Built during a time when Egypt was one of the richest and most powerful civilizations in the world, the pyramids—especially the Great Pyramids of Giza—are some of the most magnificent man-made structures in history.
Their massive scale reflects the unique role that the pharaoh, Cleopatra VII ruled ancient Egypt as co-regent first with her father, then with her two younger brothers and finally with her son for almost three decades. She was part of a dynasty of Macedonian rulers founded by Ptolemy, who served as general under Alexander the Great during The amazing works of art and architecture known as the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World serve as a testament to the ingenuity, imagination and sheer hard work of which human beings are capable.
They are also, however, reminders of the human capacity for disagreement, Civilizations like the Olmec, Maya, Aztec and Inca all built pyramids to house their deities, as well as to bury their Live TV. This Day In History. History Vault. Recommended for you. They change their names to Tutankhamun and Ankhesenamun, proclaiming their rejection of Akhenaten's heresy and their renewed dedication to the cult of Amun.
Then the curtain falls. Ten years after ascending the throne, Tutankhamun is dead, leaving no heirs to succeed him. He is hastily buried in a small tomb, designed originally for a private person rather than a king. In a backlash against Akhenaten's heresy, his successors manage to delete from history nearly all traces of the Amarna kings, including Tutankhamun.
Ironically, this attempt to erase his memory preserved Tutankhamun for all time. Less than a century after his death, the location of his tomb had been forgotten. Hidden from robbers by structures built directly above, it remained virtually untouched until its discovery in More than 5, artifacts were found inside the tomb.
But the archaeological record has so far failed to illuminate the young king's most intimate family relationships. Who were his mother and father? What became of his widow, Ankhesenamun?
Are the two mummified fetuses found in his tomb King Tutankhamun's own prematurely born children, or tokens of purity to accompany him into the afterlife? To answer these questions, we decided to analyze Tutankhamun's DNA, along with that of ten other mummies suspected to be members of his immediate family. In the past I had been against genetic studies of royal mummies.
The chance of obtaining workable samples while avoiding contamination from modern DNA seemed too small to justify disturbing these sacred remains. But in several geneticists convinced me that the field had advanced far enough to give us a good chance of getting useful results. The identities of four of the mummies were known. Among the unidentified mummies was a male found in a mysterious tomb in the Valley of the Kings known as KV Archaeological and textual evidence suggested this mummy was most likely Akhenaten or Smenkhkare.
Our search for Tutankhamun's mother and wife focused on four unidentified females. Two of these, nicknamed the "Elder Lady" and the "Younger Lady," had been discovered in , unwrapped and casually laid on the floor of a side chamber in the tomb of Amenhotep II KV35 , evidently hidden there by priests after the end of the New Kingdom, around B.
The other two anonymous females were from a small tomb KV21 in the Valley of the Kings. The architecture of this tomb suggests a date in the 18th dynasty, and both mummies hold their left fist against their chest in what is generally interpreted as a queenly pose. Finally, we would attempt to obtain DNA from the fetuses in Tutankhamun's tomb—not a promising prospect given the extremely poor condition of these mummies.
But if we succeeded, we might be able to fill in the missing pieces to a royal puzzle extending over five generations. To obtain workable samples, the geneticists extracted tissue from several different locations in each mummy, always from deep within the bone, where there was no chance the specimen would be contaminated by the DNA of previous archaeologists—or of the Egyptian priests who had performed the mummification.
Extreme care was also taken to avoid any contamination by the researchers themselves. After the samples were extracted, the DNA had to be separated from unwanted substances, including the unguents and resins the priests had used to preserve the bodies.
Since the embalming material varied with each mummy, so did the steps needed to purify the DNA. In each case the fragile material could be destroyed at every step.
If the extraction and isolation succeeded, his DNA would be captured in a clear liquid solution, ready to be analyzed. To our dismay, however, the initial solutions turned out a murky black. Six months of hard work were required to figure out how to remove the contaminant—some still unidentified product of the mummification process—and obtain a sample ready for amplifying and sequencing.
On this critical issue the archaeological record was ambiguous. In several inscriptions from his reign, Tutankhamun refers to Amenhotep III as his father, but this cannot be taken as conclusive, since the term used could also be interpreted to mean "grandfather" or "ancestor.
Many scholars believe that his father was instead Akhenaten. Supporting this view is a broken limestone block found near Amarna that bears inscriptions calling both Tutankhaten and Ankhesenpaaten beloved children of the king. Not all scholars find this evidence convincing, however, and some have argued that Tutankhamun's father was in fact the mysterious Smenkhkare.
I always favored Akhenaten myself, but it was only a theory. Related males share the same pattern of DNA in their Y chromosome, since this part of a male's genome is inherited directly from his father. But to clarify their precise relationship required a more sophisticated kind of genetic fingerprinting. As the populace was forced to honor Aten, the religious conversion threw the society into chaos.
The capital was changed from Thebes to Armana, and Akhenaten put all of his efforts into the religious transition, neglecting domestic and foreign affairs. As the power struggle between old and new intensified, Akhenaten became more autocratic and his regime more corrupt.
Following a year reign, he was gone, probably forced to abdicate, and died soon after. His nine-year-old son, Tutankhaten, took over around B. Because Tutankhaten was just nine years old when he assumed power in B.
Ay was assisted by Horemheb, Egypt's top military commander at the time. Both men reversed Akhenaten's decree to worship Aten in favor of the traditional polytheistic beliefs. King Tut had the royal court moved back to Thebes. He sought to restore the old order, hoping that the gods would once again look favorably on Egypt. He ordered the repair of the holy sites and continued construction at the temple of Karnak. He also oversaw the completion of the red granite lions at Soleb.
While foreign policy was neglected during Akhenaten's reign, Tutankhamun sought to restore better relations with Egypt's neighbors. While there is some evidence to suggest that Tutankhamun's diplomacy was successful, during his reign battles took place between Egypt and the Nubians and Asiatics over territory and control of trade routes. Tutankhamun was trained in the military, and there is some evidence that he was good at archery. However, it is unlikely that he saw any military action.
Around B. While the young couple had no surviving children, it is known they had two daughters, both likely to have been stillborn. The Hittite king sent a candidate, but he died during the journey, most likely assassinated before he got to the royal palace. Beginning in , Egyptian scientists conducted genetic tests on 16 royal mummies. Those pictured here were identified as Tut's near and dear—his grandparents, his parents, his wife, and two mummified foetuses who were found in his tomb and were most likely his daughters.
She was the principal wife of Akhenaten, Tut's father. Tut's mother was a different wife, whose name we don't know. That makes Nefertiti Tut's stepmother.
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