‘A gasp of wonderment escaped our lips’: The dazzling discovery of Tutankhamun’s tomb

“Thirty-three centuries had passed since human feet last trod the floor on which we stood, and yet the signs of recent life were around us.”

Speaking on a programme reviewing the events of 1924, he conjured the uncanny sensation he felt on 12 February that year when they finally reached Tutankhamun’s sarcophagus, the stone coffin where the pharaoh had lain undisturbed for millennia. When he notes details such as “a half‑filled bowl of mortar, a blackened lamp, the chips of wood left on the floor by a careless carpenter”, his sense of wonder comes through as alive as ever.

“We had penetrated two chambers, but when we came to a golden shrine with doors closed and sealed,” he said, “we realised that we were to witness a spectacle such as no other man in our time had been privileged to see.” He removed the precious seal and opened the door to reveal a second shrine “even more brilliant in workmanship than the last”.