All language subtitles for Historys.Greatest.Mysteries.S05E09.Who.Killed.King.Tut..1080p.HULU.WEB-DL.AAC2.0.H264-WhiteHat_track3_[eng]

(dramatic music)

- Tonight an investigation
into the death

of one of history's
most enigmatic rulers.

- King Tut might be

the most famous ancient
Egyptian Pharaoh.

- And around 1324 BC,
at about 19 years old,

he suddenly dies.

- Even after 3,300 years,

no one knows for certain

what ended the young
pharaoh's life,

- Who are the potential
suspects if it was a homicide,

which always takes us back
to the crime book theory

of means, motive
and opportunity.

- His name is wiped
out from monuments

and temples across Egypt.

Someone wants him
erased from history.

- Now we'll explore the top
theories behind the demise

of Egypt's legendary boy king.

- The bone fragments that
show up on the X-ray are

at the base of the
skull in a position

that suggests one blow
in the back of the head.

And could he have been murdered?

- DNA could really
make or break the case.

- King Tut's death.
What a mystery.

- Who or what killed King Tut?

(dramatic suspenseful music)

(mysterious music)

(dramatic suspenseful music)

It's November 4th,
1922 near Luxor, Egypt

in the ancient
burial grounds known

as the Valley of the Kings.

British archaeologist Howard

Carter is searching for the tomb

of a long forgotten
Pharaoh named Tutankhamun.

- He had a a great
deal of support.

He had a very wealthy
lord, Lord Carnarvon,

who backed him for
a number of years.

- Both were working so hard

to specifically find
King Tut's tomb.

On the list of kings they had,

every other tomb was found
in the Valley of the Kings

except for King Tut's tomb.

- He's been looking
for five years for Tut

and he has failed

over and over again.

- By the end of this
five year period,

Lord Carnarvon was
ready to give up

and you know Howard Carter
essentially begged him

for one more season, said,
look, I've got this feeling.

There's this one area

of the valley that
we haven't looked at.

Let me dig there and let
me see what I can find.

- And he'd managed to

persuade Lord Carnarvon

to pay for one more season.

The area which hadn't
been touched was right

in the center of the valley.

He dug through, he found
some huts which had been used

by the builders of
another royal tomb nearby.

Under those, they
found a stone cut step.

- [Laurence] It's here that
Carter and his team make

an extraordinary discovery.

- The staircase that leads
them all the way down

to a door with a seal on it.

And that seal said on it,

the coronation name of King Tut.

- Carter was able to
read it immediately

and know which pharaoh it was.

- And you can imagine the
feeling that Howard Carter had.

All his life he's been
waiting for that moment,

and it happened just when
he was about to give up.

- Carter decided to tear
down the sealed doorway

and continue his
excavation into this tomb.

They arrived yet again
at another sealed doorway

and Carter recounts
this in his publications

that they made a small hole

within this second
sealed doorway.

- And Howard Carter
shined his little light

and looked into the hall and
said, "I see wonderful things."

- [Laurence] What
Carter sees becomes

the most famous archaeological
discovery of the 20th century.

- What they had found was
this nearly intact tomb

of a royal burial
from the 18th dynasty.

- Over 5,000 objects
were found in the tomb

and at the core of it all
the mummy of the king,

surrounded by coffins of
solid gold and gilded wood.

(dramatic music)

- The king's mummy
was surrounded

by four different
golden shrines.

And those golden
shrines contained

a quartzite sarcophagus

and within that quartzite
sarcophagus was a series

of nested coffins, almost like
these Russian dolls, right?

One within the other.

- It must have been utterly
amazing to go through each

of the three coffins,
one inside the other,

to then finally confirm
that. yes, this is the body

of Tutankhamun and it has
been perfectly preserved

for 3,000 years.

- [Laurence] But more
than three millennia

after his mummified body
was so lavishly entombed,

little is known about the
brief reign of King Tut

or the cause of his death.

- There's this incredible irony

that we learned so much

about Ancient Egypt

through Tutankhamun,

but we really know so little
about him individually,

how he died, and
that's the mystery.

- All we know is that
King Tut was alive

and at the age of 19
he was being mummified.

- It's very likely that King
Tutankhamun came to the throne

around 1330-1332 BC having come
after his father Akhenaten,

when he was only
about nine years old.

So this was the child
that we're talking about

who essentially had to
become a living god on earth

and rule the land of Egypt.

- [Laurence] But
such a young child

could not rule Egypt on his own.

- He needed to surround
himself with close advisors,

essentially, to help
him rule as king.

- Rule would've been
in the hands of adults,

but what they were
doing would be

in the name of the young king.

(dramatic music)

- About the time

that King Tutankhamun
becomes Pharaoh of Egypt

part of his role as king
is he has to take a wife.

He ultimately ends up

marrying his half-sister,

Ankhesenamun, who
was also a daughter

of his father King Akhenaten.

- She was the royal heiress.
They were both quite young.

Ankhesenamun must must
have been about 13 years

of age by that time.

- King Tutankhamun,
he has a short reign.

It's roughly probably
about 10 years

that he's actually King of Egypt

and around 1324 BC
he suddenly dies.

- [Laurence] 70 years
after Tut's tomb was found,

one researcher thinks he
may have found the reason

for the young
pharaoh's sudden death.

- In the 1990s, Egyptology
professor Bob Brier gets a hold

of x-rays taken in the 1960s
of Tutankhamun's mummy.

- And he recognizes,
specifically, a head injury

in the back of his head

and he can tell that
the skull fragments

are inside the skull.

- Professor Brier shows
them to Dr. Gerald Irwin,

who has experience
reading the x-rays

of head trauma patients.

- And that colleague believed
the x-rays showed evidence

for a blow to the
back of the head.

- Bob Brier starts to suspect
that it was a deliberate blow

to the back of the head
intended to kill him.

- [Laurence] But who would want

to kill the 19-year-old king?

- In any murder
mystery you're looking

for means, motive
and opportunity.

Professor Brier speculates that
if Tutankhamun was murdered,

the most likely suspect would
be someone in the Royal Court.

(dramatic music)

- The first culprit

in our story is Ay,

the vizier of King Tut and
the grandfather of his wife.

Ay was one of the people that
Tut completely leaned on.

- The vizier is one

of the most powerful
officials in Ancient Egypt,

analogous to something like
the Prime Minister today.

He's in charge of
administration,

diplomacy, trade,

all sorts of functions
of the state.

- [Laurence] It's a job
Ay likely knew well,

given his long service as a
member of the Royal Court.

- Ay has been in the royal
family and the royal blood

for three generations now.

- He actually started his career

during the reign of King
Tut's father Akhenaten,

and so Ay was the second
most powerful man in Egypt,

right after the king himself.

- Ay's power would've been huge.

He would've answered,
essentially only to Tutankhamun.

- [Laurence] Since King
Tut is just a child

when he becomes pharaoh,

many historians believe that
Ay is the real power in Egypt.

And Ay's first priority is
to undo the damage caused

by Tut's father.

- King Tut's father
was King Akhenaten,

he was the king that
decided all the gods

of Ancient Egypt
didn't matter anymore

and only one God matters.

- Egyptian religion
had been based

around dozens of gods going
back to the earliest times.

- Akhenaten destroyed all
that, went on his own.

- He ultimately
moves the capital

to a different part of Egypt

to pursue a certain

religious agenda

and alienates the priesthood.

- So the reign of King
Tutankhamun's father left Egypt

more or less in a crisis.

- [Laurence] Weakened
by internal dissent,

Egypt was increasingly
vulnerable to outside attack.

- Egypt has its own enemies.

Any enemy is ready for
a moment of weakness

to come attack the
country and take it over.

- Egypt's crisis eases with
the death of Akhenaten.

- Tutankhamun reverses all
the policies of his father

under the advice
of his counselors.

The capital is brought
back to its original site.

The temples are restored

and the ancient religion
is also restored with it.

- The decisions to
make moves like that

couldn't have been made by
a nine to 12-year-old boy.

- [Laurence] But as
King Tut grows up,

Brier believes there may have
been a struggle for power.

- Under Ay, Egypt
gets its mojo back.

What he says, as the king's
chief advisor, is law.

Brier thinks that perhaps
Ay saw himself as the person

who brought Egypt
back on its feet

and sees himself then also as
the right man to be pharaoh.

- But now King Tut's also
starting to mature

as a young king

and perhaps, even
making some decisions

that go against
the puppet master

who had been controlling
him for years.

- History tends to show

that when a young king
starts thinking about stuff,

the people who've been his
regents start getting nervous.

- Ay had just seen
Tutankhamun's father destroy

so many institutions that
were so necessary for Egypt,

and he's really possibly
seeing this boy king going

to repeat all of those mistakes.

- [Laurence] Ay may
have also sensed

that this could be his last
chance to take the throne.

- The king and queen were
trying to have children.

- If Tutankhamun has an heir,

it would absolutely
end any chance

that Ay has of becoming
pharaoh because the child would

now be the next in
line for the throne.

- If you're going to plan
a murder, this is the time.

- Brier speculates that Ay
could have dispatched one

of Tutankhamun's own attendants,

the only persons with access

to his private
chambers or bedroom,

to slip in there and possibly
assassinate the king.

He picks up a heavy weapon

and he strikes a
fatal blow at the back

of the king's
skull, killing him.

- After Tutankhamun's death,

Ay becomes king of Egypt
and takes over the throne.

One of the ways that he
would've legitimized that claim

to the throne was by marrying
King Tutankhamun's half-sister

who was his widow.

- [Laurence] So is it possible

that Ay actually had
the young pharaoh killed

to maintain his own power
and control of Egypt?

- We know that Tut died

and that he died under
mysterious circumstances.

Is it natural causes?
Was it an accident?

And if none of those
are working very well,

we have to consider homicide.

(dramatic music)

- [Laurence] By 1324 BCE,

19-year-old King Tut has
been married for 10 years,

but he remains childless
and therefore vulnerable.

- Tutankhamun has no

living children in line

to assume the throne if

he were to suddenly die.

That creates an opportunity
for anyone in his inner circle

to potentially murder him

and assume the
throne for himself.

- [Laurence] Many speculate

that Tut's alleged killer is
Ay, his vizier and successor,

but Ay is not the only suspect.

- It's very common in history

when there is any political
turmoil, a coup takes place

and the head of the military
ends up being the king.

During the last years
of King Tut's reign,

there's one person
around the royal kingdom

that actually has the strength,
physically and mentally,

and has the army in their hand.

- That man is one of
Tut's closest advisors.

His commander in chief.

- Horemheb is an army general

and he first appears in history

when he's appointed as
regent for King Tut.

Clearly he must have been

somebody important prior to that

to be given the job

of running Egypt.

- General Horemheb was
not of royal blood.

He's a normal citizen of Egypt
that had become a soldier

and had raised all the way
to the protector of the king

and proved himself.

So he was nearly
operating everything

from behind the scenes.

He was there for Ay.

Ay was always calling him

his right hand man,

but in all truth,

it seems like he was the
one in charge all along.

- [Laurence] Despite having two

of the most powerful
jobs in Egypt,

some allege that Tut's regent
and top general is worried

about losing his grip

on the teenage pharaoh
and his kingdom.

- As King Tutankhamun
started to grow up

and become a man himself,

it's possible that
Horemheb sensed

that perhaps
Tutankhamun was ready

to start making
his own decisions.

- There's no point
of having a regent

when the king's an adult.

So Horemheb might resent that.

- And this perhaps was
a motive for Horemheb

to seize power for himself.

- [Laurence] Horemheb
may have concerns

about Tut's physical weaknesses.

Ancient Egyptians see their
pharaohs as the embodiment

of the gods on earth,
strong and powerful rulers.

Based on his mummified remains,

Tut does not live
up to that image.

- There are a lot of indications

that Tutankhamun was frail,

that he was weak and
that he was sick.

- Medical examination of the
body of King Tut has shown

that he was quite infirm,

probably since birth.

- The scans of his bones show
evidence of a clubbed foot.

He had a lot of walking
canes in his tomb.

Even though walking canes were

also a sign of elevation
and distinction,

there were so many that
it's hard to imagine

that he didn't also
need them for mobility.

- But the king of Egypt

at this point, leads
his troops into battle,

fights in the front
lines on his chariot.

- I don't believe for
a moment that this kid

that had a clubfoot
and physical ailments

could be out there racing

across the desert on a chariot,

flinging arrows from his bow.

It's important to let your
potential enemies know

that this guy that's leading
us is ready for battle

and he'll make sure
Egypt remains in charge.

Knowing that other
governments would look

at a leader who's frail

as potentially an example
that the country is frail,

Horemheb potentially could
be responsible for murder.

- It wouldn't have
just been his ill will

towards Tutankhamun himself,

but a belief and a fear

that this can really leave
us vulnerable to our enemies.

- [Laurence] A clue found
after Horemheb's death reveals

another possible motive.

- Horemheb's tomb
contains inscriptions

that show in hieroglyphics

that he had been appointed by
Tutankhamun as the iry-pat.

The iry-pat is a title
of legal inheritance.

It's essentially an equivalent
to our modern crown prince.

- King Tut, according
to Horemheb,

adopts Horemheb the general,

and names him the
hereditary prince,

the next in line for the throne.

- [Laurence] But there
are no guarantees

that King Tut will make good
on that line of succession.

- Horemheb's appointment

as crown prince is
effectively going

to be null and void the moment
that Tutankhamun has an heir.

And we know from the presence

of two stillborn mummies
in King Tut's tomb

that he is trying to have
children at this time.

- [Laurence] If Tut's general
has designs on the throne,

he must act before
Tut's heir is born.

- Horemheb would definitely
have had guards in the palace.

- This would've allowed
Horemheb to just give the order

to murder the king and send
off some palace guard to go

and kill Tutankhamun
in his sleep.

- [Laurence] But if
Horemheb is the killer,

why did Ay succeed
Tut on the throne?

- Because Ay is in his 60s
and near the end of his life.

It's possible that
they struck up a deal.

Essentially, Ay would take
over the role of pharaoh

for a brief period of time

after which point Horemheb
would become king,

and that is exactly
what happened.

- To see both of them take power

after the demise of this

18th dynasty royal family,

it does put the
spotlight on them.

- [Laurence] Ay dies after
just four years in power

and Horemheb takes
over as pharaoh.

- No one knows precisely how
long Horemheb is pharaoh,

but some evidence suggests that
he was pharaoh for 25 years.

- [Laurence] As Horemheb
builds his own legacy,

he also tears down
evidence of the past.

- Once he's pharaoh,
Horemheb erases any record

of Akhenaten, Tutankhamun or Ay

from historical
records, documents,

and inscriptions across Egypt.

He wants to make it as
if they've never existed.

- Horemheb either wanted to
make sure Egypt never looks weak

for the future generations,

or he wanted to make sure
he erases all the evidence

that puts him in
as the main suspect

of the death of King Tut.

(dramatic music)

- [Laurence] Without children to
succeed him, King Tut

is vulnerable to enemies who
want the throne for themselves.

But perhaps the motive

behind his alleged
murder is less political

and more personal.

- In any homicide investigation,

one of the first persons

you're gonna look at

is the spouse of a victim.

You never know what
happens behind closed doors

in a husband and
wife's relationship,

and that would've been just
as much true 3,000 years ago,

- [Laurence] Young King
Tut and his royal wife

were both children of the
previous pharaoh, Akhenaten.

- It was very common for
the ancient Egyptians,

at least the royalty, to
marry within the family

in order to kind of
keep the bloodline pure

and keep things closer
to home, let's say.

There's a number of depictions

from the tomb of
Tutankhamun that suggest

that King Tutankhamun had
a loving and devoted wife

in his half sister.

- There were these scenes

of romantic relationship

between Ankhesenamun and Tut

that suggested this is a couple

that truly loved each other.

- But things aren't often
always as they seem.

(dramatic music)

- There are lots of engravings

and depictions of Tutankhamun

and Ankhesenamun together.

One in particular,

she's putting a very sacred
collar around his neck.

He's pouring water
into her cupped hands.

- Then they're in
a hunting scene

where King Tut is sitting
down discharging arrows

with Ankhesenamun
kneeling beside him,

handing them the arrows.

- Which just seems to indicate

that they were
fulfilling the roles

that they were expected to fill.

- [Laurence] But if the
royal couple is happy,

why would the young queen
have her husband killed?

The answer may lie
in King Tut's tomb.

- The saddest
discovery that was made

in Tutankhamun's tomb
was the mummified remains

of two stillborn children.

- Two stillborn girls,

one is about seven months,

one is nearer nine months.

And there is no textual
evidence for any other children.

- This would indicate
that there was an attempt

to deliver an heir, but that
it had not yet happened.

- Tutankhamun could have kids
with all kinds of other women.

He's got a harem.
This is not a problem.

It's Ankhesenamun who needs
the baby to come from her womb

such that she can
maneuver a path to power.

- Trying multiple times to
produce an heir to the throne

and being unsuccessful in that
could have potentially led

to some resentment or
some concern, perhaps,

on part of the young queen.

- [Laurence] If true, some
suggest the queen's resentment

may have led her to homicide.

- Ankhesenamun was royal herself

and would've had a lot of reason

to want to preserve
her royal line,

and if she is looking
at the possibility

that this king is not
going to do that for her,

it could have been a
devastating prospect for her.

- Perhaps this
young queen realized

that once her husband was
no longer in the picture,

this could allow her
to have the chance

to successfully produce an heir

to take over the
throne of Egypt.

- To achieve that
the young queen plots

to avoid a likely next step,

marriage to her own
grandfather, Ay.

- We found letters that were
sent from the Egyptian queen

to the king of the Hittites
right after King Tut's death.

- And she tells him that,
"My husband has died.

A son I have not, but
you have many sons.

Give me one of your sons.

To me he will be husband.
In Egypt, he shall be king."

- She's trying to
control the narrative

by choosing who is
going to be her husband,

a foreigner who doesn't
speak a word of Egyptian

and therefore she will
be the person in power.

If she marries anybody else,

she's not gonna be
in that position.

- The king sent his prince son,

but someone found those letters.

- Some scholars believe that
Ay learns of the queen's plan

and has the Hittite
prince killed.

- And then Ay married
the queen himself,

her own grandfather,
probably by force,

and he legitimized himself

to become the next
king of Egypt.

- [Laurence] But
while a killer queen

is a compelling scenario,

some historians question whether
Tut's wife had the motive

to murder her husband.

- It serves her to have
Tutankhamun there on the throne,

for her to rule through.

- Ankhesenamun's desperate
letter to the Hittites suggested

that everything that happened

after Tutankhamun's
death was bad for her.

- By writing to the
king of the Hittites,

she chooses what, probably,
Egyptians regard as treason,

and I suspect that
may have ended

either her freedom or her life.

- Ay is now king and we hear
no more of Ankhesenamun.

- Her name and images
from history were erased.

After that, we never
saw her again.

- X-rays of King Tut
skull taken in 1968

lead some researchers to
suspect that a murderous blow

to the back of his
head ended the life

of the 19-year-old pharaoh.

More than three decades
later, new technology seems

to suggest another cause
of King Tut's death.

In 2005, King Tut's mummy
is removed from his tomb

for a CAT scan.

- Zahi Hawass and his Egyptian
team removed the king's body

from his tomb in
the Valley of the Kings

where it had been resting since
Carter's discovery in 1922

and they decide to CT scan
the king's body to see

what more information
can they learn

about the young king's health

and potentially
how he even died.

- A CT scan is much more
detailed than an x-ray.

An x-ray really does
just show you the bones,

but a CT scan gives you

a much greater
granularity of detail.

It shows you other
tissues, organs,

and sometimes blood vessels.

- [Laurence] Hawass's
team scans 1,700 images,

leading to a brand new theory
on the death of King Tut.

- They find two skull fragments,

and these are the same skull
fragments that they found

when the initial x-rays were
done of King Tut's skull.

- The early examination
opened a Pandora's box

about the king being hit over
the head and being murdered.

- But aside from these
two bone fragments,

they can't see evidence of
a fracture of his skull,

and so ultimately they
conclude that King Tut

probably didn't die
from a blow to the head,

but that the two skull fractures

are probably from
something else.

- They specifically pointed

that this was more likely

an injury to the
skull after death.

- During the
mummification process,

they're trying to
remove the brain

from the person being embalmed,

so, some skull fragments easily
could have been dislocated

in that sort of a procedure.

- There's also always
the possibility too,

that in the rough handling
of the king's mummy

by Howard Carter and
his team in the 1920s,

that some of these bone
fragments could have

also been dislodged from
the skull at that time.

- [Laurence] But
the CT scan reveals

that Tut did sustain a
major injury before he died.

- King Tut has a
femoral fracture,

which is essentially a
break in your thigh bone,

and it suggested

that he might have had
this fracture right

before the time of his death.

- The leg fracture that
we see in the CT scan

did not heal before he died.

- A femur fracture,

especially one that might
have broken through the skin,

places someone at risk
for an infection, sepsis.

Even in modern day society,

when someone develops
sepsis and septic shock,

that is a really big deal.

- [Laurence] Sepsis is a toxic

and overwhelming immune
system response to infection

that can cause profound
tissue and organ damage.

- Back in the time of King Tut
sepsis is a death sentence.

- One of the ways

that Tutankhamun could
have fractured his leg was

in one of the high-
risk activities

that we know all
pharaohs participated in,

which was hunting.

As a king, Tutankhamun would
have participated in a lot

of big game hunting expeditions,

which are inherently dangerous.

- Another thing that's found
in the tomb is a sculpture

of the king mounted on a
reed boat holding a spear,

in a marsh, hunting an
animal that might be a hippo.

- [Laurence] Egyptians
hunted hippos

for thousands of years
before and after Tut's time.

For the pharaoh himself to
hunt such a large wild animal

was a ritual display of
strength and courage.

- Hippos are actually an
incredibly territorial,

very aggressive,
deadly land animal.

They still kill over 500
people a year in Africa.

And it would've been a huge
accomplishment to kill one.

It was why they were such a
valued thing to have as a trophy

and why hunting hippos in Egypt
was such a ceremonial event.

If Tutankhamun fractured his leg

as the result of a hippo attack,

it is very likely that that
could have gotten infected

and ultimately led to his death.

- [Laurence] But is it
possible a different kind

of accident ended
young Tut's life?

In 2013, a group of
forensic scientists,

led by Dr. Chris Naunton,

examined the CT scans
originally done by Zahi Hawass.

- They perform, essentially,
a virtual autopsy.

Dr. Naunton and his
team find not only

that Tut just had
that fractured femur,

but that he had a
smashed rib cage.

His pelvis was shattered,

and he probably also endured

some internal
bleeding and damage.

- The interesting part
about all his findings is

that the rib damage
and the pelvis damage,

including the internal organs,

all were on one
side of the body.

- He came to the conclusion

that these injuries
weren't the result

of an attack by a hippo, but of
some other kind of accident

from a different kind of pastime

that the king would've done.

- Which he theorized and said,

"If this was an autopsy
of a dead person today,

I would say this is
an obvious car crash."

And he theorized it could
have been a chariot crash.

(dramatic music)

- Dr. Naunton and his
team run a simulation.

They take all the injuries
that King Tut has,

and they compare
it to what happens

to individuals in car crashes

to try to figure out
what might have happened.

- [Laurence] But when
the analysis comes back,

Dr. Naunton and his team
are in for a surprise.

- The recreations revealed
that it was highly unlikely

that Tutankhamun fell
out of his chariot.

Chariots were
actually very stable.

So the theory is that instead

of being thrown
from the chariot,

he may have been kneeling
down, fixing something,

doing something else,

and then was struck
by another chariot.

- Dr. Naunton's theory is that

because of how the injuries were

on just one side of the body,

the only explanation he
could come up with is

that King Tut would've
been kneeling on the ground

while at the same time
getting hit by a chariot

to one side of his body.

- [Laurence] But some scholars
question this scenario.

- There's no reason King
Tut would be kneeling

on the ground.

He is the king. People
kneel to the king.

(mysterious music)

- [Laurence] In 2010,
researchers launched a new study

into the life and
death of King Tut,

hoping answers might lie
within Tut's genetic code.

- Five years after the
CT scans are performed,

Dr. Hawass teams up with
paleo geneticist Carsten Pusch

to examine the DNA, both of
King Tut and 10 other mummies.

- They specifically
focused on the family

of the 18th dynasty
where King Tut was,

Akhenaten was, Akhenaten's
father was, the whole lineage.

- It was the first time that
there had ever been a DNA test

done on mummies and historians
and scientists were shocked

to find how well
preserved the DNA was.

- The reason they look at
this DNA is they want to see

what relationship King Tut
had to these other members

of the royal family, but also
to delineate the diseases

that they suffered from

and also whether these diseases

could have caused their deaths.

- [Laurence] The DNA study
reveals stunning new information

about King Tut.

- We knew that Tutankhamun's
father was Akhenaten,

but nobody knew
who his mother was.

It had been believed

that King Tut's mother
had been Nefertiti.

That was the consort
of his father,

but the DNA test proved
that it wasn't her,

it was someone else.

- His mother was actually the

full sister of his father.

(dramatic suspenseful music)

- Incest and intermarrying
ends up resulting

in many gene problems
and birth defects.

Some scholars believe
that the cause of death

to King Tut was
actually inbreeding.

- We all have recessive genes.

We all have
expressions of disease

that are in our bodies.

If we marry somebody who has
different recessive genes

and different disease
possibilities in their bodies,

we have less likelihood
of producing offspring

with those medical issues.

This is why you don't have
children with a cousin.

There are all kinds of
congenital birth defects

that will occur in the
offspring of parents

who are too closely related.

The fact that Tutankhamun
has two stillborn children

in his tomb suggests that
the more you continue

this kind of inbreeding,

the problems are only
going to get worse.

- Is it possible that the
sharing of these recessive genes

through close
sibling marriage led

to these children not being
able to survive to term,

and was it also a ticking time
bomb for the pharaoh himself?

- We know from the different
CT scans and x-rays

of the king's mummy that
he had a cleft palate,

a curved spine,
different ailments

that would've caused him a
lot of pain during his life.

- People have concluded that
his upper vertebrae were fused

and that he had a club foot.

- [Laurence] Some
researchers suggested many

of these ailments
could be symptoms

of a condition called
Marfan syndrome.

- Marfan syndrome is
a genetic disorder

that affects connective tissues

and the organs which
support the body.

- Some of the features of
Marfan syndrome can be lethal.

Specifically, if you
develop what's called an

aortic aneurysm, you
could die from that.

(dramatic music)

- [Laurence] But
the 2010 DNA tests

conclusively rule
out Marfan syndrome.

Instead, researchers
find evidence

that suggests King Tut
suffered from a condition known

as Freiberg's disease, which
causes blood loss to the feet.

- A temporary or a permanent
blockage of the blood flow

to the bones of the foot
is possibly what led

to his club foot and
the loss of his toes.

- It's gonna make
it very difficult

to walk and to have mobility.

That's probably why they
found a number of canes

and staffs in King Tut's tomb.

Having Freiberg's
disease isn't fatal,

but it could predispose him

to other complications like
developing an infection

in the joints in his foot,

something called
septic arthritis.

In Tut's time, there
were no ventilators.

There were no antibiotics.

- If King Tut got this
condition over 3,000 years ago,

it would be deadly.

- [Laurence] In 2010,
two German scientists,

Doctors Timmann and Meyer,

suggest a different cause
of Tut's bone damage.

(dramatic music)

- Dr. Timmann and Dr. Meyer
believed that the cause

of all this bone damage

could have been
sickle cell disease.

In a situation like
King Tut's family

and the multiple inbreeding,

if the sickle cell gene was
in any part of that family,

then it's very likely
that would transfer

to King Tut himself.

- The sickle-shaped cells
essentially block capillaries,

preventing blood flow
to the damaged bones

and can lead to fatal results

in childhood and
throughout life.

- [Laurence] Timmann
and Meyer believed

that sickle cell disease
could cause an infection

to spiral out of control.

- We know from the CT scans
that Tut had a leg fracture

that did not heal
before he died.

So if that had become
a point of infection,

it is possible that he had a
sickle cell crisis as a result.

- Which would've ultimately led

to oxygen not being delivered
to the king's vital organs.

And this could have led
to the king's death.

- [Laurence] It's a promising
theory, but yet unproven.

- That's not
entirely surprising.

It's 3,000 year old DNA
and might've degraded,

and so it might've made that
diagnosis really difficult.

- Hopefully, the
future will provide us

with even greater technology

that will give us an
even better insight

into the DNA of these mummies.

(dramatic music)

- [Laurence] After decades

of investigating the
death of King Tut,

a research team
led by Egyptologist

Dr. Zahi Hawass believes

they've finally
found the answer.

- It's clear that King Tut
had a whole host of ailments,

but unfortunately, none of the
genetic tests really tell us

that he was suffering
from a particular disease,

a particular condition that
could have caused his demise.

Then in 2010, Dr. Hawass
and his team re-look

at the genetic code.

- In his analysis of
the DNA of Tutankhamun,

Zahi Hawass and his
team found a clue

that could perhaps
be the smoking gun.

The ironic thing is
that this young king

who was meant to be a living
god on earth and was supposed

to be Egypt's most
powerful influential figure

could have died from one

of the world's most
common diseases.

(dramatic music)

- Malaria is an
infectious disease.

It's a parasite that's
transmitted by a mosquito,

and these mosquitoes do not
care if you're a pharaoh

or if you're a commoner.

If you're bitten by a mosquito
that's carrying the parasite,

then you ultimately
will develop malaria.

- It causes periodic fevers

and extreme it can kill you.

- [Laurence] Even today,
more than 400,000 people die

from malaria each year.

- Malaria was prevalent
throughout Ancient Egypt.

It's easy to imagine that
along the banks of the Nile,

malaria would've been quite
common for ancient Egyptians,

whether they were commoners
or the king in his palace,

- The DNA analysis
of Tut's mummy

identifies a strain called
plasmodium falciparum,

which is one of the
deadliest strains of malaria.

- [Laurence] Zahi
Hawass contends that

in Tut's final days,

malaria exacerbated
a serious injury

which may have sent
Tut to an early grave.

- The CT scan in 2005 by
Dr. Hawass and his team show

that femoral fracture,
a leg fracture.

- Now, you don't
die of a broken leg.

However, in ancient
times with no penicillin

or other sorts of drugs,

you can get a very nasty
infection and die of that.

- [Laurence] A serious infection

would've left the young
king especially vulnerable

to the deadly
effects of malaria.

- Malaria instantly
goes into your body

and attacks your liver,

which makes you completely
immunocompromised.

With a big injury on your femur,

that is just a
recipe for disaster.

Getting exposed to
malaria could do nothing,

but wreak havoc and
speed up his death.

(dramatic music)

- [Laurence] It may be the
most plausible theory yet,

but scholars agree,

we'll likely never know for
sure what killed King Tut

- When studying a mummy like
the mummy of Tutankhamun's,

you know, physical remains
that have been preserved

for over 3,300 years,
nothing's gonna be perfect.

- The level of precision
that you're going to be able

to bring to ancient genomic
studies are really limited.

So, even though we have a body

and we have genetic tests,

that's not going to
produce a smoking gun.

- Unfortunately, this mystery
will not be solved today.

He could have been murdered.

He could have died
of an accident.

Theories will keep coming out,

but all we know is
that King Tut died,

the 19-year-old boy
who ruled all of Egypt.

(dramatic music)

- Perhaps in the future,

more advanced technology
will allow science

to determine conclusively

whether it was natural
causes, an accident,

or even murder that caused
the death of King Tut.

Or perhaps it will simply
raise more questions.

Either way, every investigation

into Tut's final
days tells us more

about the fascinating life

of the once-forgotten
boy pharaoh.

I'm Lawrence Fishburne.

Thank you for watching

"History's Greatest Mysteries."

(dramatic music)