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00:06Egypt. Towering monuments. Mythic tombs. And fabled pharaohs.
00:20Much of today's fascination with ancient Egypt was ignited a century ago with the discovery of King Tutankhamen's tomb.
00:30It really set off the mass global phenomenon. This is a story that had everything. It was a discovery of
00:38treasure, it was gold, it was beautiful precious metal.
00:42Extraordinary discoveries that fired the public imagination.
00:46The reaction was unprecedented and phenomenal.
00:49It unfolded during a time of political upheaval. As Egypt pushed for independence. Sparking a race to control Egypt's story
01:02that has repercussions that still play out today.
01:06There was this push-off. We're not only reclaiming the land, we're reclaiming the heritage.
01:14Thousands of black and white photographs and reels of film survive from those transformative years.
01:22Now, advanced restoration and colourisation revive these rare images.
01:30Revealing the race for ancient Egypt like never before.
01:36These images speak to a moment in history when ancient Egypt becomes something that everybody wants a piece of.
01:57Here in the sands of Egypt, in Luxor and Giza, generations gazed in wonder upon the ancient structures.
02:06The pyramids, the pyramids, the Sphinx, Abu Simbel, and countless temples.
02:19Throughout the 19th century, foreign powers poured into Egypt, eager to uncover more of what this ancient civilisation had left
02:27behind.
02:28It was really Napoleon's invasion in 1798 that brought Egypt into the horizon of Europe.
02:36And that started 120 years of intense interest in ancient Egypt.
02:41Napoleon brought back a tonne of Egyptian artefacts and really initiated or ignited an interest in Egyptology.
02:50But by the early 20th century, while archaeologists were digging into Egypt's past,
02:56in Cairo, Egyptians were looking to their future.
03:01This is Tahrir Square in the centre of Cairo.
03:05It's synonymous with moments of change in Egypt and was at the epicentre of the 1919 revolution when Egyptians rose
03:14against colonial rule.
03:17For over four centuries, Egypt had been under foreign control.
03:22Under the Ottomans, the French and the British.
03:28But in 1919, Egyptians were fighting for their country and control over their own history.
03:37Just off Tahrir is the Egyptian museum, built while Egypt was under foreign control and run by the French.
03:46And even though it housed the most important pieces of Egyptian heritage, it still showed that the colonial powers were
03:53here.
04:00Without control of their country, Egyptians had little say over their ancient heritage.
04:06They didn't even decide who was allowed to dig.
04:10The Egyptian Antiquities Service, who regulated archaeological digs, had been run by the French since the 1850s.
04:20Egyptians could do little to stop treasures from leaving the country.
04:26It is really difficult to fathom how much material was coming out of Egypt.
04:33The British Museum is almost full of Egyptian stuff.
04:37The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Louvre, the Vatican Museums are full.
04:43Millions of pieces have sort of been dispersed into both public and private collections.
04:51Some we'll just never see again.
04:56Reflecting upon it from an archaeological perspective, these are like belongings that were taken out of context that have been
05:03lost now forever.
05:05So, in the early 20th century, when Egypt rose to reclaim its country, it also sought to reclaim its history.
05:17There was a sentiment of resentment to the foreign domination, the heritage, how it was governed, how it was even
05:25interpreted and how it was narrated,
05:27because there was no way for the Egyptians to contribute to these stories in ways that could give them some
05:32sort of right to claim this heritage as their own.
05:36From 1919 and into the 1920s, all of these factors, revolution, colonial power and spectacular discoveries intertwined,
05:47setting off a struggle over who would claim Egypt's ancient heritage.
06:15For a lot of antiquities in ancient Egypt, the things that we think of as the monuments were never lost.
06:21The pyramids were never lost. The pyramids were never lost. The Sphinx was never really lost. Karnak was never lost.
06:26But you have tombs, clearly, that are hidden.
06:30So there is a general suspicion among the Western arrivals that this ancient civilization has got lots more to reveal.
06:40And the most likely place to find a royal tomb was the Valley of the Kings at Luxor.
06:50The Valley of the Kings is the royal cemetery of the period of the New Kingdom.
06:56It's a time when it was ruled by pharaohs who were famous, lots of Amenhotep's, Thutmose's, Ramesses the Great, his
07:03father Seti the First.
07:06So this was a time of celebrity pharaohs, almost, who had great power, great wealth,
07:13and therefore enormous, lavishly decorated and appointed tombs.
07:19Archaeologists had a very clear idea of the names of the kings who reigned during that time.
07:25And so that list becomes like a checklist, not only of kings, but of tombs.
07:29Some of those tombs had been found, but there were gaps.
07:33The race was on to find these tombs.
07:38A frontrunner was Theodore Davis.
07:41Theodore Davis, an American lawyer, late 19th century, is typical of a certain type of wealthy individual,
07:49usually Western European or American, who was in Egypt for his health and to kill time,
07:57and decided, do you know what, I'll take up archaeology or sponsorship of archaeology.
08:01He wanted the fame and the praise of someone who'd made discoveries.
08:07And he did indeed, or the people working for him, found some pretty spectacular pieces of evidence.
08:15Now in the museum in Cairo are the gold-topped funerary masks from his most significant discovery,
08:23the tomb of Yuya and Thuya.
08:26It was one of the first undisturbed tombs found in the valley.
08:30Intact tombs were rare.
08:32Grave robbers were commonplace.
08:35A lot of stuff had been emptied in antiquity, or disturbed in antiquity.
08:38So even if you went in and you thought you were opening it for the first time,
08:42chances are there wasn't going to be much in there.
08:46Yuya and Thuya were a powerful, noble couple.
08:49That undisturbed pharaoh's tomb remained elusive.
08:55Between 1905 and 1914, Davis' teams uncovered 17 more tombs, but most had been robbed.
09:06When you read accounts of Theodore Davis, you get this sense that he's frustrated.
09:11He feels something is eluding him, and maybe that thing is an intact, complete royal tomb.
09:19He declared the Valley of the Kings exhausted.
09:23There were no more royal tombs there to discover.
09:27But not everyone agreed.
09:31Howard Carter, a British archaeologist with over 30 years' experience in Egypt,
09:38was convinced the Valley still held secrets.
09:42Howard Carter knew the Valley of the Kings very well.
09:45So working for various patrons, because he had no money of his own really to speak of,
09:49he methodically worked through various finds and excavations and surveys.
09:56So when Davis said,
09:58Ah, the Valley is exhausted, there are no more tombs to find,
10:01Carter didn't believe him because he felt he knew the Valley better.
10:07Theodore Davis thought he had checked more or less all of the names off the list.
10:13And that includes, at this time, a relatively obscure pharaoh called Tutankhamun.
10:18Carter's also had the feeling that what Davis believed to be the tomb of Tutankhamun,
10:24in fact, wasn't, and that the tomb was still potentially awaiting discovery.
10:32Armed with this theory, Carter approached the Earl of Carnarvon
10:38and convinced him to fund digging in the Valley.
10:42Carnarvon was a very wealthy man, an aristocrat who had gone to Egypt
10:46and kind of fallen in love with the country and its archaeology,
10:49and it was a popular pastime for people who had the money to fund an archaeological dig.
10:56It was well known that if you put a spade in the ground,
10:58the likelihood is you'll find some nice things,
11:01and there'd be an expectation that you could take those nice things home with you.
11:07Carter began excavating in the Valley in December 1917.
11:13These photos record the years Carter and his Egyptian labourers spent working the valley.
11:23This image depicts Carter overseeing the excavation.
11:31In the background, dozens of Egyptian labourers shifting sand and rubble in clouds of dust.
11:45But colourisation of such images must be done considerately.
11:51One of the problems of colourising photographs today
11:55is that we're making assumptions about people's backgrounds.
12:00Egypt has always been a very multi-layered society,
12:03multicultural, multi-religious, multi-ethnic.
12:06A collection of rare colour photos of Egypt from 1914 illustrate this diversity.
12:16So it's very, very difficult to decide how an Egyptian looks like.
12:20Being Egyptian is being all of these races or all of these ethnicities
12:25or all of these cultures in one single individual.
12:28How can you colour that?
12:30The modern colourisation techniques employed in this film
12:35allow for increasing distinctions between individuals.
12:41But there is always a degree of interpretation.
12:46So, where the identity of a recognisable figure is unknown,
12:50the decision has been made to leave the image untreated.
12:55The people working in these images, many just children, remain largely anonymous.
13:12Carter's method is to basically remove all the rubble you possibly can
13:17and strip the sand and the rubble back to bedrock
13:20to establish the location of a tomb.
13:31By the spring of 1919, little had changed for Carter and his team in Luxor.
13:39But Egypt was entering a new chapter.
13:43Hundreds of miles to the north, in Cairo, frustration with decades of British rule
13:48was spilling into the streets as a movement for independence gathered momentum.
13:54On the 15th of March 1919, this square, Tahrir Square,
14:00which was then called Ismailia Square,
14:02saw more than 10,000 people gather to protest against colonial rule.
14:08They came from all walks of life, from the factories, from the offices,
14:12from the nearby university.
14:14This was the biggest protest of its kind in modern Egyptian history.
14:19And it is something that had been brewing for quite some time.
14:25Egypt was a de facto colony.
14:28The British were making the big decisions here.
14:31Egyptians weren't really controlling their own country.
14:35And nationalist resentment began to grow.
14:40Five years earlier, Britain had dragged Egypt into the First World War.
14:47The First World War is the pivotal point.
14:51Because World War I is such a massive expense in terms of men, money and material,
14:58Egypt is co-opted into that.
15:00So, that includes the requisition of food, animals, labour as well.
15:07Very many Egyptians are forcibly moved into that Egyptian labour corps.
15:12So, there is that sense of,
15:14we have contributed hugely to your war effort.
15:19Now, what do we get in return for that service?
15:23The calls for Egyptian independence grew louder.
15:29Egypt's nationalist movement saw their best chance to get it
15:32at the post-war peace conferences in Paris.
15:37And at its head was Saad Zakhloul.
15:42Saad Zakhloul, the charismatic leader and the founder of the Weft Party,
15:48wanted to send a delegation to the Paris Peace Conference in early 1919
15:53to make the case for Egyptian independence.
15:57The Brits weren't happy with this.
15:59They weren't having it.
16:00And he was detained.
16:03He was exiled to Malta.
16:05The reaction in Egypt was swift.
16:09Zakhloul's exile was the spark that lit the fuse of revolution.
16:13Protests erupted here and around the country.
16:19Strikes and demonstrations erupted in early March 1919.
16:25It lasted for weeks and more and more groups started joining.
16:30All of the Egyptian social groups took part.
16:32From all classes, from all genders, from all religious backgrounds.
16:36Everyone took the streets.
16:40The British responded with force.
16:42According to UK government sources, 800 civilians were killed.
16:51But the Egyptians remained defiant.
16:55Saad Zakhloul's wife, Safia, supported by hundreds of other women, led more marches.
17:02And because of them, even more younger groups took the streets and went out
17:06and members of the public were more encouraged to take the streets.
17:12British authorities understood they had lost control of the situation.
17:18Something had to change.
17:21The British High Commissioner in Egypt argued that only Saad Zakhloul's return could restore calm.
17:30In April 1921, after months of negotiations, he returned to Egypt to a hero's welcome.
17:40What we're seeing here is the Egyptian celebration of the return of Saad Zakhloul from the exile.
17:45It gives us also a glimpse of the revolution in the sense of all members of the Egyptian societies contributed
17:51to the revolution.
17:53Some of them were holding the union flags of what they represented,
17:56or the students would be the ones wearing the fez and the others,
18:00what we tend to call the Egyptian farmers, who would be wearing the traditional galabayas.
18:04And that was one of the main reasons of the success of the movement.
18:08All the members of the society took part.
18:11Seeing the strength of the movement, British officials decided they needed to placate the Egyptians.
18:23The Egyptians would be allowed to have elections and an Egyptian government.
18:28But one has to say that this was not full independence as such,
18:33that the British were still controlling the economy, they were still controlling the Suez Canal.
18:40Completed 50 years earlier, the Suez Canal created a shortcut from Europe to the Indian Ocean.
18:47It was vital for Britain's trade and communication to its vast empire.
18:53At this point, Britain could not have afforded Egyptian independence.
18:58It would always be with qualifying factors such as military encampments on the Suez Canal,
19:05the security of imperial communications.
19:08Britain sees Egypt as pivotal to its global defence system.
19:13So, on paper, there's an element of independence, but in practice, it's very much circumscribed.
19:23Britain declared Egypt independent in 1922.
19:29For Cairo, it was a turning point.
19:33But 600 kilometres to the south in Luxor, Howard Carter took little notice.
19:40He was still digging through rubble.
19:45After five years with barely anything to show for it,
19:49his patron, Lord Carnarvon, was running out of patience and money.
19:57He gave Carter just one more season to find something.
20:04The Griffith Institute in Oxford is home to Howard Carter's archaeological archive.
20:10Among the thousands of documents and artefacts are the diaries from his excavations.
20:20What we're looking at here is Howard Carter's diary from 1922-23.
20:25So, what we see here is the entry for the 1st of November, when the excavation season started.
20:30You can see there's nothing on the 2nd, on the 3rd.
20:33And then on the 4th, there is this line scribbled all over the page,
20:37which says,
20:39First steps of tomb found.
20:41The moment when one of the team members discovered the first steps of a staircase that was cut into the
20:47rock.
20:48And this is the only time in the hundreds or thousands of pages we have from Howard Carter
20:54that he's not staying neatly in the line with his tiny handwriting,
20:58but he scribbles this line all over the page.
21:01This is maybe the extent of this very reserved man to show how very excited he was.
21:08The stone steps led to a sealed door, a tomb entrance.
21:15Carter telegraphed Carnarvon.
21:17After a journey of almost three weeks, Carnarvon arrived in Luxor with his daughter.
21:25Meaning now, Carter could open the tomb.
21:29On the 26th of November, he cut a small hole through the top of the tomb's sealed doorway.
21:36Holding up a candle, he peered into a chamber, untouched for millennia.
21:44Carnarvon says,
21:46Can you see anything?
21:47And Carter is reported to have said,
21:50Yes, wonderful things.
21:52Which, if anything, is an understatement.
21:55Although this is instantly the biggest news archaeology's ever had and ever would have,
22:02there's a delay before anybody else knows what's happened.
22:13Hidden away in a vast newspaper archive in England.
22:17So what we're going to look for is the 1922-23 files.
22:22The very first public mention of the incredible find.
22:27A news story published in the Times newspaper.
22:31This particular clipping is the first report of the discovery.
22:38So this is the very first reporting of the discovery of Tutankhamun's grave.
22:42It comes from 29th of November, 1922.
22:45Just three days after the tomb was first discovered.
22:47And it's from our Cairo correspondent.
22:50But I love this detail here where it says,
22:51By runner to Luxor.
22:53Someone's running to give us this news.
22:55They don't have any images to work with at the moment.
22:57So they're trying to evoke the kind of glamour,
23:01the glory of the discovery using description.
23:03It talks about there being four chariots,
23:06the sides of which were encrusted with semi-precious stones and rich gold decoration.
23:10And they're already in the 1920s,
23:12calling this the most sensational Egyptological discovery of the century.
23:16So they're calling it early.
23:18Breaking through the doorway, Carter opened the chamber.
23:23He had found what generations of archaeologists had chased for a century.
23:29An intact pharaoh's tomb.
23:37News of the discovery of King Tutankhamun's tomb raced around the world.
23:43Even without photographs,
23:45the mere idea of the treasures described grabbed the public's imagination.
23:50There's an almost instant reaction.
23:53Numbers at the British Museum,
23:56numbers of visitors to the Egyptian galleries there,
23:58the Met in New York suddenly skyrocket.
24:02There's a global hunger for more and more information
24:05about Tutankhamun and the treasures.
24:11While news of Carter's discovery of King Tut's tomb spread quickly,
24:16it was two more weeks before the first pictures,
24:20published in The Times, reached the public.
24:23So this is a real copy of The Times from the 12th of December 1922.
24:29We've got some lovely shots of Egyptian landscape here.
24:32We've got all these photos of people going in and out of the tomb.
24:37But what we're not getting is any shots of the interior of the tomb.
24:41And just a week later, we get a bit of an explanation why that is.
24:45So here, The Times again, reporting on the 18th of December,
24:48writes about the difficulties of photography
24:50and basically says they're having real trouble
24:53taking photographs of the interior of the tomb.
24:57But by now, the public were desperate for photos of the treasures.
25:04Carter had found thrones, chariots, alabaster vessels
25:08and countless other royal possessions.
25:12But all remained in the tomb.
25:16Good archaeological practice meant he needed to record
25:19every item in situ before removing anything.
25:25But in 1922, with primitive cameras,
25:29capturing artefacts in a pitch-black tomb
25:32on a desert plateau was a skilled job.
25:36Carter and Carnarvon were both good photographers,
25:40but they simply know they were not good enough.
25:42And so it came in quite handy when a few days after the discovery,
25:46Carter received a telegram from the Metropolitan Museum
25:49who offered Carter any help that he might need.
25:53The Metropolitan Museum of New York funded a large excavation
25:58at the Temple of Hatshepsut,
26:00just over the hill from the Valley of the Kings.
26:07One of the team members the Met offered
26:10was their well-respected British photographer, Harry Burton.
26:14He arrived at the tomb three weeks after the chamber was opened.
26:20Harry Burton worked with large-scale cameras
26:24that required glass plate negatives,
26:26so they were also very fragile.
26:28You had to handle them with extreme care.
26:32He had experience working in tricky environments,
26:36complicated by sand and dust.
26:38He set up his darkroom in an adjacent empty tomb
26:42and set to work.
26:44His remarkable photographs of the discovery
26:47are preserved today at the Griffith Institute.
26:52This picture was taken by Harry Burton
26:55about four weeks after Carter had his first look
26:58into the antechamber,
27:00after the electric light was installed.
27:02What we see is the centre of the first room of the tomb,
27:06the so-called antechamber,
27:08where we see one of the ritual couches,
27:11the one in the shape of a cow.
27:13In front of it, on top of it, are chairs,
27:15there are thrones.
27:17Howard Carter tells us
27:18it really reminded him of the property room
27:21of an opera house of a banished civilisation
27:24with this strange and beautiful medley
27:28of extraordinary things
27:29that were heaped upon one another.
27:33To get a better sense of what Carter saw
27:36when he first stepped into the tomb,
27:38colour has been added to Burton's
27:40original black-and-white image.
27:46Revealing the tomb's dazzling contents
27:48just as Carter would have seen it in 1922.
27:58All these images that Harry Burton took
28:01inside the tomb are extremely valuable today
28:03because these objects would, of course,
28:06have been removed out of the tomb.
28:08And we will never be able
28:10to recreate that site.
28:13By definition, archaeology is destruction.
28:16So photography offered
28:17a way of recording things
28:19which were going to disappear.
28:25It also was a means of publicity.
28:28And I think this was already an idea
28:31in the early 1920s
28:33that you could use a photograph
28:35to tell a story,
28:37not just about the past,
28:38but about the present archaeological circumstances.
28:42Lord Carnarvon understood publicity
28:44could generate money.
28:46Money to help fund
28:48what was bound to be a long
28:49and costly excavation.
28:52On the 10th of January 1923,
28:55the Times signed a deal
28:56with Lord Carnarvon,
28:57£5,000 for exclusive rights
28:59to the photographs
29:00and to the kind of news coverage
29:01of the discovery of Tutankhamen's tomb.
29:04And this is one of the first times
29:05I've ever seen a kind of big paid scoop like this.
29:08While it didn't mean
29:09that no other newspaper
29:10could report on the discovery,
29:12it was deeply unpopular
29:14with the broader press.
29:16Egyptian press
29:17were particularly frustrated.
29:19They saw this as,
29:20you know, a real outrage
29:21that an excavation
29:22that was happening
29:22on their soil,
29:23on their land,
29:24of their history,
29:26the British press
29:26was being given priority.
29:30Western archaeological interests
29:32in Egypt
29:33were about to collide
29:34with the nationalist tide
29:36unleashed
29:36by the 1919 revolution.
29:40There is this strong connection
29:42that Egyptians do feel
29:44regarding their ancient
29:45Egyptian ancestors.
29:47So for them,
29:47Tutankhamun was a grandfather.
29:51Some colonial scholars
29:53saw things differently, though.
29:55Western perception,
29:56once you arrive to Egypt,
29:57you would see, let's say,
29:59the reliefs on the temples
30:00or in the tombs.
30:01But the Egyptians
30:02that you see today,
30:04in the view of the Westerners,
30:05they are speaking Arabic.
30:07Most of them, let's say,
30:08are Muslim.
30:09They do not look anything
30:11like those on the wall.
30:16And from this Western bias,
30:20this means that
30:21the line of continuity
30:22has stopped.
30:23It is this claim
30:25of discontinuity
30:26between the ancient Egyptians
30:27and contemporary Egyptians
30:29that for the Westerners,
30:31it meant that the Egyptians
30:32had no right
30:33to claim this heritage
30:34of their own.
30:38An editorial
30:39in the Egyptian daily paper,
30:41Al-Ram,
30:42lamented the Times' deal.
30:44Lord Carnarvon
30:45is exploiting
30:46the mortal remains
30:47of our ancient fathers
30:48before our eyes,
30:50and he fails
30:51to give the grandchildren
30:52any information
30:53about their forefathers.
30:55Not only there is
30:57a colonial occupation
30:58of the land,
30:59but there was equally
31:00a colonial occupation
31:02in the sense of controlling
31:03the narrative
31:04about the heritage
31:05of the Egyptians.
31:11But this appropriation
31:13of Egypt's past
31:14was nothing new.
31:15For decades,
31:16Western academics
31:17had tried to lay claim
31:19to this ancient civilization
31:21and its precious artifacts.
31:24There were several
31:25Egyptologists
31:26who would write
31:27in their books
31:28and in their reports
31:29that this was world heritage,
31:31that we are all owners
31:32of the heritage of Egypt.
31:34They made it pretty clear
31:36that it was the Europeans
31:38and the Americans,
31:39Westerners,
31:40who were joint owners
31:41in this heritage.
31:44Not only were foreigners
31:45taking Egypt's
31:46ancient treasures,
31:48the Times deal
31:49meant Egyptians
31:50were restricted
31:51in even telling
31:52their own story.
31:54And the Times
31:55wasted no time
31:56in making the most
31:57of their exclusive access.
32:01Two months
32:02after the tomb's opening,
32:03it published
32:04the first pictures
32:05of the treasure.
32:10So the image
32:11we see here
32:11shows the right corner
32:13of the antechamber
32:15and that was actually
32:16the first big image
32:17that was published
32:18in the Times
32:19in late January 1923.
32:21It shows
32:22the two so-called
32:23guardian statues
32:24that are made of wood
32:25and in part gilded.
32:26So the discovery
32:28was of course
32:29a unique event.
32:30It was the first time
32:31a royal tomb
32:32from ancient Egypt
32:33had been discovered
32:34more or less intact
32:35and it was the first time
32:37that an event like this
32:39was more or less
32:40shown in real time
32:41in the newspapers.
32:44The story of the find
32:46now brought to life
32:47with images
32:48reached a world
32:49hungry for good news
32:51after years of being
32:53fed little but the reports
32:54of the horrors
32:55of World War I.
32:57The reaction was
32:59unprecedented
32:59and phenomenal.
33:01In the 1920s
33:03you had this huge
33:03explosion
33:04of technological advancement.
33:06So there was
33:06the telegraph
33:07which meant
33:07that any news
33:08from Egypt
33:09could be rocketed
33:10back to Britain
33:11almost instantaneously.
33:13There was
33:13a real heyday
33:15of the newspaper.
33:16They were churning out
33:18copies.
33:18New publications
33:19were coming out
33:20all the time.
33:21Readership
33:21was massive.
33:25This was also
33:26the first time
33:27that cinema
33:28had really been
33:29able to be accessible
33:30so people could
33:30go to cinemas
33:31not just to see
33:31new feature films
33:33but also news stories
33:34and newsreels.
33:35They fed
33:36the insatiable appetite
33:38for all things
33:39Egyptian.
33:40Carter and his sponsor
33:41Lord Carnarvon
33:42began in 1922
33:44to dig for the
33:44hoped-for prize
33:45of an undisturbed
33:46Pharaoh's tomb.
33:47Across Europe
33:48and America
33:51Tutmania
33:51had arrived
33:54spreading from
33:55the newspapers
33:56and newsreels
33:57into popular culture.
34:00The impact
34:01on fashion
34:01was almost immediate.
34:02Just two months
34:03in February 1923
34:05there were reports
34:06of fashion designers
34:07travelling to Egypt
34:08to get inspiration
34:09for their materials
34:10their colour palette
34:11their designs
34:11and this really
34:12tapped into
34:13a post-war need
34:14to live life
34:16a little bit
34:16more colourfully
34:17to re-satmosle
34:18saturate
34:19a kind of drab
34:20depressing
34:20grief-filled existence.
34:27As European
34:29fashion designers
34:30drew inspiration
34:31from Egypt
34:33American vaudeville
34:34wasted no time
34:35jumping on
34:36the Tutmania
34:37bandwagon.
34:38They quickly
34:40released a handful
34:41of songs
34:41like Old King Tut
34:43A real Egyptian
34:45wellness man
34:46wore nothing
34:47but a coat of tan
34:48an old king
34:49tat tat tat tat tat tat tat tat tat tat tat tat tat tat tat tat.
34:56Egypt's heritage
34:57was being commodified.
35:00Perfume bottles
35:00and perfume
35:01that really explicitly
35:03evoked
35:03ancient Egypt
35:04are called things
35:05like Ramses.
35:06Companies were in a race
35:08to capitalise on any perceived connection with Tutankhamun's tomb.
35:12They wanted to capitalise on the value that people placed on ancient Egypt
35:18and, you know, to make their stuff sell.
35:21During the Roaring Twenties, a time of growing affluence and opulence,
35:26the public soaked it up.
35:28But as much as this was appreciation of ancient Egypt,
35:31it was also appropriation.
35:33It was an interest in capitalising on, kind of commercialising ancient Egypt
35:38and, really, modern-day Egypt wasn't benefiting much
35:42from this, you know, massive global phenomenon.
35:47And it kept growing,
35:50drip-fed by new discoveries and images coming from the tomb.
35:56As Burton meticulously recorded the artefacts,
36:00Carter's team prepared them for transport.
36:03But the tomb had yet to reveal the king's mummified body.
36:08It's very striking to think that many of the most famous objects
36:14that come from the tomb of Tutankhamun
36:16actually weren't visible and weren't known to Carter for quite some time.
36:21Carter was aware from very early on
36:23that the likelihood was that over to the right as you enter the tomb,
36:28the north wall, in fact, is a false wall,
36:30probably concealing a burial chamber.
36:33And much as the temptation would have been
36:35to take that blocking down straight away
36:36and go into the burial chamber,
36:38Carter, as a very good archaeologist,
36:39knows that they can't do that
36:41until they have cleared the antechamber.
36:50It takes Carter's team two months
36:53to clear the antechamber of Tutankhamun's tomb.
37:05It is very important to understand that this is not an accidental picture.
37:11This is very carefully staged to capture that moment.
37:16Preparations for these kind of shots were very extensive.
37:19Harry Burton, of course, first had to see the space
37:22where he could put the electric light,
37:24how he positioned the people.
37:26And although you had the electric light installed in the tomb,
37:30it was very often the light was too low.
37:32So due to these light conditions
37:34and the extreme length of the exposure it took to take a photograph
37:39could take up to several minutes.
37:41So in particular, the shots with people in it
37:44were a certain challenge
37:46because they were not allowed to move for several minutes.
37:51Behind the wall, the burial chamber.
37:55In it, a huge shrine decorated with gold and bluestone inlays,
38:01the final resting place of King Tutankhamun.
38:05Having an exclusive deal with at times
38:07gave the archaeologists the opportunity
38:09to present themselves how they wanted to be perceived.
38:14So Harry Burton, the vast majority of his images
38:18are classical, traditional archaeological photographs.
38:21But he also took some photographs
38:24that you could describe as publicity shots
38:26that were supposed to end up in the Times newspaper.
38:30Evocative images of the ongoing excavation
38:33of the pharaoh's tomb
38:35drove the Times' circulation to new heights.
38:40But this image of the burial chamber reveal
38:44would be the last photo of Carnarvon inside the tomb.
38:50Only a few weeks later, in April 1923,
38:55he died of an infected mosquito bite.
38:57The death of Carnarvon is a big blow to Carter.
39:03Carnarvon not only is the permit holder and the money,
39:07he'd shielded Carter in the early days
39:10when the tomb was first a great sensation
39:13from all of that noise, I guess,
39:17that was going on outside the tomb.
39:18And things were only getting noisier.
39:23Egypt's revolution was about to impact Carter's work
39:27for the first time.
39:29Two years after the country had gained independence,
39:33in early 1924,
39:35Egyptians voted in their first parliamentary elections.
39:42Revolutionary leader Sa'ad Zakhlour and his waft party
39:47won in a landslide.
39:49The waft party had an overt intention
39:52to make Egyptian heritage link to Egyptian unity
39:56and Egyptian independence,
39:58trying to reclaim Egyptian heritage
40:01as a way of reclaiming Egyptian politics.
40:06It felt that taking charge of its heritage
40:09was a step toward true independence.
40:13Archaeology offered this avenue for soft power,
40:17not direct military conflict,
40:19but asserting control over your own heritage
40:22was a real way to send a signal to these Western powers.
40:26By the early 1920s,
40:28there was deep interest within the Egyptians
40:31to claim the Egyptian heritage as their own.
40:33So the waft party recognized that the Egyptian heritage
40:36or Egyptian archaeology was the tool of unity
40:40between the various Egyptian social groups
40:43and religious groups that exist in the nation.
40:46So there was this push of,
40:48we're not only reclaiming the land,
40:50we're reclaiming even the narrative around what Egypt is.
40:53And part of it,
40:54and a crucial part of it, was the heritage.
40:56The new Egyptian government wanted to upend a tradition
41:01that had begun when Napoleon first arrived.
41:04It wanted to make sure none of Tutankhamen's treasure
41:08would be shipped out of Egypt
41:11for display in Western museums.
41:15By the 1920s,
41:17the rules for foreigners excavating in Egypt
41:21were well established and quite clear.
41:23If you found things,
41:25and you were very likely to find things,
41:27there was an expectation on the part of the excavator
41:31that they could ask for
41:33and might be entitled to take away a portion of the objects.
41:38Archaeologists were expecting that you could take home
41:41up to 50% of what you found,
41:44so the rest of what was found
41:45went to the National Museum in Cairo.
41:48In the case of Tutankhamen,
41:51the Waft government urged the French-led Antiquities Service
41:54to block Carter from taking any treasures.
41:59It all hinged on whether a tomb was found intact.
42:06If a tomb was found to be intact,
42:09because there was such value
42:10in all of the objects forming a whole,
42:14the 50-50 split would not apply.
42:15Those things would all have to be kept together
42:17and they would stay in Egypt.
42:19The narrative so far had been that
42:22Carter had discovered exactly that,
42:26an intact tomb.
42:28The tomb of Tutankhamen,
42:29it wasn't actually completely undisturbed.
42:31It had probably been robbed twice in antiquity,
42:34but had been resealed.
42:36But everything was in there
42:38that they had expected.
42:41Keen to bring things back to Britain,
42:44Carter believed it was the wriggle room he needed.
42:49But the French head of the Antiquities Service,
42:53Pierre Lacoe,
42:54sided with the Egyptian government,
42:57informing Carter and Carnarvon's widow,
42:59who was now funding the dig,
43:01that all Tutankhamen tomb artifacts
43:04must remain in Egypt.
43:07For Lacoe,
43:08I think his support for the nationalist agenda
43:11comes from the rivalry with the British
43:12on who gets to own Egyptian heritage.
43:15Obviously, this is a major find.
43:17Britain retaining any of these artifacts
43:20meant that the French are losing absolute power
43:23over the publicity.
43:25He was controlling the museums in Egypt,
43:28and even though he himself was not Egyptian,
43:30he wanted to retain more for Egyptian museums.
43:34So there was an old political rivalry there, for sure.
43:38He just didn't want the British
43:39to get the last laugh on Tutankhamen.
43:43The entirety of the Tutankhamen treasures
43:46remained in Egypt.
43:48Then, Lacoe set about tightening supervision
43:53of the tomb's management,
43:55including sending a government overseer.
43:59The increasing restrictions frustrated Carter,
44:03who believed these actions breached previous agreements.
44:07Carter eventually finds that he cannot work anymore
44:11and abandons the excavation midway through
44:16the process of opening the sarcophagus.
44:22So many of the objects are still in there.
44:25The enormous value in archaeological terms
44:28seems unthinkable now,
44:31given how important all that material was.
44:36There was an expectation at this point
44:38that Carter's work on the tomb was done.
44:41And the new Egyptian government
44:43would take over the project.
44:45Not only be able to claim the objects
44:48for the national collection,
44:49but it would be able to take control
44:50of the whole narrative as well.
44:53When Carter left the tomb,
44:55there was an Egyptian celebration.
44:57Because this is the first case that we have,
45:00documentation,
45:01of the Egyptians mobilising for the heritage
45:04not to be removed from Egypt.
45:06So while we tend to celebrate it
45:09as the discovery of the first intact ancient Egyptian tomb,
45:13I think from an Egyptian perspective,
45:14this is the case where Egyptians were successful
45:17to retain all the belongings
45:18from one tomb for themselves.
45:20This was a huge leap
45:22in the fight of Egyptians
45:24to reclaim the narrative
45:25and to physically reclaim the heritage as their own.
45:32Excavations at the tomb stopped for now.
45:37Egypt was in possession
45:39of all the ancient relics uncovered.
45:44But the race for Egypt's ancient past
45:47was far from over.
45:49Western archaeologists were not ready
45:52to give up on the work
45:53they had spent decades pursuing.
45:56The discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb
45:58had shown that incredible finds
46:01could still be made
46:02in the rocks and sands of Egypt.
46:07Now, archaeology was no longer
46:10just about uncovering history.
46:13It had become political,
46:15bound up with questions
46:17of national identity.