King Tut's Burial Mask Has Been "Irreversibly Damaged"

I came across this article yesterday, much to my dismay....

Brace yourselves, folks. This story is all kinds of messed up. As The Associated Press is reporting, it appears that the beard was quickly glued back on by curators at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo with epoxy, an "irreversible material" that's completely unsuitable for a restoration effort of this importance. Conservators at the museum revealed the incident yesterday.

Frustratingly, the story isn't entirely clear because three of the museum's curators are offering conflicting accounts. It's not known when the incident happened, or whether the iconic beard was accidentally knocked off or removed because it was loose. What we do know, however, is that the curators were "ordered" from above to fix it quickly and that epoxy was used. All three curators refused to give their names for fear of professional reprisals.

Source

Now I don't know how the beard was attached, but for them to just knock it off while cleaning, as some sources indicate, seems incredibly careless. And, as it turns out, they used a regular, off-the-shelf two-part epoxy to glue the beard back on, which is beyond stupid, but then it gets even worse. Somehow, while they were epoxying the beard back on, they also managed to get epoxy on the face...

Another museum conservator, who was present at the time of the repair, said that epoxy had dried on the face of the boy king's mask and that a colleague used a spatula to remove it, leaving scratches. The first conservator, who inspects the artifact regularly, confirmed the scratches and said it was clear that they had been made by a tool used to scrape off the epoxy.

How is it that people that incompetent get put in a position to care for one of the world's most famous historical and archaeological artifacts in the first place? This all sounds like something out of a Three Stooges bit...

I haven't been able to find any pictures of the scratches on the face yet, but I did find this picture of the "repaired" beard:

Take a good look at that, folks....Beautiful repair job, ain't it? I am infuriated beyond words, at the fact that this was allowed to happen. I really, really hope those that were responsible not only lose their jobs, but that they are also hit with the full weight of what they've done....

Some additional sources:
King Tut's Mask Damaged During Botched Cleaning
Burial Mask Of Tutankhamun Is Permanently Damaged...

a reply to: AdmireTheDistance

Who effing cares? People make mistakes and I am sure curators make mistakes also from time to time. It is there to see, not anything else! So what it is glued, it still is cool to look at either way....I don't see any big deal here, maybe if it was personally owned and the owner was trying to sell it...But it is just an artifact for people to view, so what if there is epoxy on it? I guess I don't see a big deal but others might...It's not like the beard was removed and stolen, it is all there! Oh well, still cool to see if it has epoxy on it or not

Sounds like it has the makings of a plot for a new Night At The Museum movie.

Bungling and stupid happen everywhere. Just sad it was this treasure.

a reply to: Chrisfishenstein

Ancient artifact. Dodgy repair job.

If this was your brand new car, awesome paint job, small ding.......it's ok...."just whack some bog on it and paint over it"...type of attitude sit well with you, or anyone?

Same sort of respect, if not a heck of a lot more for something so priceless, needs to be applied to these artifacts.

a reply to: Chrisfishenstein
Of course it's still cool to see. It's not like I wouldn't go to the exhibit because there's some epoxy on the thing. It's just a shame to me, that this thing has survived thousands of years virtually unscathed, and then is permanently damaged by the very people that are charged with caring for it.

Things happen, and it may not be anybody's fault that the beard came off to begin with, but that "repair" is disgraceful. If I were to have done such a shoddy "repair" on anything, at any of the many jobs I've had, I would have been fired for it, and this is a world-famous, essentially priceless historic artifact....

a reply to: AdmireTheDistance

I am not saying it is not a shame...I am saying who really cares enough to make this a big news story? These poor curators are probably going to be banned from artifacts forever now...Everyone makes mistakes and if you made a mistake this big, you would hurry as fast as humanly possible to fix it, not thinking in the process this may not be the best way to do it...I just don't see this as being a big deal, I would still visit to see it and think it is awesome even with epoxy on it...I guess I am saying, this thing is in a museum for people to see...Why does it matter if all the pieces are still there? Do they plan on selling it for billions or something? NO....So people aren't going to not go and see this because of some epoxy...

Well, it's not like it is some ancient, priceless, one of a kind historical artifact.

No wait....

Conservators? Wow, they really take their job seriously, huh?

The more I think about this, the more I wonder.

I wonder if they even got it on straight?

a reply to: butcherguy
It looks like they got it more-or-less straight. Surprisingly. Here's a before-and-after comparison...

I enjoy historical artifacts just as much as the next person, but chris said it best. Mistakes happen part of life. And as of late my feelings on displaying artifacts that were used as part of a burial process or the body itself, is mixed. Part of m feels it is desecration but also important to study the past.

a reply to: AdmireTheDistance

Epoxy took me years to master...of coarse they screwed up.

Whats even more amazing to me is the response here of pffft,,, so what?

Some "professionals" broke off the beard "cleaning" the thing, used epoxy, smeared that around and scratched it "scraping" of the mess they made.

These aren't "curators" and shouldn't be allowed near a museum, let alone touch anything in it, let alone use a spatula (WTF) to scrape epoxy off the most precious thing in Egypt.

Unbelievable.

a reply to: AdmireTheDistance
They were looking for a parchment, or other artifact inside the beard secretly, but screwed up royally covering their tracks. J/K, but it would make for an interesting conspiracy. Hopefully, they are able to minimize the damage done.

what`s the big deal it`s not like they can`t just go to Wal-Mart and get another one...No wait!....and that patchjob? MY GOD! it looks like a 6 year old did that.

casting pearls before swine comes to mind in this case.

a reply to: intrptr
Thank you! I was beginning to think I might be going crazy or something, for thinking this is a big deal.

I don't blame the curators - I blame the higher ups at the museum who told them to fix it quickly before anyone noticed. This is the kind of repair job that you do quickly, and they couldn't have done it any other way given the time constraint. If you want to fix a priceless artifact well it takes a great deal of time and careful planning. The higher ups should have pulled the exhibit and taken the time to fix it properly before bringing it back out.

So don't point your torches and pitchforks at the curators, point them at the rich bastards who own the museum.

originally posted by: AdmireTheDistance
a reply to: intrptr
Thank you! I was beginning to think I might be going crazy or something, for thinking this is a big deal.

No problem. I was mortified at the after pic you brought. The epoxy is clearly visible as a "white band'" between the beard and chin, scratches are visible as well around the area.

Imagine conservators scratching the Mona Lisa painting during cleaning, then covering it up with a lipstick or felt pen or something…

the western world would have fits.

a reply to: peskyhumans
I agree with you, to an extent. But if I were in the same position of being ordered to hastily try to fix a priceless, iconic artifact, knowing the repair would be sub-par (or in this case, just plain disgraceful), I would refuse. Whoever ordered the quick repair answers to somebody, and I'm sure that somebody isn't happy about it and would have sided with the curators, had they refused. And if not, I'd take pride in being fired for refusing to do an inferior job, and defacing a widely important treasure....

a reply to: intrptr
..or smearing some of the ink on the Declaration Of Independence, and 'fixing' it with some white-out and a Bic....Regardless of some opinions, this is a priceless treasure, not just for Egypt (for whom it is the treasure), but for the world, and this could have easily been avoided.

originally posted by: Klassified
a reply to: AdmireTheDistance
They were looking for a parchment, or other artifact inside the beard secretly, but screwed up royally covering their tracks. J/K, but it would make for an interesting conspiracy. Hopefully, they are able to minimize the damage done.

That's what I thought. They didn't even put the beard back on at the proper angle and the position is twisted so the beard setting is completely off. They should have used some simple super glue and the break might have been unnoticeable. As it stands, 1st graders could have done a better job. It doesn't look like they did any prep work to protect the rest of the mask prior to re-attaching the beard. What a shame.

originally posted by: AdmireTheDistance
a reply to: butcherguy
It looks like they got it more-or-less straight. Surprisingly. Here's a before-and-after comparison...

I was looking at the comparison photos and I see a difference.