Beard of Egypt’s King Tut hastily glued back on with epoxy

CAIRO – The blue and gold braided beard on the burial mask of famed pharaoh Tutankhamun was hastily glued back on with epoxy, damaging the relic after it was knocked during cleaning, conservators at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo said Wednesday.

The museum is one of the city’s main tourist sites, but in some areas, ancient wooden sarcophagi lay unprotected from the public, while pharaonic burial shrouds, mounted on walls, crumble from behind open panels of glass. Tutankhamun’s mask, more than 3,300 years old, and other contents of his tomb are its top exhibits.

Three of the museum’s conservators reached by telephone gave differing accounts of when the incident occurred last year, and whether the beard was knocked off by accident while the mask’s case was being cleaned, or was removed because it was loose.

They agree, however, that orders came from above to fix it quickly and that an inappropriate adhesive was used. All spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of professional reprisals.

“Unfortunately, he used a very irreversible material – epoxy has a very high property for attaching and is used on metal or stone, but I think it wasn’t suitable for an outstanding object like Tutankhamun’s golden mask,” one conservator said.

The conservator said the mask now shows a gap between the face and the beard.