. During Akhenaten’s time, territories in northern Syria began to be lost, but Tutankhamun was still the ruler of the empire.
– I had completely missed that too! The school map only had Egypt!
Silver says that he wanted to bring out in his book that Nubia, Syria and Palestine were also under Tutankhamun.
– I myself have dug in Jerusalem, and even there no one ever said that \”hey, Tutankhamun was a ruler here too\”.
The world of Tutankhamun and his contemporaries was even bigger. Trade routes led from Egypt to the Baltic Sea. In a grave found in Denmark, there is complete proof of it confirmed by natural scientific methods.
– The glass beads found in the tomb were made in the same Egyptian workshop that also had glass objects in Tutankhamun’s tomb, says Minna Silver.
If more money were spent on elemental analyzes of archaeological finds, then who knows what kind of connections would still emerge between Tutankhamun’s Egypt and the roots of the bottom.