Tutankhamun Trivia
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50 free Tutankhamun trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Tutankhamun trivia quiz covers the boy pharaoh who mattered little in life and became the most famous Egyptian of all in death. The easy questions cover the basics: the dynasty he belonged to, roughly how old he was when he died, the man who found his tomb in 1922, the patron who paid for the dig, the mask everyone recognises and the nickname the newspapers gave him. From there it moves through his birth name and what it meant, the religious revolution of his father Akhenaten that he and his advisers reversed, the queen he married, the two daughters buried with him and the vizier and general who followed him on the throne. The harder end covers the DNA that made his parents full siblings, the malaria and the broken leg, the 130 walking sticks that showed no wear, the tomb number, the water boy who may have found the first step, the day the seal was broken, the meteorite dagger, the objects recycled from earlier owners, the amulet Carter is said to have stolen, Carnarvon's death and the curse that never was, the touring exhibitions that drew millions and the whale named after him in 2023. Every answer was checked against Tutankhamun's encyclopaedia entry before publishing and the supporting sentence is stored with each question. Our Ancient Egypt and Egyptian Mythology quizzes are natural companions.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01To which dynasty of ancient Egypt did Tutankhamun belong?
The Eighteenth
Tutankhamun was the Eighteenth Dynasty's third-to-last pharaoh, ruling roughly 1332 to 1323 BC; the same dynasty produced Hatshepsut, Thutmose III and Akhenaten.
Q 02About how old was Tutankhamun when he died?
18
He died at about 18 or 19, around 1323 BC, after a reign of roughly nine years; the age is estimated from the incomplete fusion of his bones.
Q 03Which god's cult at Thebes did Tutankhamun restore to prominence, undoing Atenism?
Amun
He and his queen swapped the -aten in their names for -amun and recorded the change on the Restoration Stela.
Q 04From which capital, built by Akhenaten, did Tutankhamun move the royal court on becoming king?
Amarna
Akhenaten's capital at Amarna (Akhetaten) was abandoned; the court went to Memphis for administration, and Thebes regained its role as the great religious centre.
Q 05According to DNA testing, what was the relationship between Tutankhamun's parents?
Full brother and sister
Full brother and sister: the 2010 DNA study found both parents were children of Amenhotep III and Tiye, the father being the KV55 mummy (thought to be Akhenaten) and the mother the 'Younger Lady'.
Q 06Which of Akhenaten's daughters did Tutankhamun marry?
Ankhesenpaaten
Ankhesenpaaten, Akhenaten's third daughter, later took the name Ankhesenamun; after Tutankhamun's death she disappears from the record.
Q 07How old was Tutankhamun when he became pharaoh?
Eight or nine
He became pharaoh at eight or nine, around 1332 BC, after the short reigns of Akhenaten's successors Smenkhkare and Neferneferuaten.
Q 08What throne name did Tutankhamun take on his accession?
Nebkheperure
Priests of his cult held titles such as 'First Prophet of Nebkheperure'.
Q 09Which official, 'overseer of the treasuries', carried out Tutankhamun's restoration programme?
Maya
Maya, overseer of the treasuries, directed the rebuilding of the temples; his own tomb at Saqqara, near Horemheb's, was rediscovered in 1986.
Q 10At Karnak, Tutankhamun laid out an avenue of sphinxes leading to the temple of which goddess?
Mut
The avenue led to the precinct of Mut, Amun's consort, south of the main Karnak temple; its sphinxes, first carved for Akhenaten and Nefertiti, were given new ram heads.
Q 11With which northern kingdom did Tutankhamun re-establish diplomatic relations?
The Mitanni
Relations with the Mitanni, the Hurrian kingdom on the upper Euphrates, were renewed; gifts from various countries in his tomb suggest the diplomacy worked, while campaigns against Nubians and Asiatics were recorded.
Q 12Tutankhamun was one of the few pharaohs to be what during his own lifetime?
Worshipped as a god
Worshipped as a god in his own lifetime, Tutankhamun had temples to his deified form built in Nubia, an honour most kings received only after death.
Q 13Which two medical conditions have been confirmed in Tutankhamun's mummy?
Q 21Why was Tutankhamun buried in a sepulchre unusually small for a king?
His royal tomb was unfinished when he died unexpectedly
His royal tomb was unfinished when he died unexpectedly at about 18; burial had to happen within the customary 70 days, so a smaller tomb meant for someone else was adapted.
Q 22What is the number of Tutankhamun's tomb in the Valley of the Kings?
KV62
KV62's entrance lay under debris and workmen's huts from the later cutting of KV9, the tomb of Ramesses VI, which hid it from robbers; KV55 held the mummy thought to be his father.
Q 23Which American excavator gave up the Valley of the Kings concession in 1914, declaring the valley 'exhausted'?
Malaria and a leg fracture
DNA showed repeated infection with the most severe malaria strain; the compound fracture showed no healing.
Q 14How could scientists tell Tutankhamun's leg broke before death, not during modern handling?
Embalming substances were inside the fracture
Embalming substances were found inside the fracture of his left femur on the 2005 CT scan, so the break had to predate mummification; it was probably suffered days before his death.
Q 15How many canes and sticks were found in Tutankhamun's tomb?
More than 130
More than 130 canes and sticks were catalogued; the 2010 CT and DNA study tied them to his clubfoot and Köhler disease, which would have made walking painful.
Q 16How tall was Tutankhamun's mummy?
About 167 cm (5 ft 6 in)
About 167 cm (5 ft 6 in): slightly built and a little taller than average for the period, with good teeth and the pronounced overbite seen in his family line.
Q 17What did the 1968 X-ray find inside Tutankhamun's skull that briefly fuelled a murder theory?
Two loose bone fragments
Two loose bone fragments showed up in Ronald Harrison's 1968 X-ray; the 2005 CT scan showed they came from the embalming or the modern unwrapping, not from a blow to the head.
Q 18Which successor is shown performing the opening-of-the-mouth ritual on Tutankhamun's burial chamber wall?
Ay
The rite was performed by the next pharaoh, so Ay's succession was settled by the funeral; he was probably an old man.
Q 19Which commander-in-chief of Tutankhamun's army eventually became pharaoh after Ay?
Horemheb
Horemheb, who had been the army's commander-in-chief and Tutankhamun's designated deputy, took the throne after Ay and later chose Ramesses I as his heir.
Q 20The search for Tutankhamun's missing mortuary temple led in 2021 to the discovery of what?
The lost city of Aten
Zahi Hawass's team, hunting for the mortuary temple near Medinet Habu, instead uncovered the lost city of Aten, a 'golden city' founded by Amenhotep III, announced in April 2021.
Theodore Davis
Theodore Davis had found Tutankhamun's embalming cache (KV54) and a small pit with gold foil bearing the king's name, and declared that pit to be the lost tomb.
Q 24Who led the excavation that found Tutankhamun's tomb?
Howard Carter
He had begun a systematic search of the valley in 1915 and took ten years to catalogue the finds.
Q 25Which aristocrat financed Carter's excavations?
The 5th Earl of Carnarvon
George Herbert took up Egyptology after a doctor sent him to Egypt's warm climate following a 1901 car accident.
Q 26On what date was the first step of the tomb's staircase uncovered?
4 November 1922
On 4 November 1922 Carter's workmen uncovered the first step; some accounts credit a water boy, Hussein Abdel-Rassoul, digging outside the work area.
Q 27How many items were found in Tutankhamun's tomb?
5,398
Carter's team catalogued 5,398 items, among them a solid gold coffin, trumpets, a lotus chalice, food, wine, sandals and linen loincloths.
Q 28How long did the excavator take to catalogue the contents of the tomb?
10 years
Howard Carter took 10 years, from 1922 to 1932, to clear and catalogue the tomb, the most intact royal burial ever found in the Valley of the Kings.
Q 29The blade of a dagger found in the tomb was made of iron from what source?
A meteorite
The iron came from a meteorite: a 2016 X-ray fluorescence study showed the blade's nickel and cobalt levels match meteoritic iron; a miniature headrest, an Eye of Horus amulet and chisel blades were also iron.
Q 30Whose cartouches were found beneath Tutankhamun's on the golden Nut pectoral and canopic coffins?
Neferneferuaten's
Neferneferuaten's cartouches, partly erased and overwritten with Tutankhamun's, show that many burial goods, including the canopic coffinettes, were recycled from a predecessor who was probably a female king.