Death of a pharaoh

The enigma surrounding a 3,000-year-old royal murder seems to have been solved.
Nevine El-Aref looks at the latest evidence

Forensic technology has recently been playing a major role in Egyptology. After centuries of ambiguity and mystery surrounding several chapters of ancient Egyptian history, modern science has finally cleared up many of the enigmas and provided a better understanding of some important episodes in this great civilisation.
Modern methods have recently succeeded in identifying several royal mummies, detailing their lineages and recognising the diseases from which they suffered in life as well as solving the paradoxes behind some mysterious deaths.

Among these achievements has been solving the enigma of the early death of the boy king Tutankhamun, including the symptoms that led to his demise in early manhood as well as the identity of the mummies of his two unborn children.

It also identified the mummy of the monotheistic Pharaoh Akhenaten, and proved that he was Tutankhamun’s father by a secondary wife.

The mummies of Queen Hatshepsut and Pharaoh Amenhotep II, the grandfather of Tutankhamun, have also been identified.

This week scientific researches, archaeological reviews, DNA analyses, CT images and forensic, anthropological and genetic studies have put an end to the long-debated mystery over the death of Pharaoh Ramses III, a conundrum that has perplexed Egyptologists ever since the discovery of the king’s mummy in the Deir Al-Bahari cachet in Luxor in 1886. The events recorded on the harem conspiracy papyrus now exhibited at the Turin Museum further deepened the mystery.

King Ramesses III's throat was slit, analysis reveals

By Michelle Roberts

Conspirators murdered Egyptian King Ramesses III by slitting his throat, experts now believe, based on a new forensic analysis.

The first CT scans to examine the king's mummy reveal a cut to the neck deep enough to be fatal.

The secret has been hidden for centuries by the bandages covering the mummy's throat that could not be removed for preservation's sake.

The work may end at least one of the controversies surrounding his death.

Precisely how he died has been hotly debated by historians.

Ancient documents including the Judicial Papyrus of Turin say that in 1155BC members of his harem attempted to kill him as part of a palace coup.

But it is less clear whether the assassination was successful. Some say it was, while other accounts at the time imply the second Pharaoh of the 20th dynasty survived the attack, at least for a short while.