Suez Blocked the Pharaoh’s Curse? Rumors made by the mummy 22nd march

After March 23, when a super-large container ship blocked the Suez Canal, news of various accidents lined up in Egypt. According to Arab News, on March 26, two trains crashed in the south, killing 32 people and injuring more than 100. It was an accident that occurred when someone pulled on an emergency safety device and the train suddenly stopped and another train that was following collided. The very next day, a residential building collapsed in the capital Cairo, killing 18 and wounding 24. The structure of the bridge under construction in two places, including Giza, collapsed. There were also fires in three or more cities.

The Daily Mail, a popular magazine in the UK, dealt with this with an article titled’Does the Curse of the Pharaoh Become Real?’ Social media users claim that this series of events is related to the transfer of the 22 ancient Egyptian mummies from the Egyptian Museum on April 3 to the National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, which opened in 2017. The Daily Mail reported that social media users were telling the old curse of saying,’If you disturb the king’s tranquility, you will die suddenly.’

It is said that “Ramses’ Revenge: The Suez Canal confusion in Egypt and the other two disasters were attributed to the’Pharaoh’s Curse’ for the plan to move Ramses II’s body,” said The Sun, the UK’s No. 1 publication. ‘ In fact, among the 22 ancient Egyptian mummies relocating on April 3, there is also the mummies of Ramses II, the most famous of the ancient Egyptian pharaohs.
The Israeli Jerusalem Post, which is not a popular paper, also posted a related article with the title, “Is the Curse of the Pharaohs Caused the Suez Canal Crisis and Other Egyptian Disasters?” He said, “Many people are concerned that a supernatural cause might have contributed to the difficulties in Egypt.” It is the same as telling stories that appear on social media. NBC Broadcasting in the US and ABC News in Australia also reported this.

‘Pharaoh’s Curse’ or’Tutankhamen’s Curse’ is an old repertoire that has been around for 100 years. It is almost a classic class among the’curse series’ that have come and go in the mouths of people and media. It has already become the subject of numerous movies and horror films. Such an absurd story has been struck by social media in the 21st century.
Tutankhamun was a pharaoh who ruled the country in the second half of the 18th dynasty of ancient Egypt (approximately 1549/1550 B.C. to 1292 B.C.E.), approximately 1342 B.C. to 1325 B.C. His cemetery in Luxor, central Egypt, was excavated by British archaeologist Howard Carter, sponsored by British financier Sir George Herbert Kannaburn. Almost perfect Pharaoh’s coffins, golden masks, and more than 5,000 burial items were found, thanks to sheltering under another cemetery to avoid robbery.

The discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb was made on November 4, 1922, and all burial items were unearthed until February 17, 1923. Two months later, on April 5, 1923, the patron Lord Kanaburn died in Cairo, Egypt, at the age of 56, and became more famous around the world. At the time, a popular British newspaper reported this, adding an unfounded story that his death was due to the’curse of the pharaohs’.

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, European nations brought countless ancient treasures from Egypt to their homes and filled them in museums, arousing speculation with a strange curiosity about mummies and ancient Egyptian civilization. As a result, the absurd claim of’the curse of the mummy’ was born. In 1912, even before the tomb of Tutankhamun was unearthed, when the latest passenger ship Titanic, which was confident that it would never sink, sank, there was also an endless claim of’the curse of the mummy’.
Along with the death of Lord Carnarvon, an investigation into the people who died before and after the excavation revealed that there was no mysterious death. But speculation continues to this day.
Responding to some social media users claiming that the Suez accident was due to the curse of the pharaoh, Egyptian archaeologist Dr. Zahi Hawas told the Egyptian Daily Independent, “I was astonished to hear such a rumor. Bad luck, sickness, and death have never happened.”

In fact, the’Curse Series’ hits the media around the world from time to time. There is no basis. Nevertheless, such a’supernatural curse’ is dealt with in a good country. Social media is even more enthusiastic.
In the United States,’The Curse of Tecumse’ is famous. It is said that the American Indian chief Tecumse, who died in 1813 while resisting the United States, cursed that the president of the United States, elected in a year that ends at zero every 20 years, will die during his term of office. This is a’curse theory’ that spreads only when John F. Kennedy, who was elected in 1960, was assassinated in 63.
Strangely enough, this is the case for the president who died during his tenure in the United States. William Henry Harrison, elected in 1840, died of pneumonia the following year, and Abraham Lincoln, first elected in 1860, was assassinated in 1865 after the Civil War. James Garfield, who was elected in 1880, and William Mackenzie, who was reelected in 1900, were assassinated. Warren Harding, who was elected in 1920, died of a heart attack in 1923, and Franklin Roosevelt, who was re-elected in 1940, died of a brain hemorrhage in 1945.
However, Ronald Reagan, who was first elected in 1980, was shot by an attempted assassin, but saved his life and was re-elected safely. George W. Bush, who was elected in 2000, was attacked by a grenade while speaking in Georgia in 2005, but he was fine. Since these two presidents are the exceptions, the story was added that this time,’they saved their lives because they did well to the Indians.’ It is a curse theory of persistent vitality.

The theory of curse also exists in the communist world. In the former Soviet Union, Timur’s curse turned into a plausible story. The story begins in 1941 when Soviet dictator Iosif Stalin sent archaeologists to Samarkand, Uzbekistan to excavate the tomb of Timur, a Muslim conqueror in Central Asia in the 14th century. According to this, the curse was written on Timur’s sarcophagus, saying,’Whoever touches my sanctuary will be subjected to more invasion than I did.’ However, archaeologists ignored this and opened the tomb. Then, just a few days later, the Soviets were invaded by Nazi Germany at the order of Adolf Hitler. The Soviet Union lost 26 million lives in this war. The following year, in 1942, Stalin again sent an archaeologist to close Timur’s sarcophagus. After that, the Soviet Union won the Battle of Stalingrad in early February 1943 and turned the war from defensive to offensive. No matter how much you look at it, history fits together.

After these curses, 22 mummies, including 18 kings and 4 queens or queens, moved politely from Cairo, the capital of Egypt, on April 3rd. The Ministry of Tourism and Archaeology in Egypt named the event’Pharaoh’s Golden March’. The BBC reported that Egyptian authorities spent millions of US dollars on the event.
The BBC reported that they left the peach-colored Egyptian Museum building built in 1902 and moved to the National Museum of Egyptian Civilization, 5 km away, in 30 minutes. According to the Associated Press, the mummies lined up from Sekenenra Taa II, a pharaoh of the 17th Dynasty (1580 BC to 1550 BC), to Ramses 9, a pharaoh of the 20th Dynasty (1189 BC to 1072 BC). Moved.
The BBC said it included Ramses II, who ruled Egypt for 67 years and signed the Kadesh Treaty, the world’s first peace treaty between Egypt and neighboring Hittites. A replica of the relief inscribed with this treaty is displayed at the United Nations headquarters in New York, USA to commemorate the world’s first peace treaty.

Ramses II left huge structures all over Egypt, including the massive temples of Abu Simbel and his statues. Thanks to him, he became the most famous pharaoh in Egypt. He is also one of the candidates for pharaoh for Moses’ escape from Egypt in the Old Testament.
In the Egyptian Museum, his mummies and the mummies of some famous pharaohs have been unveiled in special exhibitions. In addition to the admission fee, the audience had to pay a substantial admission fee. I saw it in 1998, and even though it was a mummy of an old man who died at the age of 90, Ramses II looked tall and epic.

Hatshepsut’s mummy, known as the second female monarch in Egyptian history, also moved through this march. The Egyptian authorities put a lot of effort into this golden march. A model of an ancient ship used at an ancient funeral was made and a mummified inside it was loaded onto a vehicle. It is modeled after a funeral ship used to move from Thebes, an ancient city on the east side of the Nile, where Luxor is located, to a tomb built in the’Valley of Kings’ on the west side of the river.
The mummy was placed in a box filled with nitrogen, and care was taken not to be damaged by environmental changes. All mobile vehicles are equipped with anti-shock devices. Motorcycles escorted around the vehicle, and an ancient tank pulled by two horses was reproduced and followed. Here, a large number of people led the procession in ancient Egyptian costumes. The road was also repaved to make the vehicle pass smoothly, the BBC said. The pharaoh’s march was seen by the Egyptian President Abdel Fatah El Sisi in person.

The targets to be moved this time are the mummy of a pharaoh, queen, and queen of the Egyptian New Dynasty (1550 B.C. to 1069 B.C.E.). Their mummies were uniquely gathered in one or two places. In 1881, a robber named Abdel Rasul is known to have found it when a goat fell into a burrow. Even in ancient times, there were many robbers who aimed for mummies’ treasures, so it seems that ancient priests suffered from headaches. So I used all the methods, such as moving the tomb several times, but it was useless. Even Ramses II was moved to another queen’s tomb, and after 72 hours, he moved to another place in a hurry to avoid the eyes of a robber, but it seemed to be useless. Eventually, the ancient priests wrapped more than 50 mummies of pharaohs, queens, and queens back in linen, recorded who they were there, and how they were moved, put them in wooden coffins, and stored them in a burrow. This collective mummy tomb is now called TT320 (in the past DB320).
This time, many years have passed without robbery. There was no treasure. Abdel Rasul, a robber who discovered it in 1881, sold it to a French archaeologist, and was caught by the authorities.

Eventually, all the royal mummies discovered in 1898 were moved to Cairo. Most were on board ships from Luxor and traveled across the Nile to Cairo. Local residents are said to see off the ancient pharaoh leaving while weeping. Some women are said to have loosened their hair. Very few were carried in the first class car on the train. The descendants of 3000 to 3500 years later treated the ancient pharaohs as kings and queens.
Those who had already sought refuge in the TT320 through several places in ancient times were already moved to Cairo more than 100 years ago to make the museum their new home. Then I moved to a new house this time. Looking at this process, there is no limit to calling the curse of the pharaoh or the curse of the mummy. There have never been any reports of supernatural phenomena related to mummies.
If the curse of a pharaoh or mummy spreads like this, it is the Egyptian tourism authorities that benefit. In addition to the existing Egyptian Museum, Egypt will have the Egyptian Civilization Museum, where the mummies moved, and the Grand Egyptian Museum in Giza, which is scheduled to open this year. It seems to be an attempt to disperse the relics concentrated in the Egyptian museum and open more special exhibitions in a wider space, highlighting the ancient cultural heritage of Egypt and maximizing tourism profits. Egypt is preparing for a post-corona future, not a pharaoh’s past. With this mobile performance, Egypt has succeeded in promoting them to the world again as a tourist resource.

Reporter Chae In-taek, JoongAng Ilbo, international journalist [email protected]