Originally published at: King Tut may have died in a drunk driving accident | Boing Boing
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Reading this, there’s literally no evidence that is offered that come to this conclusion other than:
“He was rich and loved wine”
and
“Those egyptians loved chariot racing.”
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Sigh. This is just wild speculation.
Tutankhamen’s body was in a shockingly poor state of preservation before the ‘autopsy’, in large part because a process of carbonisation triggered by the large amounts of unstable oils used in the unguents that were poured in litre quantities into the inner coffin before it was sealed. Most of his flesh was reduced to little more than charcoal; he’s probably the worst preserved of the verifiable New Kingdom pharaonic mummies.
The ‘autopsy’ was nothing of the sort - Tutankhamen’s body was dismantled to remove it from the coffin, no attempt was made at the time to ascertain the cause of death. Many of the supposed fractures and bone fragments that are used as ‘evidence’ in these hypotheses were almost certainly caused post-mortem, in many cases in the 20th Century.
Between the time Carter and his team first revealed the body, there was almost no protection for the mummy and it appears to have repeatedly been mistreated before the Egyptian authorities finally gave it some measure of care. Pieces of the mummy have clearly been lost between the 1920s and the current era.
Tutankhamen lived, married and died without an heir - those are the facts. How he died is almost immaterial.
It’s about ten years old, but I recommend reading The Shadow King: The Bizarre Afterlife of King Tut’s Mummy by Jo Marchant for a detailed yet accessible explanation of why the physical evidence we have today can no longer be trusted. It is a very sad read indeed.
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there’s a lot of things that we can’t answer.
That is all.
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This is about the quality that I expect from BBC science articles now. They are too scared of the Tories to actually do any real science reporting.
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That’s enough that Fast and Furious: 1300 BCE will be able to say it’s based on possibly real events though!
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It’s more that certain subjects guarantee clicks - they’d be ecstatic if they could link Tutankhamen to the Titanic by way of a T-Rex.
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I’ve steadfastly refused to watch any of those movies but you may have just convinced me. Cast Rami Malek and I’m all in.
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I’ve got a book that claims Tut was Jesus, so I think they’ll manage that somehow.
I thought it was more reality based than it was when I snagged it. Boy, was I wrong.
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Man, those horses must have been really drunk!
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King Tut may have died in a laser tag accident!
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As depicted in Hot Tut Time Machine. 
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Well, yeah. Those red dots and Bastet, you’re just ASKING for trouble
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occam’s razor, man. drunk teens have been having vehicle accidents for a long time. this checks out.
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Now, when I die
Don’t think I’m a nut
Don’t want no fancy funeral
Just one like ole king Tut
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But the headline said…
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“Would this ‘tragic accident’ be in any way connected to the vogue among bloggers and churnalists and hard-up-for-publicity researchers for playing CSI-Ancient Egypt with the death of Tutankhamun?” tigris surmised. “The endless re-hashing of X-rays and autopsies?”
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Thank-you! I knew I had seen a paper listing the various ‘theories’ put forward about Tutankhamen’s death.
They’re probably almost as numerous as the theories about the diseases and inherited conditions he supposedly suffered.
Which must rapidly be approaching the number of theories about his father.
Generally, the number of theories is inversely proportional to the quantity and quality of the evidence.
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