HOWARD CARTER DISCOVERS TUTANKHAMUN'S TOMB

Howard Carter

Today, The Grandma feels better and she has decided to get up and try to arrive to her sofa. She has received the wonderful visit of Joseph de Ca'th Lon.

They are very interested in reading about Howard Carter, one of the most important archaeologists of the history who discovered the tomb of Tutankhamun. 

The Grandma loves History and Joseph loves Archaeology and talking about Howard Carter and all his discoveries in Egypt is a fantastic way to spend the day.

Before Joseph's arrival, The Grandma has studied a new lesson of her Intermediate Language Practice manual (Grammar 6).

More information: Present Perfect 1-I & II

Howard Carter (9 May 1874-2 March 1939) was a British archaeologist and Egyptologist who became world-famous after discovering the intact tomb, designated KV62, of the 18th Dynasty Pharaoh, Tutankhamun, colloquially known as King Tut and the boy king, in November 1922.

Howard Carter was born in Kensington, which is in England, on 9 May 1874, the son of Samuel John Carter, an artist, and Martha Joyce Carter. His father trained and developed Howard's artistic talents.

Carter spent much of his childhood with relatives in the Norfolk market town of Swaffham, the birthplace of both his parents. Nearby was the mansion of the Amherst family, Didlington Hall, containing a sizable collection of Egyptian antiques, which sparked Carter's interest in that subject.

Opening the sealed doorway

In 1891 the Egypt Exploration Fund (EEF), on the prompting of Mary Cecil, sent Carter to assist an Amherst family friend, Percy Newberry, in the excavation and recording of Middle Kingdom tombs at Beni Hasan.

Although only 17, Carter was innovative in improving the methods of copying tomb decoration. In 1892, he worked under the tutelage of Flinders Petrie for one season at Amarna, the capital founded by the pharaoh Akhenaten.

From 1894 to 1899, he worked with Édouard Naville at Deir el-Bahari, where he recorded the wall reliefs in the temple of Hatshepsut.

In 1899, Carter was appointed to the position of Chief Inspector of the Egyptian Antiquities Service (EAS). He supervised a number of excavations at Thebes, now known as Luxor.

More information: Eye Witness to History

In 1904, he was transferred to the Inspectorate of Lower Egypt. Carter was praised for his improvements in the protection of, and accessibility to, existing excavation sites, and his development of a grid-block system for searching for tombs. The Antiquities Service also provided funding for Carter to head his own excavation projects.

Carter resigned from the Antiquities Service in 1905 after a formal inquiry into what became known as the Saqqara Affair, a noisy confrontation between Egyptian site guards and a group of French tourists. Carter sided with the Egyptian personnel.

Howard Carter working in Egypt

In 1907, after three hard years for Carter, Lord Carnarvon employed him to supervise excavations of nobles' tombs in Deir el-Bahri, near Thebes. Gaston Maspero had recommended Carter to Carnarvon as he knew he would apply modern archaeological methods and systems of recording.

In 1914, Lord Carnarvon received the concession to dig in the Valley of the Kings, Carter was again employed to lead the work. However excavations and study were soon interrupted by the First World War, Carter spending these war years working for the British Government as a diplomatic courier and translator. He enthusiastically resumed his excavation work towards the end of 1917.

By 1922, Lord Carnarvon had become dissatisfied with the lack of results after several years of finding little. He informed Carter that he had one more season of funding to make a significant find in the Valley of the Kings.

More information: UnMuseum

Carter returned to the Valley of Kings, and investigated a line of huts that he had abandoned a few seasons earlier. The crew cleared the huts and rock debris beneath. 

On 4 November 1922, their young water boy accidentally stumbled on a stone that turned out to be the top of a flight of steps cut into the bedrock. Carter had the steps partially dug out until the top of a mud-plastered doorway was found. The doorway was stamped with indistinct cartouches, oval seals with hieroglyphic writing. Carter ordered the staircase to be refilled, and sent a telegram to Carnarvon, who arrived two-and-a-half weeks later on 23 November.

On 26 November 1922, Carter made a tiny breach in the top left hand corner of the doorway, with Carnarvon, his daughter Lady Evelyn Herbert, and others in attendance, using a chisel that his grandmother had given him for his 17th birthday. 

Carter, Carnarvon & Lady Herbert, Tutankhamen's tomb

He was able to peer in by the light of a candle and see that many of the gold and ebony treasures were still in place. He did not yet know whether it was a tomb or merely a cache, but he did see a promising sealed doorway between two sentinel statues.

Carnarvon asked, Can you see anything? Carter replied with the famous words: Yes, wonderful things! Carter had, in fact, discovered Tutankhamun's tomb, subsequently designated KV62.

The next several months were spent cataloguing the contents of the antechamber under the often stressful supervision of Pierre Lacau, director general of the Department of Antiquities of Egypt.

More information: ThoughtCo

On 16 February 1923, Carter opened the sealed doorway and found that it did indeed lead to a burial chamber, and he got his first glimpse of the sarcophagus of Tutankhamun.

The tomb was considered the best preserved and most intact pharaonic tomb ever found in the Valley of the Kings, and the discovery was eagerly covered by the world's press, but most of their representatives were kept in their hotels, much to their annoyance. Only H. V. Morton of The Times was allowed on the scene, and his vivid descriptions helped to cement Carter's reputation with the British public.

Carter's own notes and photographic evidence indicate that he, Lord Carnarvon, and Lady Evelyn Herbert entered the burial chamber in November 1922, shortly after the tomb's discovery and before the official opening.

Howard Carter working in Egypt

Towards the end of February 1923 a rift between Lord Carnarvon and Carter, probably caused by a disagreement on how to manage the supervising Egyptian authorities, temporarily closed excavation. Work recommenced in early March after Lord Carnarvon apologised to Carter.

Later that month Lord Carnarvon contracted blood poisoning while staying in Luxor near the tomb site. He died in Cairo on 5 April 1923. Lady Carnarvon retained her late husband's concession in the Valley of the Kings, allowing Carter to continue his work.

Carter's painstaking cataloguing of the thousands of objects in the tomb continued until 1932, most being moved to the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. There were a number of breaks in the work, including one lasting nearly a year in 1924–25, caused by to a dispute over what Carter saw as excessive control of the excavation by the Egyptian Antiquities Service. The Egyptian authorities eventually agreed that Carter should complete the tomb's clearance.

Despite being involved in the greatest archaeological find of his time, Carter received no honour from the British government. However, in 1926, Carter received the Order of the Nile, third class, from King Fuad I of Egypt.

Carter died at his London flat at 49 Albert Court, next to the Royal Albert Hall, on 2 March 1939, aged 64 from Hodgkin's Disease. Few people attended his funeral, one of them was his older brother William (b. 1863) who died in the same year. Carter is buried in Putney Vale Cemetery in London.

More information: Spiegel

The news of the discovery spread fast all over the country,

and inquisitive enquiries mingled with congratulations

from this moment became the daily programme.

Howard Carter