Now When He Was a Young Man, He Never Thought He’d See, People Stand in Line to See the Boy King!

I recently trekked to Indianapolis to see King Tut. (Cue Steve Martin..) Tut is currently on exhibit at the Indianapolis Children’s Museum until October (BTW, Haley, you’re welcome for the plug).

I had seen a Tut exhibit several years ago in Kansas City, but the items we saw there were replications, (or so I’ve been told – I don’t consciously recall that.) This exhibit, however, was the real stuff and it’s a real honor for Indy to have this exhibit, because normally it only goes to bigger cities/museums.

The exhibit opened with a short video narrated by Indiana Jones himself, Harrison Ford, explaining what we’d be seeing. Then the doors opened into several rooms with non-Tut-related artifacts. It was in one of these rooms that I found my favorite item: the sarcophagus for Crown Prince Thutmose’s pet cat. See, due to my father’s recent passing, I think of these things more often, so I had been discussing with Holly what would happen to my beloved cats, Sophie and Gizmo, if I were to go before them. But here the light bulb popped on in my head that if they go first, I could just have them mummified and put in a cute little sarcophagus just like Thutmose did! It was in this room, for this item, that I was sorely tempted to risk Security’s wrath and take a picture, but I chickened out. Fortunately, I was able to get a postcard of it. (See the picture)

After seeing several rooms of non-Tut stuff, you entered Tut’s tomb!! (mwahahaha) From here on, the exhibit was set out like the actual tomb was when Howard Carter found it in 1920-something. Of course, there was a lot more stuff packed into the actual tomb and it was rather haphazardly shoved in there, from what I’ve read about it. But the items that were on display were pretty interesting. We got to see Haley’s favorite item: a beautiful mini-sarcophagus, about 15 inches high and inlayed with gold and jewels, which held the body parts (brain, stomach, etc.) removed in mummification and went into canopic jars. We got to see toys for Tut to play with in the afterlife. There was a solid gold earring that must’ve weighed 30 pounds! And there were a bunch of shabti – little statuettes that were buried with the mummy and would do any hard labor that the deceased might be expected to do in the afterlife. (Even in death he got to have minions – why can’t I have just one?!)

Finally, as with all respectable exhibits, the tour ended in the gift shop. There was something for everyone, young and old, in the gift shop – from the usual cheap crap to incredibly expensive nice stuff. I purchased the aforementioned postcard of Prince Thutmose’s cat’s sarcophagus and the Egyptian addition to the United Nations. The United Nations being my growing collection of stuffed animals representing the countries I, or members of my family, have visited. (Yes, I think this counts!) (See the picture)



The night before we went to see the Tut exhibit, Haley’s boss was able to get Mom, Holly, and I tickets to attend a talk at Butler University by Dr. Zahi Hawass, the noted Egyptian archaeologist. He is the Secretary General of the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities and he is a hoot! He spoke of the DNA studies that are being done on various mummies, including two infants buried with Tut, and anticipated discoveries of new tombs. Unfortunately, though, the man was maddening in his refusal to give details on the results; saying only that there will be news conferences in a month and later in the year.