Scientists offer insights into death of King Tut

The sophisticated CT scans carried out by his team could pick out the residue of the resin used to preserve bodies in ancient Egypt, allowing the scientists to deduce when damage to the bones had occurred. A second clue was found by examining a major fracture in Tut's left thigh bone. The femur had a thin coating of embalming resin around the break, indicating that Tut had broken his leg just before he died and that his death may have resulted from an infection or other complications, Selim said. Another possibility is a fat embolism, which could have acted like a clot to cause a heart attack."The leg fracture was induced just before death," said Selim. "When they embalmed the body and poured liquid resin, it went through a wound to coat the edges of the fracture."

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