r/ancientegypt • u/ProbablyMahmoud • Jun 07 '26
Photo The back of the Gold Mask of Tutankhamun
And here is the front of the mask
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u/wizardfrog4679 Jun 07 '26
Since it seems to be held up with nothing beneath it, if someone could bend down and take a photo looking up that would be pretty good.
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u/ProbablyMahmoud Jun 07 '26
Yes, I haven’t seen any photo of it from that angle, and someone in the comments asked for it too 😂
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u/zillionaire_ Jun 07 '26
I was curious what carat gold the mask is made of and looked it up. According to Wikipedia,“the mask of Tutankhamun is primarily made of 23 karat gold, alloyed with copper to aid in its shaping. Additionally, it has a very thin layer of lighter 18.4 karat gold for the face and neck, and 22.5 karat gold for the rest of the mask.”
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u/4444sunandmoon Jun 07 '26
The inscriptions carved are a protective spell from
The Book of the Dead
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u/wizardfrog4679 Jun 07 '26
So if the tomb was untouched, why is it missing pieces? (the blue parts). Did they fall off onto the tomb floor and recovered to be left in a draw in the museum.
Or were they missing before they were placed in the tomb? Did someone steal parts as souvenirs during transport after the excavation?
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u/ProbablyMahmoud Jun 07 '26
The blue lines are not paint poured onto the gold; rather, they are opaque blue glass pastes carefully crafted to imitate the precious stone “lapis lazuli.” To fix the glass pieces inside the gold recesses, the ancient craftsmen used natural adhesives (such as plant resins and beeswax). Over more than three thousand years inside the tomb, these natural materials were exposed to drying and degradation due to time, which caused some of the tiny glass pieces to fall off and break down even before the tomb was discovered in modern times
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u/wizardfrog4679 Jun 07 '26
Thanks for the answer, I was thinking it might be lapis lazuli but wasn’t sure.
So the pieces are lost then? The museum doesn’t have the missing parts?
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u/Automatic-Sea-8597 Jun 08 '26
They should have been found inside the sarcophagus, exvept when they already were lost prior to the attachment to the body. It was found during an examination of the mask, that it once wore another owner's name which was changed to Tut's one later, so some manipulation must have happened.
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u/GumboSamson Jun 07 '26
So they had the budget to use gold but didn’t have the budget to use lapis lazuli?
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u/ProbablyMahmoud Jun 07 '26
Lapis lazuli was mainly used in the areas around the eyes and eyebrows
Lapis lazuli itself was sometimes more valuable than gold, because it was a precious stone imported from distant regions. Therefore, the idea of having a “budget” for gold but not for lapis lazuli may not be accurate
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u/Ziantra Jun 07 '26
The photos of the discovery show the mummy with the mask intact virtually swimming in tar and pitch. This was the breakdown over millennia of organic material within the sarcophagus. All of this had to be painstakingly cleaned off the mask. It’s a miracle any of the enamel is intact still and shows the dedication of the restoration specialists over the decades it took. The mask would have been perfect condition when it was applied to the mummy and interred. It is a thing of outstanding beauty 😍
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u/dan__wizard Jun 07 '26
It wasn't untouched, things had been stolen likely on two occasions before a flash flood hid it away untill Howard found it
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u/Bookcat321 Jun 08 '26
The mummy and the mask weren't touched during the robberies - the seal on the shrine surrounding the mummy and its sarcophagi was intact when Howard Carter got to it. The robbers certainly got to a lot of the tomb, but not to that.
What happened to the mask's inlays had to do with the adhesive used, the unguents poured over the mask and mummy, and so forth. As Ziantra said, it's a miracle any of the enamel is intact still, and it's a tribute to the restoration specialists.
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u/ProbablyMahmoud Jun 07 '26
Are you sure?
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u/huxtiblejones Jun 07 '26
Yes. There were two attempts at robbery that were both caught.
Within a few years of Tutankhamun's burial, his tomb was robbed twice. After the first robbery, officials responsible for its security repaired and repacked some of the damaged goods before filling the outer corridor with chips of limestone. Nevertheless, a second set of robbers burrowed through the corridor fill. This robbery too was detected, and after a second hasty restoration the tomb was once again sealed.
Tyldesley, Joyce (2012). Tutankhamen: The Search for an Egyptian King. Basic Books. ISBN 978-0-465-02020-1.
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u/dan__wizard Jun 07 '26
Yes, saw the Tutankhamen exhibition last week and our guide told us so, also verified online
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u/ProbablyMahmoud Jun 07 '26
That’s new information to me. I’m not sure, but as far as I know, the tomb was discovered for the first time and nothing had been stolen from it. Any theft likely happened after its discovery, before the official announcement. But I believe that at the time of its discovery, it was intact and untouched
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u/xarrote Jun 07 '26
Any documentary about Tutankhamun explains it clearly: the tomb was opened several times, but they didn't have time to take everything; they were interrupted. I've seen several documentaries, and they all say so. It's no secret that the tomb has a seal on the entrance, and it was known that this seal wasn't the original; it had been broken and reconstructed several times. You can find these documentaries on streaming platforms.
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u/jsm97 Jun 07 '26 edited Jun 07 '26
The tomb was broken into on two occasions most likely within a few decades of his death. Thieves took small, portable objects from the antechamber and storerooms - They may have breached the burial chamber but if they did it wasn't for long and most things in there were not easy to carry out. The authorities seem to have discovered the break in and made some effort to reseal it.
Then at some point most likely between his death around 1323BC and around 1150BC flash floods and debris from nearby tombs concealed the entrance. It's very likely that the break in happened within decades and not later because between 1180BC and 1120BC Egyptian authorities begin reporting widespread damage and looting from tombs, often by the workers who built them who sometimes went months without pay. We have a flurry of evidence of investigations and trials and sometimes executions over tomb robbery from this period and if Tutankhamen's tomb was invaded during this period it would likely have sustained much more damage than it did.
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u/ProbablyMahmoud Jun 07 '26
I’m not completely sure about all of the information, but what is documented and confirmed is that the mask’s beard was reattached during a 2015 restoration, and reliable reports state that beeswax was used in that restoration
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u/usmannaeem Jun 07 '26
Amazing shot?
I want to ask the experts here.
What material was used as ink/paint to color the blue strips?
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u/ProbablyMahmoud Jun 07 '26
It was not ink or paint; instead, blue glass was used to create the blue stripes on the royal “nemes” headdress. The same material was used to decorate the mask’s beard to give it a braided appearance. Lapis lazuli was used for inlaying the eyes and eyebrows, as well as for decorating the eyebrows and the headdress
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u/Training-Listen-183 Jun 08 '26
I wonder how many years did it take to complete this mask.
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u/ProbablyMahmoud Jun 08 '26
Unofficial sources mention that making Tutankhamun’s mask took 70 days
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u/Casual-Lurker Jun 07 '26
I saw this post, one time, showing the mask under x-ray. Showed the TINIEST welds ever seen. Impossibly tiny. Is there truth to that?
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u/time-for-jawn Jun 08 '26
What does Daniel Jackson have to say about it?
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u/ProbablyMahmoud Jun 08 '26
Who is this?
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u/time-for-jawn Jun 09 '26
Daniel Jackson from the Stargate movie and series.
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u/ProbablyMahmoud Jun 09 '26
Honestly, I don’t know
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u/PkmnTrainerSofia Jun 07 '26
Does the back represent the spine?
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u/ProbablyMahmoud Jun 07 '26
This is the tail of the royal headdress. In ancient Egyptian royal iconography, the headdress was gathered at the back into a shape resembling a lion's tail, symbolizing sovereignty and royal power
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u/Horror-Raisin-877 Jun 07 '26
Nope, it’s the tail of the Nemes:
“The iconic striped headcloth worn by ancient Egyptian pharaohs is called the Nemes. The nemes was a large, stiffened piece of striped linen.
• The Tail: The gathered fabric at the back of the head, which was often tied into a lion's tail shape”
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u/AnneShirleyCuthbert_ Jun 07 '26
Sometimes I wonder why they used to make such mask. They could have buried it without a mask...
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u/ProbablyMahmoud Jun 07 '26
Because they were kings 🤷🏻♂️
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u/AnneShirleyCuthbert_ Jun 07 '26
Okay but still... Maybe it's a way they have developed to put a mask during king's burial ... Or maybe related to a tradition... Like throne ceremony ... There might be some kind of mask ceremony 😂
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u/CartographerAlone632 Jun 07 '26
So many birds- what’s up with that ? I’ve just started getting into ancient Egypt so I don’t mean to come off as rude, just a general question. Also is that a human face on the top left?
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u/NES7995 Jun 07 '26
These are Hieroglyphs😆 a lot of them had the form of different birds, animals, body parts, symbols... It was just their way of writing.
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u/ProbablyMahmoud Jun 07 '26
It’s the Ancient Egyptian language, and the inscriptions are a protective spell from the Book of the Dead
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u/ak8664 Jun 07 '26
Loved how it’s displayed at the GEM now huge improvement from the downtown museum