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Howard Carter, the archaeologist who physically opened Tutankhamun's burial chamber in 1923 and spent more time inside the tomb than anyone else involved in the dig, lived another sixteen years and died in his London apartment in 1939 at age 64 — natural causes, no mystery attached. That single fact undercuts the “Curse of the Pharaohs” story more than almost any other, and it comes directly from the historical record rather than from folklore.
Verified History and Documented Facts
Howard Carter discovered Tutankhamun's nearly intact tomb in the Valley of the Kings on November 4, 1922, funded by his patron Lord Carnarvon (George Herbert, 5th Earl of Carnarvon). No curse inscription was found anywhere in the tomb; Carter himself explicitly denied that the widely quoted warning — “Death shall come on swift wings to him that toucheth the tomb of a pharaoh” — existed at all, and no first-hand account from the excavation team records any such text. Historians researching the period have traced the phrase's popularization instead to newspaper coverage and to the British novelist Marie Corelli, who publicly warned in the press that disturbing a sealed pharaoh's tomb could bring dire consequences, well before any inscription claim entered circulation.
Lord Carnarvon died on April 5, 1923, less than five months after the tomb's opening, and his death is the case most often cited as the curse's first “victim.” Documented medical history shows Carnarvon was 56, already in poor health following a serious car accident years earlier, and the direct cause of death recorded at the time was blood poisoning that developed from an infected mosquito bite he had aggravated while shaving. Sensational press coverage in the 1920s connected his death to the tomb regardless, and outlets including The Times and The New York World ran speculative curse-themed stories in the following weeks.
The Legend Itself
As the story spread through 1920s newspapers, tabloids began attributing to the curse the death of nearly anyone with even a loose connection to the excavation — visitors to the site, relatives of team members, and in some retellings people who had merely handled Egyptian artifacts unrelated to the dig. Some versions of the story claimed as many as 20 or more “curse victims” over the following years. The legend was reinforced by a handful of genuinely eerie coincidences reported at the time, including claims that a power outage hit Cairo at the exact moment of Carnarvon's death and that his dog back in England reportedly died the same night — details that circulated widely in the press but were never independently corroborated.
What's Actually Verifiable
Historians who have reviewed the excavation team's actual health and mortality records found the opposite pattern from what the curse legend claims: the people most directly and repeatedly exposed to the tomb, including Howard Carter himself, tended to live long, ordinary lives, while the “curse” narrative was built by selectively counting deaths of people with only tenuous connections to the dig and ignoring those at its center who survived for decades. Modern researchers have also proposed mundane explanations for the deaths that did occur close to the excavation, including bacterial or fungal contamination in long-sealed tombs as a general (though unproven in Carnarvon's specific case) hazard for archaeologists. We could not verify any credible, independently documented case of a death directly and exclusively attributable to the tomb's opening rather than to ordinary illness, age, or accident.
Cultural Significance Today
The “Curse of the Pharaohs” remains one of the most widely recognized archaeology-adjacent legends in popular culture, referenced constantly in film, television, and tourism material connected to Egypt's Valley of the Kings, even as Egyptologists and historians of the period consistently describe it as a media-driven myth rather than a documented phenomenon. The story is frequently cited in journalism and academic writing as an early, clear-cut case study in how 1920s newspaper sensationalism could manufacture a supernatural legend around a real historical event.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q1: Was a curse inscription actually found in King Tutankhamun's tomb?
No. Howard Carter explicitly stated no such inscription existed, and no first-hand account from the excavation records one.
Q2: How did Lord Carnarvon actually die?
Documented medical history attributes his death to blood poisoning from an infected mosquito bite, aggravated while shaving, in a man already in poor health following a car accident years earlier.
Q3: Did Howard Carter, who spent the most time in the tomb, die from the “curse”?
No. Carter lived another sixteen years after the discovery and died of natural causes in London in 1939 at age 64.
Q4: Where did the famous curse warning phrase come from?
Historians trace its popularization to 1920s newspaper coverage and to novelist Marie Corelli's public warnings, not to any inscription in the tomb itself.
Q5: How many people are said to have died from the curse?
Sensational retellings claim 20 or more, but historians note this count is built by including people with only loose or indirect connections to the excavation.
Q6: Do historians consider the curse real?
No. It is consistently treated by historians and Egyptologists as a media-driven myth from the 1920s press rather than a documented phenomenon.
Learn More
- Books on the discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb
- Ancient Egypt history and archaeology books
- Valley of the Kings and Egyptology guides
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