Dig Days: The day of the foetuses By Zahi Hawass Even today, Tutankhamun remains a mystery. When I mention his name, excitement fills the air because the press is fascinated by him. I, myself, have been quite happy to undertake various projects regarding the Golden Boy. I will never forget when I arrived at the Valley of the Kings in order to move Tut's mummy from the sarcophagus to a display case for restoration. Reporters from around the world were waiting to see the Boy King. For the latest project, I went to the University of Cairo and met with my friend Ahmed Samen, dean of the Faculty of Medicine at Cairo University. Faculty members cooperated with the SCA to carry out a CT-scan and to examine, for the first time, the foetuses buried with King Tut. Many stories have surrounded these foetuses over the years. Fawzi Gaballa, who has been taking good care of them, considers them to be the king's babies. Before I met Samen, I investigated the story of their discovery. Howard Carter found the mummified foetuses buried in the tomb of King Tut. Douglas Derry, the anatomist working with Carter, was in charge of the study performed on the mummy of Tut when they opened the sarcophagus in November 1925. Carter's team discovered that the golden mask was fixed with resin to the face and chest of the king, and that about 15 different types of amulets had been inserted inside the mummy wrappings and placed on the outside. Derry and Carter took the mummy out of the tomb and placed it in the sun in the hope that the heat would melt the resin, but the mask never left the mummy. They then took the sarcophagus to the tomb of Seti II; their temporary laboratory. With the help of sharp, steaming hot tools, they removed the mask and the amulets. This operation damaged the mummy, and I believe that this is why Carter left Tut's mummy inside his tomb. It was the only identified mummy to be left behind in the valley. Carter, as the chief inspector of the West Bank at Luxor, transferred all the other known mummies from the valley to the Egyptian Museum. He also shipped two of Tut's golden coffins; the innermost coffin and the second outside coffin, to the Egyptian Museum and left behind the outer coffin above Tut's mummy in his tomb. We do not know exactly when the foetuses were transferred to the Faculty of Medicine, but it must have been after 1930. There are two foetuses; one was seven months old and the other five months. We are uncertain of their gender. I used to believe that they were not the children of King Tut and his queen Ankhesenamun, but rather that they were placed inside the tomb as symbols to represent the king's and queen's rebirth in the afterlife. When I visited my friend Samen, it was the first time that I had seen the foetuses. I was surprised at the poor state of preservation of the first one -- only bones and ashes remained. Fortunately, the second one was in better condition. The day of the investigation arrived. I took Ashraf Selim and his team as well as Yehia Zabara, a DNA specialist, with me to do the DNA tests and the CT-scans at the Faculty of Medicine. Most importantly, we had to guarantee the safety of the foetuses during their move to the CT- scanner in the university's radiology department, which was located about 200 metres away. I therefore also brought SCA experts who succeeded in moving the foetuses without damaging them. We put them under the CT-scanner and took DNA samples. This examination will prove the lineage of the foetuses, and whether or not they were the children of King Tut. If they were his children, then we will be able to identify their mother from among the unidentified mummies of KV 35 or from among the two female mummies found in KV 21. If we succeed, then we will be able to identify the mummy of Queen Nefertiti, the mother of King Tut's wife. The story behind the family members of King Tut will be very exciting to uncover for the first time. To discover if his father was Amenhotep III, also known as Akhenaten, will be a great achievement by the Egyptian Mummy Project.
