The (unfulfilled) wish that Howard Carter confessed to ABC

“Confidentially, giving all his emotion and lyricism,” Villaseca wrote, Carter described how “everything changed in an instant” on November 4, 1922. His tireless search for the tomb of the child Pharaoh in the Valley of the Kings was finally rewarded that day. “When I went to work I saw the novelty, was surprised by an interrupted silence. My men had found the first rung of the ladder and were waiting for my orders. The archaeologist encouraged them to continue and he himself began “feverishly” clearing with his ax the steps leading to the first brick door of the tomb.

He said, “At other moments, the dazzling sight of the porch and the entrance to the crypt created within me a feeling that was perhaps more beautiful, but not as triumphant.”

Carter, who paused “like a wise storyteller”, described his dazzle at the treasures of Tutankhamun’s vestibule and assured that no other funerary monument like the crypt made him experience so intensely “the sensation of a dream of death”. .

When Carter visited Spain the last lid of the sarcophagus containing the pharaoh’s mummy had not yet been opened. “I think it represents a little boy of 18 or 20 years of age, and it is probable that he held in his hands a precious and revealing book, which would perhaps be the best treasure that his tomb has given us, ” He then guessed without knowing. The magnificent gold mask of Tutankhamun, the most famous example of all Egyptian art.

As the conversation progressed, the journalist asked him if he had other archaeological projects. “Yes. Excavation of two more tombs of Pharaoh“Carter replied.” But on the next logical question about what tombs he dreamed of finding, the Egyptologist smiled “without wishing to go into other details about the matter”. » Years later, he leaked to the press his intention to discover the tomb Alexander the Great in Alexandria, but there is no evidence that he completed that undertaking,” Myriam Sacco and Javier Martínez say in their book Tutankhamun. Howard Carter in Spain’. And “he spoke on some occasion cleopatra«Seco connects to ABC. The place of both burials remains a mystery.

The discoverer of Tutankhamun’s tomb said goodbye with words of gratitude for the attention he received in Spain. Madrid is one of the most beautiful cities in Europe. Moreover, since after archeology I am not interested in anything other than painting, Madrid and Toledo have provided me with unforgettable moments. With such a good guide as the Duke of Alba, I have spent the morning in the Prado Museum, of which you are proud. Carter donated the cliches and films used at his conferences to the Spanish-British Committee chaired by the Duke of Alba so that the findings could be disseminated to provincial capitals. “Spain is going to have a long season of Tutankhamun,” he predicted.

After the great impact of these first conferences, Count Gimeno translated into Spanish the first volume of Carter’s memoirs on ‘The Tomb of Tutankhamun’, which he published in 1923. They were first published in Spain in the magazine ’18 Foci. ‘Blanco and Negro’ in 1925 and 1926.

Three years later, in June 1928, Carter made his last trip to Spain and once again filled theaters with his lectures. His friendship with the Duke of Alba lasted until the Egyptologist’s death in 1939.