The Harem Conspiracy

Overheard at National Geographic

National Geographic

Science, Society & Culture

4.5 • 10.1K Ratings

🗓️ 16 July 2019

⏱️ 23 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Murder, succession, and a 18-foot scroll of papyrus that reads like an ancient Egyptian episode of Law and Order. We get the lowdown on the Judicial Papyrus of Turin. For more information on this episode visit nationalgeographic.com/overheard Want More? Read about the bloody coup described in the Judicial Papyrus of Turin, as well as other poignant examples of law and order in ancient Egypt. Learn more about the Queens of Egypt exhibition at the National Geographic Museum. Also Explore: Explore the Book of the Dead, ancient Egypt's guide to the underworld. See the artifacts that honor Egypt's powerful queens. Test your knowledge of ancient Egypt. If you like what you hear and want to support more content like this, please consider a National Geographic subscription. Go to natgeo.com/exploremore to subscribe today. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	We're at the National Geographic Museum here in Washington, D.C. for a magnificent new exhibition on Queens of Egypt.
0:11.0	So it's 8.30 in the morning. The museum hasn't even opened yet.
0:15.0	And we're getting a special tour from archaeologist and residence, Fred Hebert.
0:19.0	It's got 350 artifacts in it from the very oldest collection of Egyptian antiquities actually in the world.
0:29.0	When Fred's not out in the field studying ancient trade routes or searching for never-tidies tomb, he's back here helping to curate this museum.
0:37.0	Fred winds us through the dimly lit exhibit. He points out a perfectly preserved royal sandal, a bust of Cleopatra, some stone statues of pharaohs from the Valley of the Kings.
0:49.0	That's a life-sized sculpture of Tuttmost, the first.
0:53.0	This is clearly a man who loves his job.
0:56.0	Opening the boxes is like Christmas 350 times over. Here's this big box that has no label whatsoever.
1:03.0	We know that we have to open the box and it's like, wait, wait.
1:07.0	Oh, it's Tuttmost!
1:09.0	He brings us over to a long glass case.
1:13.0	So we have here an absolutely unique papyrus. It's about 18 feet long describing this conspiracy that happened to pop off the pharaoh.
1:26.0	Fred says the text is written in Hyratic, a cursive form of hieroglyphics. It's really beautiful.
1:33.0	But the details written down here, those are not pretty.
1:37.0	It's a judicial document. It's a record of a court proceeding in which the court has identified a couple of perpetrators who were scheming to assassinate pharaoh Ramses III.
1:50.0	It describes having the perpetrators plead guilty. It describes how the perpetrators were forced to commit suicide.
1:59.0	It's all written down here.
2:02.0	39 people were convicted of high treason. Some were disfigured. Others were executed or forced to kill themselves.
2:10.0	This papyrus tells the story of an inside job, a conspiracy hatched by the pharaoh's own family by one of his wives.
2:20.0	I'm Peter Gwynn, and this is overheard at National Geographic, a show where we eavesdrop on the wild conversations we have at NGEO and follow them to the edges of our big, weird and beautiful world.
2:38.0	This week, a dynasty in disarray, a secret kept from millennia, and some new science that cracks the case wide open.
	...

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