My 10yo daughter is studying ancient Egyptian history, and was reading a chapter about the discovery of Tutankhamen’s tomb. She came to me to ask me what a picture caption meant when it said
Mind you, this is a history book aimed at the junior-high level from the Oxford freaking University Press and I think they could have done better with that caption. People began to drop dead? Really?
Anyway she didn’t see how there could really be a curse, so we looked it up. We found that the rumors started with the death of Lord Carnarvon from blood poisoning, and we found out how many people who were present at various events died in the next 10 years. We also found that the other three people most involved with the dig lived fairly long lives.
She decided that it was pretty obvious that there was no curse, and put it in her report. It’s a proud moment for a mother.
Not a word. The rest of the chapter is entirely a good and detailed description of the tomb dig and contents. I never knew that there was a wreath of flowers inside the sarcophagus, on the coffin’s crown. They threw it away.
That’s very cool dangermom, good on both of you. In an odd parallel, when I was 10 years old, I visited the Tutankhamun exhibition when it came to London in 1972. It is returning all these years later. I hope it’s as good.
I’m pretty sure that they think using the term “rumors” implies that it isn’t true. It is a limited amount of space. Still, I could understand kids not getting that, especially with the rest of the wording, so I am definitely proud of your daughter.
We got to go see it in San Francisco in February. It was very good, but a bit sparse–I understand that a lot of the most valuable things are no longer allowed out of Egypt.
Well, what they proved was that the book’s statement that ‘people present at the opening of the tomb began to drop dead’ was false or at least misleading - never mind the question of whether curses exist.
Good point. I was concentrating on the wrong part. Drop dead does imply immediate death, when it was really a bunch of different deaths that were connected by a false rumor.
I’m just saying I get what they were trying to say. But, you are right, that is not good enough in this context.
Yes, that really is the part I object to most. Lord Carnarvon cannot be said to have dropped dead, and the caption makes it sound like a bunch of people just died all of a sudden as soon as the tomb was opened.
