Ever since archeologist Howard Threadboneham-Carter discovered the tomb of Tukankh'amun (aka Tutankh'aten aka Tutankh'piece) in the Valley of the Kings (aka Kington Magna) in November 1922, scholars have pondered the deeper implications of what is still widely regarded as the most remarkable find of the 20th century. What, for example, was this "Boy King" like? What did he do alone in his bedroom all day, did he have spots, what was his favourite football team? Did he prefer skinny or regular fit jeans and why did he sleep every night in such elaborate hard-shelled pyjamas? These and other impoderables have tantalised scholars for nearly a hundred years but one question above all has returned to the fore time and time again. What did the kid actually look like?
Scholarly opinion has been sharply divided on the matter, with American academics tending towards the Bobby Darin ("There is no question he was well-groomed and had a neatly-combed quiff") whilst their Europeans colleagues have leant more towards the Russ Conway, based no-doubt upon his stubby unmusical hands. Much of the speculation has been at best guesswork, influenced by individual as well as national prejudice though, more recently, science has increasingly informed the debate, thanks to breakthrough discoveries in the fields of both genome sequencing and facial reconstruction prosthetics.
Now in a landmark study, technicians and pscho-analysts at the Threadbone Laboratories in Great Heaving have applied state-of-the-art technologies (originally developed to improve 3D laser printing of thrupiecdiet plastic giveaway toys) to the deathmask of the world's most famous pharaoh to establish definitively his true appearance.
Finding previous methods - for example clay modelling based on bone structure and implied musculature - inadequate, they have instead modelled their subject based on psychological profiling, feeding his recorded character traits into the Threadbone Corporation's Super-computer and comparing them with similar personality identifiers in more recent and better documented "great men". "We know, for example, that the Boy King was a powerful even charismatic figure", Chief Reconstructive Scientist & Project Leader Di Cast says, "and he was clearly influential; au fait with the most advanced arts and sciences of his day and perhaps even an early polymath. He was well-travelled, used to public speaking and at ease with women of all classes. He painted, wrote extensively, had culinary as well as ethical interests and enjoyed something of a cult following. Above all he died in still mysterious circumstances and probably not in his own bed... So we looked for a modern day equivalent and modelled his features on a trait-by-trait digi-matching of these characteristics".
The results are certainly arresting and, the Threadbone scientists believe, compelling to the point of indisputability. "We feel absolutlely certain that this now puts the matter beyond doubt. We couldn't believe our eyes when the three dimensional model emerged: it was at once strange yet familiar and it was at that moment - that magical instant of recognition - that we knew we had hit the jackpot: there before our very eyes was the face of a legendary icon unseen for nearly 3,500 years".
The reconstructed face and mask will be exhibited at the Whisky-McNightly Gallery of the Gussage St. Michael Museum of Archeology from 18-27 August.
The Threadbone Laboratory findings are published in this month's World Archeology Magazine: Cover HERE
"Face to Face with the Boy King" Exhibition Catalogue HERE
"Face to Face with the Boy King" Exhibition Catalogue FLIPPED™ HERE
TOP: Howard Threadboneham-Carter; BOTTOM: Threadboneham-Carter discovered the tomb of Tukankh'amun (aka Tutankh'aten aka Tutankh'piece) in the Valley of the Kings (aka Kington Magna) in November 1922. The Boy King's appearance has been a matter of vigorous debate ever since.