by Padre Art

Created on: February 23, 2009

For almost one hundred years the mystery of King Tutankhamun's death has been a who-done-it in the classic sense, with a number of suspects and various motives, an uncertainty about the manner of death and whether it was really murder. Although he died about 1325 BC the questions arising from the circumstances surrounding his death were entombed with his mummy and its vast treasure until Howard Carter unearthed them in 1922.

Tutankhamun gained the throne, when he was nine years old, upon the equally mysterious death of the preceding pharaoh called Akhenatun the Heretic. This heretical king had turned the religious structure of the Egyptian society upside down during his reign and set the stage for the possible assassination of Tutankhamun.

The first of the four most likely suspects in the possible murder of the boy-king was a foreigner named Tutu (or Dudu) in the court of Amenhotep III and he continued as an official with the next king, Akhenatun. At this time someone was intercepting messages requesting help from the army and as a result there were a number of disastrous defeats. Suspicion fell upon the foreign Tutu and then Akhenatun swore to investigate and find the traitor. Before anything could be done the king died under questionable circumstances.

The new pharaoh, Tutankhamun, was young and inexperienced when he inherited this unsavory character who was rumored to encourage strife amongst the members of the court. Some believe that he had a hand in the possible murder of the new king as well as the preceding one. Whether for his own benefit or at the command of another party remains to be seen.

At the tender age of nine, Tutankhamun was unprepared to rule a kingdom but he had two experienced and ambitious men to make decisions in his name. Aye was a high priest with some royal blood that ruled as Vizier and as a regent of sorts. Horemhab was the general in command of the army of Egypt and had a taste for power although without the royal bloodlines that would make him fit to be king.

These two, the priest and the general, are the people, whether individually or in concert, that had the strongest motives for eliminating the young pharaoh. For the entire ten years Tutankhamun occupied the throne of Egypt Horemhab and the older Aye ruled in his name and became accustomed to having the reins of power in their hands. By the time Tutankhamun had reached his late teens it is likely they saw the possibility of their power diminishing.

Only one other person was

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