The problem of the safety of the property of the Egyptian pharaohs, with whom they went to the afterlife, worried the builders of the pyramids. Intricate systems of traps, false passages and cameras, walled-ups and artificial false tombs were used against the robbers. But they especially counted on the terrible power of spells …
Medieval Arab authors give descriptions of the magical "guardians of the pyramids." One of the tombs was guarded by a statue, in the forehead of which a "serpent" was hidden, attacking anyone who approached; another pyramid was guarded by a colossus of black and white onyx with a spear in hand. As soon as an alien appeared, a dull sound was heard from the depths of the statue, and the uninvited guest fell dead. The third was guarded by a stone guard with such unprecedented strength that it knocked down and killed a person.
In addition to the statues, the pyramids were guarded by spirits. Ancient Egyptian sources dully mention a certain "lord of cemeteries". In one case, the spirit took the form of a young man with long teeth and yellowed skin, in the other, it was a naked woman who lured robbers and sent a destructive spell on them. We saw the spirit of the pyramids in the form of an old man who wandered around the tombs, waving fire in a vessel like a censer …
"The spirits of the past are hovering in the valley of the dead …" These warnings of local residents were probably recalled by the English traveler James Brook, when one of the nights in 1768 in the Valley of the Kings he was seized by a sudden panic, fear. Brooke rushed to run, and only the glistening ahead of the Nile made him breathe a sigh of relief. But only when he reached his boat and pushed off the shore, he felt like a man who had returned to life.
The fact that the ancient Egyptians cast special spells on tombs became known to Europeans at the end of the last century, when most of the ancient Egyptian texts were deciphered. But then they did not attach importance to this, and the "curse of the pharaohs" was remembered only in connection with the events around the tomb of Tutankhamun. When archaeologists opened it, they saw two black statues of guards with gilded heads standing at the sealed doors of the royal tomb. Their appearance was reminiscent of the old Arabic descriptions of "guardians of the pyramids" …
After the opening of the tomb, a series of strange deaths began. A few months later, Lord Carnarvon, one of the leaders of the excavation, suddenly dies. He was followed to the next world by his brother, friends, nurse … In total, there are 21 "victims" of the tomb of Tutankhamun. In the late 1950s, it was hypothesized that the mysterious deaths were caused by the histoplasmosis virus contained in bat droppings, which entered Tutankhamun's tomb through the gaps left by ancient robbers. This virus was allegedly inadvertently "deconserved" by researchers. However, the inconsistency of this hypothesis was quickly proved: the bats simply could not get into the tomb, since the hole made by the robbers was filled up more than 3 thousand years ago.
Meanwhile, cases of "revenge of the pharaohs" were noted even before the story of Tutankhamun. Thus, B. Henderson, a doctor of the East India Company, who stole two mummies in Thebes in 1805, went mad a year later. The Swede F. Leadman, who traveled extensively in Egypt, collected an extensive collection of looted items from tombs. But the collection he had prepared for shipment suddenly burned down in a warehouse in Constantinople. In 1914, the Russian researcher V. P. Krasovsky died. Before his death, he was tormented, as he wrote, by the "soul" of the pyramid he had opened. The Egyptian workers who helped with the excavation also died. Krasovsky's colleague, the Englishman Cockcroft, died in a car accident. It was suggested that the pyramid was made of radioactive granite and that the cause of death of Krasovsky and the workers was radiation sickness. However, in the event of a car accident, radioactivity clearly had nothing to do with it …
The last known victim of the "curse of the pharaohs" was the Egyptian archaeologist Mohammed Zakaria Goneim, who made a number of important discoveries in 1952-1954. In particular, he opened and investigated the pyramid of Pharaoh Seheskhet, the son and heir of the first pyramid builder Djoser. Then, when clearing the underground passage, one of the stone blocks of the ceiling suddenly collapsed and buried a worker under it. And in 1957, Goneim himself died tragically.
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Dark stories also occur with ordinary robbers, at their own peril and risk, entering the tombs. For many years, grave-diggers have been living “on loan”, looking for treasures in the underground tombs of the era of the pharaohs. A gloomy spirit hovers over Jabel Abu Sir - a vast desert plateau covered with more than 5 thousand ancient burials. For almost half a century, the bowels of this tract have been a real treasure for scientists and treasure hunters. But already at the very beginning of the excavations, one of the treasure seekers was buried in the tomb he had disturbed with an unexpectedly torn off pile of earth. After the first misfortune, others followed. Several people suffocated in underground tunnels. In one of the tombs in the rubble, 14 treasure hunters died at once. Since then, there has been a gloomy warning among the grave diggers: “Beware! Jabel will call you! Few of them die of natural causes. But two newcomers immediately replace one dead person …
So is there a “curse of the pharaohs” phenomenon? There is no definite answer. Of course, much of what happens to the explorers and tomb robbers can be considered coincidence, but only too many of these coincidences.
Four millennia ago, in a message to the heir, one of the pharaohs taught his descendants: “Don't destroy the tomb, don't destroy, don't destroy. So I did this, and according to my deeds God dealt with me. And the Egyptians believed that the magical eye of Ujat was vigilantly watching the uninvited visitors to the tomb, which allows the dead from the sarcophagus to see the world …
From the book by Nikolai Nepomniachtchi "XX century: Discovery after discovery"