Lucy's Bones, Sacred Stones, & Einstein's Brain

by Harvey Rachlin

  Howard Carter, who had long been interested in King Tutankhamen, questioned Davis’s claim. Few archaeologists of the day were more qualified than Carter to take such a position and—as it turned out—to undertake a painstaking search to find Tut’s royal subterranean graveyard.

  Born in Norfolk, England, in 1873, Carter received his initiation into archaeology at an early age. When he was seventeen, he worked in Egypt as a draftsman for the Archaeological Survey of Egypt. The next year, he trained in excavating under the renowned archaeologist Flinders Petrie. By the time he was thirty, Carter had a command of the Arabic language and had excavated extensively in Egypt. His career came to an abrupt halt in the early 1900s, however, when, as an inspector in the Egyptian government’s antiquities department, he became embroiled in an altercation involving some belligerent tourists and, believing he had acted properly, refused to render an apology. Carter was fired from his job and slunk into early retirement.

  At about the same time that Carter’s professional career in archaeology was coming to an end, an aristocratic Englishman’s interest in the subject was starting to blossom. Respiratory problems forced Lord Carnarvon, born George Edward Stanhope Molyneux Herbert, son of the fourth earl of Carnarvon, to seek refuge from England’s harsh winters in a more salubrious climate, and for that he chose Egypt. There he developed an interest in archaeology that bloomed into a full passion for digging for and collecting Egyptian antiquities. Lord Carnarvon was but an amateur in excavating, however, and if he was going to take his interest seriously, he needed the help of a professional. A friend suggested he solicit Howard Carter, and in 1907 the two joined forces, Lord Carnarvon providing the money, Carter the expertise.

  The collaboration resulted in the discoveries of many tombs, including that of King Amenophis I. Three years after the two began working together, the concession rights to the Valley of the Kings passed to Lord Carnarvon and Howard Carter.

  Although Theodore Davis asserted that the valley had been emptied, Carter thought otherwise. The cramped pit that Davis uncovered would have been an unfit sepulchre for an Egyptian pharaoh, and having explored the area, Carter believed there were sections that had escaped thorough investigation.

  Although King Tutankhamen came into power at a very young age, he did indeed preside over a nation as a ruler in the Eighteenth Dynasty of Pharaohs. He became pharaoh by familial succession, through his marriage to the third daughter of King Akhenaton. After the king died in 1362 B.C., Tutankhaton, as he was known as a prince, succeeded him. The new king and queen were both about nine or ten years old. Tutankhamen ruled unremarkably until his death, nine years later, at the age of eighteen (he reigned from 1361 to 1352 B.C.) and would have been to modern society an obscure pharaoh but for two factors: his tomb, though pillaged shortly after his death, escaped wholesale liquidation by later plunderers; and Howard Carter, in the twentieth century, held to the belief that Tut’s tomb lay undiscovered.

  Carter was convinced that the Valley of the Kings, near Luxor, must indeed be the burial site of King Tut, since a nest of shattered pottery and linen found there that had been dismissed by Davis was later found to bear Tutankhamen’s name. Believing that the burial chambers of King Tut lay around the middle of the valley, Carter began planning his excavation, only to be interrupted by World War I.

  Howard Carter, left, and A.C. Mace at the closed entrance to Tutankhamen's burial chamber.

  Digging began after the war but bore no fruit after six seasons. Carter felt work should continue as long as there was land that remained unexcavated. “It is true that you may find less in more time in The Valley than in any other site in Egypt,” he wrote in The Tomb of Tut-Ankh-Amen, his account of the search co-written with A. C. Mace, “but, on the other hand, if a lucky strike be made, you will be repaid for years and years of dull and unprofitable work.” Although he continued excavating, coming up empty after six seasons had left him depressed and discouraged. “We had almost made up our minds that we were beaten, and were preparing to leave The Valley and try our luck elsewhere; and then—hardly had we set hoe to ground in our last despairing effort than we made a discovery that far exceeded our wildest dreams.”

  The digging had halted the previous season by the northeast corner of Ramses VI’s tomb. This time Carter directed his men to excavate south. The area they would come upon, Carter recalled, had ancient huts; these were typically used by a pharaoh’s laborers when building a tomb and could mean a tomb was nearby.

  On the morning of November 4, 1922, Carter reported to the excavation site. He was immediately struck by the silence. Where were the clamoring of hammers and the chattering of human voices? Carter was told that the workmen had ceased activity earlier when a step cut had been discovered beneath an ancient hut. Further digging revealed a stairway and, as the thrilling possibilities ran through the minds of all present, a large corridor was found to lead to a sealed doorway. Carter bored a hole through the door, put in a flare, and observed stones piled ceiling-high. This subterranean necropolis was chaste!

  Carter summoned Lord Carnarvon in England to join him for the entering of what appeared to be Tut’s royal tomb. As he waited a fortnight for his arrival, word about the possibility spread, and soon people’s attention everywhere was fixed on the Valley of the Kings.

  After Carnarvon arrived in Egypt, workmen began clearing the stones beyond the sealed door. They cleared a passageway and, on the afternoon of the twenty-sixth of November 1922, found another sealed door. Royal cachets on this door revealed it was indeed the tomb of Tutankhamen. What lay beyond the door? With Carnarvon, Carnarvon’s daughter, and workmen behind him, Carter, shaking with excitement, made a hole. Then he introduced a light into the blackness. Let Carter tell you what he saw: “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.” Carter and the others became the first human beings in three thousand years to enter King Tutankhamen’s royal gallery, uncovering the richest archaeological find in modern history.

  The posthumous symbol of the ancient Egyptian boy-king.

  Over the next few months, they found priceless ancient treasures. But they were also reluctant to violate sacred rooms that had seen no living human for three millennia. Those present have recorded their palpable sense of fear in passing through the sealed door to the burial room, which reached its highest pitch as they raised the lid of King Tut’s sarcophagus.

  The searchers found Tutankhamen’s mummy (which is still in his tomb in the Valley of the Kings at Luxor) and the mummies of two babies (Museum of the Faculty of Medicine, Cairo University). Carter also found fruit, grains, and honey in the tomb.

  Much of ancient Egyptian life was based on superstition and idol worship; the society was organized around the constant need to placate Egypt’s fierce and wrathful gods. But after the exhumation of King Tut’s tomb, a sequence of tragic occurrences caused many to wonder if those gods had been disturbed.

  Only five months after the discovery, Lord Carnarvon, patron of the expedition, had a bitter argument with Carter over the disposition of the chamber’s treasures. Carter demanded that they become possessions of the Egyptian government. Lord Carnarvon, insisting that they be moved to England, was then bitten on the cheek by a mosquito and died in Cairo from the resulting infection. (An autopsy performed later on the mummy revealed a similar insect bite in the same area of Tut’s face.) Two strange phenomena were observed at the precise moment of Carnarvon’s death: the lights in Cairo suddenly and inexplicably went dark, and Carnarvon’s dog, back in England, had a howling fit and expired for no apparent reason.

  A string of deaths ensued. A specialist in Egyptian antiquities in Paris who had inventoried the burial treasure suddenly died, then Carter’s literary collaborator on the expedition, A. C. Mace of the Metropolitan Museum of Art
in New York City. More inexplicable deaths of people connected to the expedition followed, as well as suicides and an assassination. The number of fatalities eventually surpassed two dozen.

  Was the mummy cursed? To many, such a theory is preposterous. Sensationalized press reports and the public’s thirst for incredible and gruesome events are cited as the reasons for the propagation of tales of the mummy’s curse.* Yet while the sequence of calamitous events surely seems uncanny to a reasonable mind, it must be considered that many of the protagonists and minor players did live out normal lives; Carter himself lived to the age of sixty-five.

  Indeed, the fantastic notion of a curse should not supplant the incredible fact that an abundant treasure reposed intact and undisturbed through the ages in a sculpted subterranean time capsule as all history marched on, as civilizations took root, as wars were unleashed, as the course of human events in its plenary dramas unfolded. For today we have not just the personal possessions of an ancient forebear but the imposing, magnificent royal cache of a king who led a nation more than thirty-three hundred years ago—before Moses delivered the Israelites from Egyptian bondage and took them to the Promised Land, before David became the king of the united Hebrew nation of Judah and Israel, and long before the birth of Christ and the start of the common era.

  LOCATION: Egyptian Museum, Cairo, Egypt.

  Footnote

  *In September 1993 an Italian medical investigator named Nicola De Paola announced that a poisonous microscopic fungus, whose germination in sealed ancient tombs is enabled by moisture and air that seep through narrow cracks of stone, may be responsible for the fatalities of those who mysteriously died after entering King Tutankhamen’s tomb or coming into contact with mummies or other objects from it. But given the quantity of deaths ascribed to Tut’s curse, as well as the decades that have passed since the victims’ interments and the geographic diversity of their graves, conclusive proof that the fungus killed all the victims is unlikely.

  THE BLACK OBELISK

  DATE: Circa 827 B.C.

  WHAT IT IS: A magnificent biographical monument depicting battles and other events during the reign of Shalmaneser III, king of Assyria from 858 to 824 B.C. The structure adds credence to the Bible with its mention of Jehu, the Israelite king who is written about in 1 and 2 Kings of the Old Testament.

  WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE: The four-sided obelisk is made of black limestone and measures almost 7 feet in length. There are 190 lines of cuneiform text, and on each side, five rows of relief sculptures (twenty panels in all).

  The wrath of God was about to be unleashed.

  According to biblical tradition, it was the middle of the ninth century B.C. in the kingdom of Israel, and sacrilege was rampant among the people. Jezebel, the wife of King Ahab, had introduced worship of the pagan god Baal during her husband’s reign. The children of Israel had destroyed their altars, slain by sword all the prophets of the Lord (save the one hundred who had been hidden in the caves), and forsaken their covenant with the Lord.

  Around 842 B.C., Elisha the prophet instructed a young student* prophet to journey to Ramoth Gilead, find an army captain named Jehu, and anoint him king of Israel. The young man went and anointed Jehu, telling him the Lord had ordered him to strike the house of his master, Ahab, and avenge the blood of all the servants of the Lord slaughtered at the hands of Jezebel (2 Kings 9:7). Jehu told his men of the Lord’s decree, and they immediately declared him king.

  In the city of Jezreel, Joram, Ahab and Jezebel’s son who had inherited the crown of Israel, was convalescing from wounds received in battle with the Aramaeans. Ahaziah, the king of Judah, was visiting with him. A tower watchman spotted Jehu’s company of soldiers outside the city and alerted Joram, who sent a messenger to inquire if Jehu came in peace. When the messenger didn’t return, Joram dispatched yet another, who also never returned. And so Joram and Ahaziah prepared their chariots and rode out to confront Jehu. When Joram asked if his mission was peaceful, Jehu responded that there could be no peace as long as the harlotries and witchcrafts of Joram’s mother, Jezebel, were so bountiful.

  Joram proclaimed to Ahaziah that this was treachery and dashed off in his chariot, but Jehu aimed his bow at him and shot with such force that the arrow went through his heart and came out the other side of his body. Jehu ordered his captain to cast Joram’s corpse onto the field of Naboth. Naboth was an Israelite who refused to sell his vineyard to Ahab. In response Jezebel had spread lies that Naboth was sacrilegious, and he was killed. When Ahaziah saw Joram’s remains on the field, he too tried to flee in his chariot but was shot by Jehu’s men and later died at Megiddo. There was still more vengeance for the new king of Israel to take.

  Jehu entered Jezreel and sought out Jezebel, whom he found at her window with her eyes painted and her head attired. Jezebel castigated Jehu for what he had done, but Jehu ignored her; he found several men in the royal residence who were on his side, and ordered them to throw Jezebel out the window. They did, and Jehu then rode his chariot over Jezebel, killing her. Before she could be buried, her corpse, in fulfillment of a prophecy, was eaten by dogs in the moat of Jezreel (1 Kings 21:23).

  Jehu finished his commission from the Lord by slaughtering Ahab’s seventy remaining sons, as well as all the friends and priests and wise men of the house of Ahab, whereupon he established himself as ruler. As a reward for having carried out what was right in the Lord’s eyes, the Lord promised Jehu a dynasty of four generations. But in ruling Israel, Jehu never put a stop to the sacrilegious practices introduced by Jeroboam, the founder of the kingdom of Israel, and the people continued to sin.

  Jehu’s kingdom was threatened by the Aramaeans, neighbors in Damascus, so he obtained protection from the Assyrians, led by Shalmaneser III, by paying heavy tribute. Along with other events occurring during Shalmaneser III’s reign, Jehu’s obeisance was inscribed on a magnificent monument, which over the course of time became buried and lost.

  Late October 1845, Mosul, Ottoman Empire (later part of modern Iraq). Having departed Constantinople by steamer and traversing mountains on foot and valleys and plains on horseback, Austen Henry Layard, a twenty-eight-year-old French-born Englishman, arrived at this city on the west bank of the Tigris. Layard was trained to be a barrister but submitted to a keener penchant for traveling and exploring archaeological ruins. Inspired by the Assyrian discoveries of the Frenchman Paul Emile Botta at Khorsabad, Layard secured limited funds from British diplomat Sir Stratford Canning to carry on excavations at the site of Nimrud, which he had long desired to do. On earlier journeys he had seen huge mounds in the deserts that seemed to promise the remains of ancient civilizations somewhere within their depths. Arab inhabitants of the land reported that in digging foundations for their homes they had unearthed many of the kinds of objects that Europeans came to search for so passionately. Proper excavation could yield dramatic results.

  At that time the Ottoman Empire was in precipitous decline. Saved from conquest by Egypt some years earlier by a treaty prompted by international powers, the sultan embarked on a series of reforms. Yet deep within the empire, corruption among local officials was still viciously rampant, with marauding armies supplementing the terror the officials used to govern the people, or rather to extricate people’s property at their whim. Just two years earlier Beder Khan Bey at Tryari Province slaughtered ten thousand men, women, and children.

  At Mosul, Layard proffered letters of introduction from the British embassy at Constantinople to the governor, Mohammed Pasha, a disfigured tyrant who levied tariffs upon tribes of the territory to pay for the care of his teeth, decayed by the food he lowered himself to accept from them. It would have been dangerous for Layard to reveal the true nature of his mission; ostensibly he was there to hunt wild boars. The people were so terror-stricken by the pasha (the Turkish title for a governor) that the mere presence of a foreigner offered hope. But the pasha was cunning and mindful that a stranger could stir thoughts of rebellion within the souls of the discontented, an
d so in a test of their loyalty he feigned his own death. The pasha’s reported passing was naturally cause for celebration by the inhabitants, who were oblivious to the pasha’s moles around them. The pasha grinningly emerged in the broad light of day to the shock of the people and used the insult of their bliss over his reported passing to usurp property he somehow previously overlooked.

  Such was the climate of politics and the oppressed conditions of the territory in which Layard traveled. On November 8 Layard and a small party, armed with an arsenal of weapons, ventured on a raft down the Tigris for Nimrud. Several hours later the group arrived at Naifa, a small village. It was dark, with little sign of life, when Layard spotted a flicker of light emanating from a wretched hut. The party quietly walked over, and Layard observed through a split in a wall a turbaned Arab with three women whose heads were covered with black handkerchiefs, naked children, and a couple of dogs.

  When Layard introduced himself, the man, recognizing him as a European, was honest and forthright, telling him that the villagers, as a result of the pasha’s pillaging, had dispersed. Layard took a liking to the man, obviously of intelligence, and offered him a job gathering and supervising a crew of men for excavating. The man in turn entertained Layard with tales about the buried ruins; it was here, for example, that the prophet Abraham shattered the idols, and when the heathen Nimrod sought to kill him, Abraham prayed to God for protection and asked not for his deliverance by armies, the mightiest of which Nimrod could cut down, but by a tiny creature. So God sent a gnat to Nimrod, which entered his ear and ate away at his brain for four centuries while his servants beat drums to mitigate the excruciating pain.