page_title: Tutankhamun
section_title: Contents
hierarchical_section_title: Tutankhamun / Tomb / Contents
context_page_description: Tutankhamun, Egyptological pronunciation Tutankhamen, was an ancient Egyptian pharaoh who was the last of his royal family to rule during the end of the 18th dynasty during the New Kingdom of Egyptian history. His father was the pharaoh Akhenaten, believed to be the mummy found in the tomb KV55. His mother is his father's sister, identified through DNA testing as an unknown mummy referred to as "The Younger Lady" who was found in KV35.
  Tutankhamun took the throne at eight or nine years of age under the unprecedented viziership of his eventual successor, Ay, to whom he may have been related. He married his half sister Ankhesenamun. During their marriage they lost two daughters, one at 5–6 months of pregnancy and the other shortly after birth at full-term. His names—Tutankhaten and Tutankhamun—are thought to mean "Living image of Aten" and "Living image of Amun", with Aten replaced by Amun after Akhenaten's death. A small number of Egyptologists, including Battiscombe Gunn, believe the translation may be incorrect and closer to "The-life-of-Aten-is-pleasing" or, as Professor Gerhard Fecht believes, reads as "One-perfect-of-life-is-Aten".
context_section_description: There were 5,398 items found in the tomb, including a solid gold coffin, face mask, thrones, archery bows, trumpets, a lotus chalice, food, wine, sandals, and fresh linen underwear. Howard Carter took 10 years to catalog the items. Recent analysis suggests a dagger recovered from the tomb had an iron blade made from a meteorite; study of artifacts of the time including other artifacts from Tutankhamun's tomb could provide valuable insights into metalworking technologies around the Mediterranean at the time.
  Almost 80% of Tutankhamun's burial equipment originated from the female pharaoh Neferneferuaten's funerary goods, including the Mask of Tutankhamun. In 2015, English Egyptologist Nicholas Reeves published evidence showing that an earlier cartouche on Tutankhamun's famous gold mask read "Ankhkheperure mery-Neferkheperure" (Ankhkheperure beloved of Akhenaten); therefore, the mask was originally made for Nefertiti, Akhenaten's chief queen, who used the royal name Ankhkheperure when she most likely assumed the throne after her husband's death. Neferneferuaten may have been deposed in a struggle for power and possibly deprived of a royal burial, or she was buried with a different set of Akhenaten's funerary equipment by Tutankhamun's officials, since Tutankhamun succeeded her as king. Neferneferuaten was likely succeeded by Tutankhamun based on the presence of her funerary goods in his tomb.
  On 4 November 2007, 85 years to the day after Carter's discovery, Tutankhamun's mummy was placed on display in his underground tomb at Luxor, when the linen-wrapped mummy was removed from its golden sarcophagus to a climate-controlled glass box. The case was designed to prevent the heightened rate of decomposition caused by the humidity and warmth from tourists visiting the tomb. In 2009 the tomb was closed for restoration by the ministry of antiquities and the Getty Conservation Institute. While the closure was originally planned for five years to restore the walls affected by humidity, the 2011 Egyptian revolution set the project back. The tomb re-opened in February 2019.
caption: Diagram of Tutankhamun's tomb