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explores the mysterious deaths and misfortunes that befell members of the expedition that discovered the tomb of King Tutankhamen in 1922.
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00:00A play was written many years ago in memory of a long-dead Egyptian king.
00:06Two young women were chosen to play the leading roles.
00:12The play was the whim of an American writer who thought to poke fun at ancient Egyptian superstition.
00:22Legend had it that the priests of Egypt cursed their dead king to wander aimlessly through eternity.
00:28They did this by forbidding anyone to speak his name.
00:34We call out the name Akhenaten.
00:38That night, both women had eerie dreams about the cursed king Akhenaten.
00:43One, that she was struck across the face.
00:46In the morning, she was nearly blind.
00:50Coincidence? Or was there another force involved?
00:53A curse working its evil way after nearly 4,000 years.
00:58A curse to upon someone in-anor
01:13A curse of a curse.
01:17A curse of a curse.
01:18The priests of Egypt had enormous power.
01:32Not even the Pharaoh was immune from their vengeance.
01:34This series presents information based in part on theory and conjecture.
01:49The producer's purpose is to suggest some possible explanation,
01:53but not necessarily the only ones, to the mysteries we will examine.
01:57Egypt. It was already a great nation 3,000 years before Christ was born.
02:09Its kings built enormous monuments during their lifetimes.
02:14By the 20th century, 33 royal tombs had been excavated in the Valley of the Kings.
02:20The most exciting discovery, however, was still to come.
02:23It would be the culmination of a sequence of events that began, not in Egypt,
02:28but in the green fields of England.
02:33The Berkshire Downs.
02:37High Clear Castle is the ancestral home of the Earls of Carnarvon.
02:41The lord who presided here in the first quarter of this century would help make history.
02:46It would cost him dearly, however.
02:48The earl did not leave the comfort of his castle
02:54and embark on the adventurer's trail by choice.
02:58A curious chain of events compelled him to go to Egypt.
03:03The present Lord Carnarvon remembers very well how it began.
03:06First of all, my father had a serious accident in Germany, a motor accident,
03:14and he was rather badly injured.
03:17He also suffered from rather weak lungs.
03:20So his doctors said to him,
03:22doesn't matter where you go,
03:24but you must go to a dry, warm climate every year from now on in the winter months.
03:30So Papa said to himself,
03:32well, that's a fine kettle of fish.
03:33He liked shooting and everything else.
03:35So he decided that he'd go off in the shooting season by the beginning of February,
03:39and he went to Egypt.
03:44The rhythm of life along the Nile was a radical change for the earl.
03:48After he'd been there a few months,
03:53Lord Comer was sent for him and said,
03:55my dear Porchy, he said,
03:57if you're coming out here regularly,
03:59you're going to be so bored you won't know what to do with yourself.
04:03So may I make a suggestion?
04:04Yes, indeed, I'd be honoured if you'd tell me what to do.
04:07Right, he said.
04:08Why don't you take up as a hobby Egyptology?
04:11He said, it's very interesting.
04:12And what's more, he said,
04:14it happens that at this moment of time,
04:16I've got the very fella who will help you best.
04:20He happens to be an awfully nice young man called Howard Carter.
04:25Howard Carter was an intense, driven man.
04:30After 15 years with the British Civil Service in Egypt,
04:33he'd been fired for refusing to apologize to a superior.
04:38Carter stayed on in Egypt because he had a dream.
04:42By the time Lord Carnarvon returned to England,
04:44he'd agreed to bankroll that dream.
04:49Fifteen years after the bargain was struck,
04:52Carter still labored in the Valley of the Kings.
04:55His dream?
04:56To find the tomb of King Tutankhamen.
05:00Professional archaeologists thought the valley had been picked clean years before.
05:05Carter disagreed.
05:07The search was exasperating.
05:10Carnarvon was threatening to cut the money off
05:12when in November 1922,
05:15Carter unearthed the staircase.
05:17At the bottom,
05:19a door with royal seals intact.
05:23The door had been sealed more than 3,000 years before.
05:28Carter couldn't be sure he'd found Tutankhamen's tomb.
05:31But whatever lay behind the door
05:33was bound to make his years of toil worthwhile.
05:36And at that moment,
05:39he got to the stage where he was able to see
05:42that there really was
05:44the jackpot,
05:47the hopes that they'd worked for all those years.
05:50They uncovered the steps,
05:52the first steps.
05:54And at that stage,
05:55he thought the only thing to do
05:56is to quickly cable to my father,
06:00tell him to come out,
06:01which he did.
06:02Carter waited patiently for Carnarvon's arrival.
06:05Together,
06:07they breached the door.
06:12Can you see anything?
06:14Carnarvon asked.
06:15Then,
06:17slowly,
06:17the answer.
06:19Yes.
06:20Wonderful things.
06:24Wonderful indeed.
06:27Carter's vision
06:27and Carnarvon's patience
06:29had paid off.
06:30Beyond treasure,
06:31there was the undisturbed body
06:33of a long-dead king,
06:35the resting place of Tutankhamen,
06:38Pharaoh of Egypt.
06:40At last,
06:41Carter was face to face with his dream.
06:47Around Tutankhamen's neck,
06:49a magnificent gold collar.
06:54Carter recognized it
06:55as the vulture goddess,
06:56Necbeth,
06:57a warning to intruders.
07:02There were reports
07:04of another warning
07:04on a tablet
07:05that has since vanished.
07:07Death will slay with his wings
07:09whoever disturbs
07:10the rest of the Pharaoh.
07:12There was little time
07:22to worry about curses.
07:24Ahead lay the enormous task
07:25of cataloging the treasure.
07:29Carter and Carnarvon
07:30were apparently
07:31not the first
07:32to enter the tomb
07:33after it was sealed.
07:34There was evidence
07:35that someone
07:36had rummaged around,
07:37then fled.
07:39Perhaps ancient tomb robbers
07:41frightened by the curse.
07:45Carter gathered up
07:46the great treasure
07:47thieves had abandoned,
07:49evidence that Tutankhamen
07:51reigned in the glory days
07:52of Egypt's past.
07:57He ruled from about
07:581334 to 1325 B.C.
08:03Tutankhamen was nine
08:04when he became Pharaoh,
08:06not yet 20
08:07when he died.
08:11In those days,
08:13Egypt exacted tribute
08:14from Asiatic princes
08:15and carried on
08:17an active trade
08:17with the Mediterranean
08:18kingdom of Manoa.
08:21Word of the discovery
08:22of Tutankhamen's treasure
08:24spread quickly.
08:26Tourists were becoming
08:27a problem.
08:30Lord Carnarvon
08:31returned to Cairo
08:32with part of the treasure.
08:34He had no way
08:35of knowing it,
08:36but he would never
08:36see England again.
08:38fever brought on
08:42by an infected
08:43mosquito bite
08:44ravaged the earl's body.
08:46When I arrived,
08:48there was my father,
08:49pulse beating in his throat.
08:51You could see
08:51he,
08:52very bloodshot eyes,
08:54obviously,
08:55frightfully feverish in your,
08:57so I say to the nurse,
08:59whatever happens,
09:01for heaven's sake,
09:02call me.
09:02The young Carnarvon
09:05went to his own room
09:06as his father fought
09:07what was to be
09:08the last battle
09:09of his life.
09:10Oh.
09:10Oh.
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09:34Shoros fate.
09:35About five to two,
09:37the good lady is shaking me awake,
09:40and she said,
09:41your father's drawn his last breath,
09:44please come quickly.
09:53Something was wrong with the lights,
09:55and young Carnarvon needed a flashlight
09:57to find his way to the earl's bedside.
10:02Officially, the cause of Carnarvon's death would be pneumonia.
10:18The Egyptian press had another explanation.
10:21Your father disturbed the remains of King Tutankhamen.
10:32He took his revenge, and he was responsible for the whole of the lights in Cairo going out at exactly the moment he died.
10:51Lord Carnarvon was only the first of many who would die shortly after visiting the tomb of Tutankhamen.
11:02The discovery of Tutankhamen's tomb was a great event, but the sudden and mysterious death of Lord Carnarvon had cast a pall on the celebration.
11:13Carnarvon's grieving son returned to England, only to find new evidence that his father might have unleashed some malevolent force, which cost him his life.
11:22Already, the popular press was proclaiming Lord Carnarvon's death to be the revenge of the mummy.
11:30His son took refuge behind the walls of High Clear Castle.
11:35The memory of that awful night in Cairo would not so easily be shaken.
11:39I had a little fox terrier bitch called Susie.
11:45And when I got back, the old-fashioned housekeeper, Mrs. McClain, said to me,
11:51I've something to tell you, my lord, really extraordinarily happening.
11:56At five minutes to four, and as you know, Cairo time is two hours.
12:01I swear to you out in front of Cairo, she said,
12:05Susie sat up on her hind legs.
12:09Her mouth was covered in foam.
12:12She let out a howl like a wolf and fell back dead.
12:19Something of a panic set in.
12:21Collectors rushed to get rid of whatever Egyptian relics they possessed.
12:24Howard Carter's assistant, Richard Bethel, died suddenly of a circulatory collapse.
12:32Bethel's father, Lord Westbury, committed suicide.
12:37The chief Egyptologist at both Paris' Louvre and New York's Metropolitan Museum died
12:42shortly after visiting the tomb.
12:45American financier Jay Gould took ill and died
12:48within days of seeing Tutankhamen's final resting place.
12:52To date, 22 deaths have been associated with the curse.
13:04Oxford University became the center for an exhaustive study of the relics removed from Tutankhamen's tomb
13:10and for an investigation of the curse many now believed was real.
13:15Oxford's Ashmolean Museum is still one of the richest repositories of Egyptian antiquities.
13:26Historian Henry Lincoln is a frequent visitor.
13:28It's very easy with our 20th century sceptical materialistic minds
13:33to dismiss the curse of the pharaohs as absolute rubbish.
13:39Well, it is just that, absolute rubbish.
13:43Death to anyone who enters this tomb is a pretty fierce curse to somebody with a superstitious mind.
13:50But it's just a threat, a pretty ineffectual one of that.
13:53And we all know that the curse of the pharaohs was concocted by the popular press
14:00because Lord Carnarvon had sold the rights to the discovery of Tutankhamen's tomb to the Times
14:05and the other papers wanted something sensational to write about.
14:09But to the Egyptians, a curse wasn't rubbish.
14:15Tutankhamen figured largely in the thinking about the curse.
14:19And it was Tutankhamen's father-in-law who, in fact, was cursed to wander in all eternity
14:27by the priests of Amon.
14:30The ram's head god, Amon-Ra, was dominant in Egypt before the reign of Akhenaten.
14:36Akhenaten introduced the practice of sun worship, symbolized by a new god, Atun.
14:42The priests of Amon were stripped of their power.
14:48Under this new religion, only the pharaoh could commune directly with Atun.
14:54The temples of Amon were defaced, but the priests bided their time.
14:59The old religion and the old ways went underground.
15:03Egypt's peasants apparently also maintained their loyalty to Amon.
15:07Akhenaten died in the 17th year of his reign.
15:13His tomb has never been found.
15:15Even as the young Tutankhamen was ascending the throne,
15:18the priests of Amon moved to regain their power.
15:23Akhenaten's name was eradicated from great monuments.
15:26His likenesses destroyed.
15:28There was an American artist, Joseph Lyndon Smith,
15:33working in the tombs, taking copies of the wall paintings
15:35at the time that Tutankhamen's tomb was discovered.
15:39He felt it would be a good thing to intercede with the gods on behalf of Akhenaten
15:43and to lift the curse of Amon-Ra
15:46so that the pharaoh was no longer condemned to wander forever in eternity.
15:51He was going to do this by putting on a play.
15:54The ruler is born like the actor
16:02and will endure for eternity
16:05if only we speak his name.
16:10We call out the name Akhenaten.
16:13Akhenaten.
16:17Akhenaten.
16:18Akhenaten.
16:21Akhenaten.
16:22Akhenaten.
16:24Akhenaten.
16:26Akhenaten.
16:27Akhenaten.
16:29Akhenaten.
16:29We call out the name Akhenaten.
16:35At the final dress rehearsal, something unheard of happened.
16:40At the moment when Akhenaten's own prayer was being spoken,
16:44a colossal hailstorm began.
16:47To the Egyptian helpers who were there for the play,
16:50it was as if the gods were throwing stones at them.
16:54The rehearsal had to be abandoned.
16:57The two women who were playing Akhenaten and his mother,
17:01both that night had the same dream.
17:04Each dreamt that she was standing in a temple dedicated to Amon-Ra.
17:07And the statue of the god came to life and struck them.
17:14But for each woman, there was one small difference in the dream.
17:17One of the women was struck across the stomach
17:19and the other across the face.
17:22Within 48 hours,
17:24the one who had been struck across the body
17:26was having a serious abdominal operation.
17:29And the one who had been struck across the face
17:31had the most vigilant case of trachoma ever seen in a European.
17:36She almost lost her sight.
17:38Everybody associated with that little play
17:41within that period of 48 hours
17:44had been struck down by some minor illness or other.
17:49Was that the curse of the priests of Amon
17:53still working after all those thousands of years?
17:58A new chapter to the mystery of the mummy's curse
18:09opened in 1976 at the Paris airport.
18:13The occasion was an eerie state visit.
18:16The mummy of King Ramses was arriving with pomp and circumstance due a chief of state.
18:21Something terrible was happening to the mummy and Egypt wanted France to help.
18:28The mummy was taken to the Museum of Man in Paris.
18:32In a sealed laboratory, Egyptologists gathered.
18:35The Ramesses mummy was among the most perfectly preserved
18:39of all those found in the Valley of the Kings.
18:42Now it was beginning to deteriorate rapidly.
18:46The Egyptians wanted to know if Ramesses could be saved.
18:49Tutankhamen's mummy had been ravished by the time of its discovery.
18:58Some theorize the priests of Amon deliberately thwarted the embalming procedure.
19:03There has been no public announcement to date about what the French experts found
19:08when they unwrapped the body of Ramesses.
19:15The speculation has been that a dangerous bacteria,
19:18perhaps dormant for thousands of years,
19:21is now alive and at work on the mummy.
19:26Egypt's priests knew something of biology.
19:29Perhaps they knew more than modern men imagine.
19:33In the tomb of Tutankhamen were many wonderful vessels of gold and alabaster.
19:39They were apparently designed to hold precious liquids and rare unguents.
19:44If they contained something else, something lethal,
19:48the secret died with the last priest of Amon-Ra.
19:551977 affords millions of Americans the opportunity to see Tutankhamen's treasures.
20:00They are on special loan from the Egyptian government
20:04and will tour museums in Washington, D.C.,
20:07Chicago, New Orleans, Los Angeles, Seattle, and New York.
20:13Fifty-five works of art from what many consider the greatest archaeological find in history.
20:18Time has eroded much of the mystery and awe which gripped discoverers Carter and Carnarvon.
20:25The curse is probably rubbish after all.
20:31Perhaps the priests of Amon-Ra tasted enough vengeance
20:34with the deaths of Lord Carnarvon and some of his close associates.
20:38After all, Howard Carter lived out a long and happy life
20:42and he was the first to break the seals on Tutankhamen's tomb.
20:47If the priests of Amon sought to obliterate the memory of Akhenaten and his heir Tutankhamen,
20:53they failed.
20:55Their names have been rediscovered and spoken again and again.
20:58To a pharaoh, that was assurance of immortality.
21:06Life, symbolized by the Ankh.
21:11Earrings, probably worn by Tutankhamen as a young boy.
21:14The wooden figures are likenesses of favorite slaves,
21:21servants for the pharaoh in the afterlife.
21:28Other figures guarded the young king's tomb
21:31for the 3,000 years he was forgotten.
21:33If we believe the curse,
21:47we must believe something else.
21:50We must believe that in the end,
21:52Tutankhamen triumphed over the priests of Amon.
21:55We must believe that in the end,
22:25of the
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