The Excavation of Tutankhamun’s Mummy | King Tut in Color

NARRATOR: At last, in October 19, 2005, after three years of excavating Tutankhamun's tomb, Howard Carter and his team begin to open the king's coffin. Lifting its lid exposes another shroud. When Carter carefully peels that back, he discovers a second gild coffin even more magnificent. It has to be hoisted out of the first, revealing decorations of iridescent blue, green, and red glass inlay. And inside that, a third coffin. But this one is covered with a thick black perfumed resonance material. With hammering, chemical solvents, and heat, Carter's team gradually cleans it. What this reveals is incredible. While the two outer coffins were crafted from wood and covered in gold, this one is made of solid gold. Winged goddesses protect the king who holds the crook and flail, symbols of royal power. It takes eight men to lift its lid to reveal the most incredible sight of all. Tutankhamun's mummy is covered in jewels and crowned with an exquisite mask of solid gold, glass, and precious stones.

AIDAN DODSON: And colorization really brings out something. There is this amazing helmet mask of solid gold inlaid with glass. There's this great scarab on its breast. There are gold hands. There are inlaid strips with magical formulae all over the whole thing. No one had ever seen this before, a pharaoh laid exactly as he had been by the priests 3 and 1/2 thousand years ago.

NARRATOR: The image of the gold mask shoots around the world. But nowhere is its impact greater than in Egypt itself.

HEBA ABD EL-GAWAD: This was a very highly emotional moment in Egypt. The discovery was used as a reassertion of the Egyptian identity and a proof of us being the descendants of the ancient Egyptians, which means that we're not supposed to be ruled by any foreigners. This meant that Tutankhamun had to stay in Egypt and it were for the Egyptians.

NARRATOR: As Carter struggles to remove the mask from the mummy, its beard becomes detached, revealing boyish looks. And here we have an explanation of why his tomb is so small. This is not the tomb of an old ruler. The remains are of a teenage boy. Later research suggests he died age 19. There hadn't been time to finish an official tomb. So the jumbled objects and small tomb are explained. It was quickly assembled for the untimely death of a young man.