Ada: The real fight wasn't supernatural, it was political. Carter and Carnarvon expected the old custom of partage, a fifty-fifty split of the finds with Egypt. But Egypt had just been declared independent, and the antiquities director, Pierre Lacau, said no. An intact royal tomb belonged one hundred percent to Egypt.
Theo: So the whole model that funded these digs just collapsed under them.
Ada: In nineteen twenty-four Carter staged a walkout and locked the tomb in protest. The government simply seized the keys and barred him for nearly a year. When the dust settled, every object was declared non-exportable Egyptian property. All five thousand, three hundred and ninety-eight of them.
Theo: And that's the part that actually changed the world, more than any curse.
Ada: It did. But Carter didn't leave entirely empty-handed, and not legally. Letters published in twenty twenty-two show he'd quietly handed out amulets from the tomb. One matched the exact mold of others from KV62. A painted head of the king turned up hidden in a wine crate.7
Theo: The man who gave us the greatest archaeological record ever was also pocketing the merchandise.
Ada: Both things are true. Harry Burton shot some twenty-eight hundred glass plates documenting every object in place, a scientific gift. And Carter helped himself on the side. As for the king, when they finally freed the gold mask with heated knives, the mummy was damaged badly in the process.78
Theo: So the boy king who survived three thousand years got broken by the people who found him.
Ada: The water boy's photo survived, though. The treasures stayed in Egypt. And the curse turned out to be the one story nobody could kill, because people never wanted to. If any of this makes you want to stop us and ask a question, you can, any time, right in the middle of an episode.4
Theo: This was Historai, where history answers back.