Howard Carter was a British archaeologist. An archaeologist is a person who digs up and studies the remains and ruins of the dead.
Carter’s passion was Egyptian kings. On November 26, 1922, after five years of digging in the Valley of the Kings, Carter found an entrance to a hidden tomb. His discovery turned out to be one of the most important finds in the history of archaeology. It was the sealed 3,200-year-old tomb of King Tutankhamen (also called King Tut).
First, the workers found 16 steps buried under the sand. At the bottom, they uncovered a doorway. Behind that was a passage and, at the end of it, a door marked with the seal of Tutankhamen. As he worked his way into the tomb, Carter could see life-size statues, golden couches, glittering chests, animals, and “everywhere the glint of gold.”
Carter had to work slowly on his discovery. Every object had to be photographed, and the area had to be mapped, cleaned, and documented. It would be three more years before he could open the coffins. It was almost ten years before he could examine all the statues, furniture, and shrines of the tomb of the man now known as the Golden Pharaoh.
