King Tut's gold-encrusted dagger blade made from meteorite

New research by international scientists shows that King Tutankhamun was buried with a dagger blade originating from a meteorite in space.

The dagger buried with King Tutankhamun in the coffin. Photo: Daniela Comelli.

Using a nondestructive X-ray fluorescence spectrometer, a team of Italian and Egyptian researchers confirmed that the iron blade of a dagger found on the right thigh of King Tut's mummy came from a meteorite, Live Science reported. The team, which included researchers from the Polytechnic University of Milan, the University of Pisa, and the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, detailed their findings in the journal Meteoritics and Planetary Science in late May.

The dagger is currently on display in the Egyptian Museum. Described by Howard Carter, who discovered the treasure-filled tomb of King Tutankhamun in 1922, it is a gold dagger with intricate carvings and crystal decorations.

Made from a uniform, rust-free metal material, the blade has a gold-cast handle. The sheath is also made of gold, finished with a lily motif on one side and a feather motif on the other, along with a jackal's head on the edge of the knife.

Technological improvements allowed researchers to determine the blade's composition. "The high nickel content clearly indicates that the iron is of meteoric origin," said Daniela Comelli, a scientist at the Department of Physics at the Polytechnic University of Milan and lead author of the study, Discovery News reported.

Iron meteorites are composed primarily of iron and nickel, with trace amounts of cobalt, phosphorus, sulfur, and carbon. While artifacts made from underground iron ore contain a maximum of 4% nickel, the iron blade of King Tutankhamun’s dagger contains nearly 11% nickel. Further evidence that the blade is a meteorite comes from traces of cobalt.

"The nickel and cobalt ratios in the dagger blade are consistent with those in iron meteorites, which are similar to the primordial ratios during the formation of the planets of the early Solar System," Comelli said. Comelli's team also looked into the origin of the iron blade.

"We looked at all the meteorites found within a 2,000-kilometer radius of the Red Sea and found 20 iron meteorites," Comelli said. "Only one, called Kharga, had nickel and cobalt compositions consistent with the blade."

A fragment of the Kharga meteorite was found in 2000 on a limestone plateau at Mersa Matruh, a seaport 240 km west of Alexandria, Egypt. Research suggests that the ancient Egyptians valued the iron from the meteorite and used it to make valuable objects. It is possible that the ancient Egyptians believed that the pieces of iron falling from the sky carried messages from the gods.

The high quality of the dagger blade buried next to King Tut indicates that ironsmithing was highly developed in the 14th century BC. The dagger blade was not the only object of cosmic origin in the boy king’s tomb. The king’s necklace was strung through a scarab amulet, crafted from siliceous glass from the Libyan desert.

This type of glass is created by the impact of meteorites or comets on the sand. Natural glass only exists in the remote and isolated western desert of Egypt. To produce the amulet, the ancient Egyptians had to travel more than 800 km of desert.

According to VNE