actually...tut was not black. in fact, many of the ancient egyptians had blonde and red hair. what you see now in egypt is a mostly arab that happened circa 700 ad. alexandria has some greek/roman influence and the south has nubians...but the ancient egyptians before they were mixed and their genetics got diluted were actually a rather white bunch.
yuya (father of queen tiy--mother of ankhenaten--the marfan's syndrome pharaoh) and thuya (great-grandmother of tutankhamen) were both BLONDE! hatchepsut was blonde. all in the 18th dynasty. the 19th dynasty seemed to have a lot of red heads, including ramses II.
The mummified remains of numerous pharaohs and common folk from this first great Egyptian civilization have unmistakable White features, while the first written reference to blond hair is made on an Egyptian wall painting of the daughter of the famous pharaoh Cheops, Queen Hetep-Heres II, who is identified specifically by her blond hair.
tutankhamen's items have also a significant amount of nubian and semitic enemies he is shown fighting. he was not nubian (who were actually mostly seen as slaves of the egyptians--the only black dynasty of egypt was the 25th--the end) nor arab (being that they didn't come in until 700 ad).
so it is therefore correct that tut is shown a bit on the paler side.
being that his relatives were blondes, nefertiti certainly wasn't dark-skinned as seen by the bust that was made as a guide for artisans so she wouldn't have to sit in while she was sculpted, rather than official sculpture, therefore why it looks rather different and more lifelike than other depictions of her. not to mention hatchepsut's long blonde hair and rather european anthropologic features. these early dynasties were certainly not nubians, nor arab.
and the chemical mummification argument about it changing their hair falls flat with the "ginger" man at the british museum that was buried in the sand before mummification was started--when the dryness of the desert did the trick. this guy had red hair too.
“The tomb of the wife of Zoser, the builder of the first pyramid in Egypt, has a painting of her showing her with reddish-blond hair.” (‘The Ra Expeditions’, Thor Heyerdahl, Garden City, Doubleday, 1971, p.249)
"A funerary mask with the attributes of the goddess Isis shows a vivid blue-green color of eyes.” (‘A General Introduction to the Egyptian Collections in the British Museum’, London, Harrison and Sons, 1930, p.49)
“The mummy of the wife of King Tutankhamen has auburn hair.” (‘Tutankhamen, The Golden Monarch’, Michael Carter, N.Y. 1972 p.68)
“Red-haired mummies were found in the crocodile-caverns of Aboufaida.” (‘Remarks on Mr. Flinders Petries Collection of Ethnographic Types from the Monuments of Egypt’, Henry George Tomkins, Journal of the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland Vol. XVIIII, 1889, p.216)
“A blond mummy was found at Kawamil along with many chestnut-colored ones.” (‘L'Aryen, Sa Vie Sociale’, De Lapouge, G. Vacher,. Paris, Pichat, 1899, p.26)
“Amenhotep III's tomb painting shows him as having light red hair.” (‘Ancient Egypt, Discovering its Splendors’, National Geographic Society, 1978 p.103)
“An Egyptian scribe named Sakkarah around 2500 B.C. has blue eyes.” (‘Life of the Ancient Egyptians’, Eugen Strouhal, Norman, Oklahoma, University of Oklahoma Press, 1992, p.53)
“A common good luck charm was the eye of Horus, the so-called Wedjat Eye. The eye is always blue, and the word "wedjat" means "blue" in Egyptian. Queen Thi is painted as having a rosy complexion, blue eyes and blond hair.” (‘Races Humaines de la Vallee du Nil’, E.T. Hamy, Bulletin de la Societe d'Anthropologie de Paris, 1886, p.739)
“Paintings from the Third Dynasty show native Egyptians with red hair and blue eyes.” (‘Historia del Arte Vol III’, Jose Pijoan, Madrid, Espasa-Calpe, 1932, plate XI)
“The god Nuit was painted as white and blond.” (‘Le Nil et la Societe Egyptienne’, H. Champollion, Marseille, Musee Boreby, 1973 p.94)
“A painting from Iteti's tomb at Saqqara shows a very Nordic-looking man with blond hair.” (‘Painting, Sculpture and Architecture of Ancient Egypt’, Wolfhart Westendorf, New York, Harry N. Abrams, Inc. 1968 p.65)
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