Egypt says King Tut's tomb may have hidden chambers

[Omaha Steve]

Source: AP

By MARAM MAZEN

LUXOR, Egypt (AP) — King Tut's tomb may contain hidden chambers, Egypt's antiquities minister said Tuesday, lending support to a new theory that a queen may be buried in the walls of the 3,300 year-old pharaonic mausoleum.

While touring the burial sites of Tutankhamun and other pharaohs in the famed Valley of the Kings, Minister Mamdouh el-Damaty said he will seek final approval for the radar inspection of the tomb.

El-Damaty was visiting Luxor with British Egyptologist Nicholas Reeves, who recently theorized that Tutankhamun, popularly known as King Tut, who died at the age of 19, may have been rushed into an outer chamber of what was originally the tomb of Queen Nefertiti.

He said high-resolution images of what is known as King Tut's tomb "revealed several very interesting features which look not at all natural, features like very, very straight lines which are 90 degrees to the ground, positioned so as to correspond with other features within the tomb."

FULL story and more photos at link.


Carvings are seen on a wall at the Horemheb tomb in the Valley of the Kings in Luxor, Egypt, Tuesday, Sept. 29, 2015. Egypt's antiquities minister said King Tut's tomb may contain hidden chambers, lending support to a British Egyptologist's theory that a queen may be buried in the walls of the 3,300 year-old pharaonic mausoleum. (AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty)

Read more: http://bigstory.ap.org/article/1407cbe6da9f4b0dacced3b6d8cc2b45/egypt-says-king-tuts-tomb-may-have-hidden-chambers

[murielm99]

1. Oh, I love stories like this!

[restorefreedom]

2. i love all things tut and ancient egypt

thanks steve!

[Omaha Steve]

5. Marta has a couple shelves full of books, video, and a few replicas

I used to have a great Tut shirt. But as I aged it shrank.

I got her this poster in the 70's. We had kids and couldn't afford to make the trip.

http://interactive.wttw.com/remembering-chicago/tutmania-field-museum

[restorefreedom]

6. yeah. laundry has a life of its own, hey?

maybe one day a traveling exhibit will go through your area. i will keep my fingers crossed. i tried to get to one some years ago but it didn't happen

[merrily]

3. All I wanted to know is how paint lasted that long. Not to mention the tombs themselves.

I am a firm union supporter but building trades are just not what they used to be.

[oneshooter]

12. Dry air and a sealed chamber.. n/t

[merrily]

17. Well, dry air yes. But, we've had tourists visiting -- and lighting torches and matches in small

quarters and breathing for almost a century. I've never had a paint job look decent for a century.

[Nihil]

18. The former is the most important.

I was stunned at the clarity of the painting not just in the tombs (all sealed up
for long periods) but also the temples, as long as the surface is protected from
the (very occasional) rain - and the generations of various vandals of course!

They look better after a couple of millenia than most modern buildings do after
a couple of decades.

[bklyncowgirl]

14. For what it's worth the tomb workers were well payed.

They also had family and medical leave, health care, state supplied housing and were known to go out on strike when their pay was not forthcoming.

[Dont call me Shirley]

4. Cool! I saw the King Tut exhibit at the NY MMOA. Maybe someday the pyramids in Egypt.

[calikid]

15. I saw the exibit in the LA area,

I'd forgotten all about it
Thank you Steve

[BumRushDaShow]

7. Interesting

if she is there given his dad Amenhotep IV (a/k/a Akhenaten) was basically being wiped from the history (and had settled away from the traditional Luxor area). Tut pre-deceased her but he had moved the operations back to Luxor.

Was fortunate to travel to Egypt (from Cairo to Abu Simbal and major spots in between including Luxor and Aswan) and saw a number tombs in both the Valley of the Kings and Valley of the Queens. Tut's tomb was closed for renovation when I was there (over 20+ years ago) but they had just opened the Tut Wing at the Cairo Museum so all the stuff that toured here in the U.S. plus cases and cases and rooms and more rooms packed to the rafters, had been included in that section.

[melm00se]

8. I'd've thought that archeologists

would have used ground penetrating radar or some other similar technology to explore tombs for things like this.

[PosterChild]

16. Seems like the next step..

"Minister Mamdouh el-Damaty said he will seek final approval for the radar inspection of the tomb"

I think they are very careful about review and consideration of each step forward .

[packman]

9. Remember standing in a 4 hr. line in Wash. D.C

to see the travelling King Tut exhibit with my two kids, age 7 and 5. They were not impressed, but I was. Rather amazing what you can do and justify as "enrichment" and impose on your children. In other words, I wanted to see it, but dragged the kids along.

[LibertyLover]

10. I've been to KV 62 (number of Tutankhamon's tomb in the Valley of the Kings)

twice as well as the Cairo Museum a couple of times to see its contents, and did the various Amarna/Tutankhamon exhibits in NY, DC, Philadelphia, Detroit, Brooklyn and Chicago. It will be interesting to see if this story has legs, as the saying goes. Honestly, it shouldn't take too much to run a ground penetrating radar rig over the area adjacent to KV 62 to see if there are voids. However, it's Egypt, the Valley of the Kings and a Western archaeologist's theory, so I don't expect anything to happen quickly, if at all.

[sinkingfeeling]

11. Visited the tomb in 2012. And of course the Cairo Museum. Wish I could have stayed about 3 months.

[bklyncowgirl]

13. They're calling this theory Tutfertiti.

If there is a secret chamber. At least as far as treasure goes it is probably going to be a bust, Al CaponesVault c1300 BC. but even broken potsherds and construction debris could hold important clues as to what happened after the much hated Alhenaton's death. One big problem is that there are ancient murals right where the door is supposed to be. They're going to have to figure out a work around.

Needless to say it would be exciting if Nefertiti or one of the other short lived rulers between Alhenaton and Tut was buried there.