Protests over light-skinned King Tut exhibit
CVK
The Museum of Art in Fort Lauderdale is at the center of a controversy surrounding its new exhibit, “Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs.” Why the uproar? Because the museum is exhibiting arguably Caucasian-looking CGI busts of King Tut. From the Houston Chronicle:
“We’re visual people, so whatever they throw at us, we’re going to take it as a fact, when in reality it’s just a theory,” said demonstrator Asante Waa. “We’re afraid of the implications that this re-creation is going to have on kids, especially on black kids.”
Particularly controversial in the exhibit are computer-generated busts of Tut with a skin tone that critics say make him look Caucasian.
“For the Image of the Living God — as Tutankhamun represents — to be replaced with anything else but a black man’s is a slap in the face,” said Alicia Milligen, a Lauderhill, Fla., nurse.
Jeff Stevens wrote:
I know there is a drive among american afro-centrics to make Egyptians “black” in the Michael Jordan or Shaquille O’Neal sense of the word , but the supporting evidence just isn’t there. While I haven’t seen the pictures in question , I do know the Nefertiti bust which clearly shows “caucasian” skin. Most Egyptian art depicts a people of a tan to copper color.
The comment by the nurse about him not being depicted as a black man being a slap in the face shows a clear lack of true knowledge of Egyptology or Egyptian art. The Egyptians themselves made clear distinction between themselves and their darker southern neighbors (Sudan etc ) and their paler western ones in Libya. One could arguably say they were “black” based on a one-drop mentality, but if so then why is it important to alter the appearance or color since american blacks are the first to complain when a white appearing mixed person doesn’t identify as black? You can’t have it both ways.
Posted 19 Dec 2005 at 5:56 pm ¶
BROWN IS A COLOR wrote:
Actually, ancient Egyptians weren’t White…or Black. They were brown. Just like Jesus was too.
Afrocentrists shouldn’t base their racial self-esteem on such faulty claims.
Posted 19 Dec 2005 at 6:02 pm ¶
Ben wrote:
oh my god. the current president of egypt is (arguably) caucasian looking! he appears to have light skin! what will the implications be for black children in america?
egypt is but a small corner of africa, closer to greece, turkey, and most of the middle east than to any non-adjacent african nations. for king tut to have had light (brown) skin is not only plausible, it is highly likely.
furthermore, for people to see this (unarguably) african figure with features that have heretofore been considered (arguably) caucasian might help us understand the silliness of racial classification. i mean, if an african person can look white, doesn’t that complicate things?
(incidentally, the US government considers Egyptians white. scroll to the bottom.)
Posted 19 Dec 2005 at 7:43 pm ¶
JK wrote:
More importantly, ancient Egyptians are closest in relation to African and Middle-Eastern ethnicities. The Afro-Asiatic language group included the language that the Egyptians spoke is considered, by almost every expert on the subject, to have originated in Africa, probably in modern Ethiopia or the Sudan. The top three most spoken Afro-Asiatic languages today are Arabic, Hausa, and Afaan Oromo. Hausa and Afaan Oromo are spoken solely by people, from Niger/Nigeria and Ethiopia respectively, who would be considered “black Africans.”
The Egyptians were undoubtedly mixed according to modern racial standards (backed up by population genetics studies; search for info on the E3b haplogroup). They got their language and probably other cultural traits from a small presumably “black” group that replaced many of the older pre-Afro-Asiatic traits. Whatever the actual mix was, it is the actual HISTORY and not just images of Ancient Egypt that should be stressed. The same should be stressed by the shared linguistic history of the groups I’ve mentioned to the Semitic language speakers in the Middle-east and the Berber speakers in North Africa. I highly recommend Christopher Ehret’s “The Civilizations of Africa: A History to 1800″ which actually bases itself on linguistics and related studies and not the questionable sources of an Afrocentrist like Cheikh Anta Diop.
Importantly, things like this show that “race mixing” isn’t some modern thing (remember the finding of the judge in the Loving vs. Virginia case, who claimed that God put the races on seperate continents so as not to mix) but goes back to one of the oldest known civilizations. And it wasn’t a case of “whites civilizing (insert non-European group)” which some try to stress in the “Aryan invasion theory” of the Indian subcontinent.
Posted 19 Dec 2005 at 9:49 pm ¶
Kaonashi wrote:
I always pictured him as being a dark tan peanut butter color…not really dark but not Caucasian either. When I was younger I studed almost everything I could get my hands on about Ancient Egypt, and I saw the peanut butter color the most, then copper, then the darker, burnt sienna hues, and then the even darker hues; nothing that would be really considered “Caucasian.” The art and busts of the Egyptian Queens Tiyi and Hatshepsut definitely depict them as having African features and dark skin, while the bust of Nefertiti is much lighter.
I personally haven’t seen a lot of Egyptian art or murals with people who look Caucasian on them and with the King Tut collection the vast majority of the objects with his likeness on them still had the jewel overlays due to the fact that his tomb wasn’t looted, so they really don’t have a frieze or mural painting to go by…it’s a lot of guesswork. And in this case, I think they guessed wrong. What’s wrong with making him Burnt Sienna or copper colored?
Posted 20 Dec 2005 at 12:23 am ¶
tony wrote:
The Egyptains were mulattos, they were brown with frizzy mulatto-like hair.
Posted 20 Dec 2005 at 7:07 am ¶
Dave wrote:
Although mixedmediawatch deserves a lot of credit for being the most visible blog out there challenging one-droppism, I’m surprised that this article was posted without criticizing the one-drop idea that the only 2 options for King Tut are to appear either monoracially white, or monoracially black.
Basically I agree with what “BROWN IS A COLOR” posted above. Only talking about monoracial blacks and monoracial whites can be a good way to make brown folks disappear from public consciousness.
-Dave
For a message board community of over 60 members talking about these issues, please visit:
http://www.mulatto.org
Posted 20 Dec 2005 at 10:26 am ¶
Kaonashi wrote:
Um, no to the hair thing, Tony. Due to the prevalence of lice (as well as hot weather) both men and women in what would be considered the middle to upper-middle class shaved their heads. Most of the elaborate braided hairdos that you see were wigs. They also stuck these big waxy cones of incense on top, and as the day got hotter they would melt and the oil would run down the head, scenting the hair.
As for Tut, they should have either made him that peanut butter shade or brown, because THAT would probably be more accurate than what they did.
Posted 20 Dec 2005 at 11:02 pm ¶
KP wrote:
The truth is that this is a whitewashing of an undisputably Black farao.
No one who has seen the Golden Mask will walk away with any other impression, unless they have been conditioned to believe that highly civilized ancient people could not possibly have been Black.
Egypt is in Africa, people. The Nile is one of Africa’s longest rivers. It originates in Uganda and Ethiopia. The country on Egypt’s southern border is called Nubia. Part of Nubia have been part of Egypt since Egypt was created as a state.
The Pre-Dynastic Egyptians (Natufians) came to populate the Nile Valley from the South. Case closed.
Why on earth would it be shocking to believe that there are Black people living in Africa?
What is more, the Nubian people of Ancient Egyptian times were Much more Black looking than even modern Nubians. The same with the Egyptians themselves. The truth is that both during Ancient Egypt’s existence, and in the centuries after it’s fall, there has been an influx of people from the North, especially into the Delta. Babylonians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs, French, Brits have all come through the place. The most famous Egyptian, Omar Sharif, has both his parents coming from The Lebanon. There is a huge Palestinian population too. The people speak Arabic, which the Ancient Egyptians never did. They are now Muslims.
And by the way, Hosny Mubarak has frizzy hair. Anwar al Sadat was teased for being darkskinned and called a Nubian by the paler foreigners. Try seeing more darkskinned people on Egyptian television, and you get the picture. They are just a colour conscious as South Americans. Maybe some day, they too will properly reflect their populations on television.
Just a thought.
Posted 26 Dec 2005 at 6:51 pm ¶
yeah wrote:
I agree with KP. The lightskinned bust of King Tut looks nothing like the Golden Mask. His lips, nose, and the shape of his face do not match up. Other people (both white and black) have made fun of the bust, commenting that it looks more like Boy George than King Tut. As for the skin tone, I think people must remeber that not all people of African descent are black skinned. The San people of South Africa have an orangish-brown hue, yet no one would argue that these people are “racially mixed.” Anthropologists have designated these people the oldest people in the world, with the most complex of all the languages. It is true that in later dynasties other groups (european groups) migrated to Egypt and mixed with the population, however the people living in Egypt today and NOT the genetic descendants of the Ancient Egyptians. With that being said, I think the light toned bust of King Tut is more fallacy than truth. King Tut was never pictured by Ancient Egyptinas artists as having light skin. I think in reality, King Tut had a carmel skin tone on the order of SOME present day Ethiopians. But I know people will believe what they want to believe.
Posted 12 Jan 2006 at 2:41 pm ¶
egyptian born wrote:
let me tell all of u to solve this contreversial topic, i am 100% egyptian and i lived in egyptt until i was 18 in alexandria(northern egypt) and let me tell u if u say that i am caucaision i will spit on your face because that is an impossibility. I saw the last 3 generations of my family in person and in photos and they were in the range of tan color to dark brown with wooly hair. Many times i have been mistaken as mexican, cuban, brazilian, indian, iraqi but never white. And these are the facts coming from a true egpytian(masry il baltagy) and all these opinions by these white scholars are just another way to brainwash and try to dominate the world with there white race. True egpytians are mixed with several different ethnicities, but sayin we are causasion, not thats crazy.
Posted 05 Feb 2006 at 8:30 pm ¶
LL wrote:
I hope you are aware of the fact that you, egyptian are NOT the decendants of the Ancient Egyptians. Although I agree with you, the Ancients Egyptians were not caucasian.
Posted 22 Feb 2006 at 7:08 pm ¶
egyptian born wrote:
true LL u do got a point egyptian r mixed with so many different ethnicities from all of the foreign counties that conquerd them in the past but its a negative opinion when people sayin we r white but n e wayz in egypt race is not a major topic we could care less wether some one is light or darken skin we care more bout our futures
Posted 22 Feb 2006 at 11:10 pm ¶
Bohwe wrote:
The modern Egyptians are not the descendants of the ancient Egyptians. The ancient Egyptians were the same as people of Sudan and Ethiopia, black. And let’s be realistic, the modern day Egypt is not the Egypt of the past. Ancient Egypt was much bigger and had a bigger landmass in Africa. As well as Ethiopia and Sudan. In fact, Africa was not divided into different conturies like it is today.
As far as King Tut being non-Black, well if King Tut wasn’t black, than why did Napoleon and other white conquerers feel the need to destroy the Spinx by shooting off it’s nose and lips. And why is it that the same is done to various mummies. Even in Greece. The Emperor Haille Selassie once said, that people don’t want Ethiopians to be black, but we are and have always been black. Many people know that the first inhabitants of Egypt were the Ethiopians , and that’s why they don’t want Ethiopians to be black. And realistically, Ethiopians should be the ones people should glorify, they are the Africans who haven’t been colonized, and beat invaders , kept their culture. To me, the Ethiopians are interesting. And for the most part, aren’t ashame of their Black history.
Posted 20 Jun 2006 at 4:15 am ¶
immotep wrote:
egyptains were black and asian why i say that i’am egyptain and black my father is have epgyptain
Posted 13 Jul 2006 at 4:23 pm ¶
Jasmine wrote:
The ancient Egyptians were very dark people and you won’t to know why people fight over this today, because they were very dark people. And if your black and did great things the white man will not allow you to know. Its funny how everything the black man did it’s written out of history or we’re turned into looking like we were white!
I get so sick of it! Why can’t I go in the street and be proud of who I am. Because if I knew the true of everything my people did even you would be like wow! The more you read the more you’ll find out. It took me a long to find out about the Egyptians. I’m not to sure what Cleopatra was either she was black or “half white” but in the things I read about her Cleopatra would always say she was black. Now Queen Nefertiti was black and dark at that. Don’t allow anyone to tell you other wise.
We as black people most start and fight for our history. If we don’t know no one will. Don’t allow them to think we had nothing to do with it. Because that’s what there doing with that whole black people were not Egyptians. Next they’ll say Nubians were not black and neither were the Moors, what a sec their starting to do that now! I wonder why.
Posted 31 Jul 2006 at 12:17 am ¶
danny wrote:
ONE thing the proponents of eurocentrism forget to inquire is,why was every ancient civilization described by color-Black-In all ancient languages.
All the gods,magic,megaliths,occult etc.Why does the megalith trails begin at the bottom of the nile proceed to sudan egypt senegambia sahara cyrenaica-tunisia europe and south america.Why does a civilization more ancient than egypt leave traces(the portolan maps)indicating excellent cartography up to the north pole-through the same african trail.
Co-eval with egyptian civilization were negroe academics like teutdora-’theodoras”who taught geometery,algebra,liberal arts and mathematics in athens.
If the implacable racists would study black history more comprehensively they would have no difficulty edorsing ancient egypt as a genuine black civilization.
Posted 18 Aug 2006 at 8:44 am ¶