First, a disclosure: The Muzeo Museum and Cultural Center’s new exhibit on the treasures of King Tutankhamen’s tomb doesn’t include any 3,000-year-old artifacts.
No, these are reproductions, crafted by artisans in the Pharaonic Village in Giza, Egypt, with help from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. But surprisingly, that’s what makes the exhibit, “King Tut: ‘Wonderful Things’ from the Pharaoh’s Tomb,” compelling, and unusual.
Rather than relics faded, chipped and dirtied by millennia, the reproductions of King Tut’s bed, sandals, throne, chariot, favorite game and dozens of other objects buried with him show what these things looked like in their prime.
“Every time you turn a corner, there’s going to be a ‘wow’ factor with a big, golden object,” Daniel Finely, the museum’s executive director, said of the exhibit. The show is arranged by theme, with rooms focusing on Tutankhamen’s public life, private life, burial and the discovery of his tomb. Golden centerpieces abound, such as the gold-covered chariot he was buried with and his gold-covered royal throne.
“It’s an amazing story,” Finley said. “Here we are, 3,000 years later, and we’re still clamoring to learn about Tut.”
King Tutankhamen ruled for only about a decade, from approximately 1332 to 1323 B.C. He died young, at 18 or 19, for reasons that still aren’t definitively known. Some have speculated he was killed by a blow to the head from a rival trying to gain power. More recent evidence has suggested malaria or an infection from a broken leg.
In 1922, British archaeologist Howard Carter was on the verge of losing funding for his explorations in Egypt’s Valley of the Kings, the burial ground for Tutankhamen and other pharaohs who ruled during Egypt’s New Kingdom period.
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Throughout the Muzeo exhibit are enlarged, black-and-white photos showing the tomb as Carter and his team discovered it and while they meticulously cataloged its contents. One photo shows Tutankhamen’s chariot in a jumbled pile with other items he’d need in the afterlife. But the re-creation of the chariot, in the center of one room, is dazzling with its bright gold finish, giving visitors an idea of the lavish surroundings and objects enjoyed by Egyptian royalty, who were seen as divine.
Of course, there’s also the king’s famous death mask and a very realistic-looking mummy replica of Tut as Carter found him, shriveled and shrunken inside gauzy wraps and overlaid with carefully placed ornaments and jewels.
‘King Tut: “Wonderful Things” from the Pharaoh’s Tomb
‘Where: Muzeo Museum and Cultural Center, 241 S. Anaheim Blvd., Anaheim
When: Through Jan. 24. 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesdays-Sundays, closed Mondays
How much: $10 for adults, $6 for kids
Call: 714-956-8936
Online: muzeo.org
