{toot-ahng-kah'-men}
Tutankhamen, a pharaoh (r.1361-1352 BC) of the 18th dynasty, is one of the most famous Egyptian kings because his tomb was the richest of the few royal burial chambers that survived comparatively intact. The son-in-law of Akhenaten, he was only nine years old when he succeeded his brother Smenkhkare (r. 1364-1361 BC), and for much of his reign Egypt was actually governed by his senior officials. The vizier Ay skillfully replaced Akhenaten's monotheistic cult of Aten (Aton) with the traditional polytheistic religion. Tell el-Amarna, the monotheistic center, was abandoned, the capital was returned to Thebes, and the cults of the state god Amen (Amon) and other gods were revived. The king himself changed his name from Tutankhaten ("living image of Aten") to Tutankhamen ("living image of Amen"). His general, Horemheb, fought Hittite attacks on the Egyptian empire in northern Syria. Tutankhamen died at the age of 18 and was succeeded by Ay (r. 1352-1348), who married Tutankhamen's widow and appropriated the king's tomb for himself. Although all the other tombs in the Valley of the Kings at Thebes were later plundered, the tomb in which Tutankhamen was ultimately buried was hidden by rock chips dumped from cutting the tomb of a later king. In 1922, Howard Carter discovered the tomb, which was filled with extraordinary treasure, including a solid gold coffin, a gold mask, jewelry, and other artifacts.