This week Ancient Aliens looks into the legendary curse that is said to have placed on the tomb of Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamun.
From a historical perspective the only really remarkable thing about the young pharaoh was that his tomb was discovered unmolested in 1922 by British archeologist Howard Carter.
The boy king was around 17 years-old when he died and was the 11th pharaoh of the 18th dynasty of Ancient Egypt, around 3,300 years ago. Historians believe he was on the throne for about 10 years, having inherited it from his father Akhenaten and either died in a hunting accident or was assassinated.
His father was notable for having made some changes to the deities the Egyptians worshipped, promoting his new sun god Aten over the traditional Amun. Tutankhamun reversed this trend and went about reconstructing various monuments to Amun.
Amun was known as the King of the Gods and when he was later comibned with the sun god Ra to form Amum-Ra, he became a more powerful figure still.
However, beyond the amazing treasures found in his tomb it is what happened to those who opened the tomb that has perked the ears of ancient astronaut theorists and others.
Many ancient tombs are said to have curses and after Tutankhamun’s was opened several deaths were attributed to the curse said to be protecting all the pharaoh’s tombs.
Lord Carnarvon who backed the excavation and was there when the tomb was opened, died 4 months after the discovery. He cut a mosquito bite whilst shaving and later died from blood poisoning.
A month later George Jay Gould I, who had also been at the tomb, also died, this time from a fever. The same year an Egyptian prince was shot by his wife and Caranavon’s half-brother also died from blood poisoning.
In 1924 the radiologist who x-rayed the mummy died from an unknown illness and in 1928 another member of the excavation team died, this time from arsenic poisoning.
There were other untimely deaths as well and all this caused a bit of a media storm with newspapers running lurid tales of Tutankhamun’s curse.
Some have also tried to put a scientific twist on the curse, wondering if the deaths could have be caused by exposure to radiation or some sort of weird bacteria in the tomb.
Other go down the ancient alien route and think it could be related to the Egyptian gods not being gods at all but rather aliens. They point to the fact that the boy king’s dagger was made not of bronze but of meteoric iron and they wonder if the ancients could really have produced both the stunning objects and huge structures without help.
Ancient Astronaut theorists also think the curse could be protecting some extraterrestrial technology that is buried somewhere on Earth, a few even going as far as naming Oak Island as the location.
Ancient Aliens airs on Fridays at 9:00 PM on History Channel.