[Al Arabiya Latest] One of the great remaining mysteries of ancient Egypt, the lineage of the boy-pharaoh Tutankhamun, may soon be solved, the country's antiquities supremo hinted on Sunday.Zahi Hawass told AFP he has scheduled a news conference for Feb. 17 in the Cairo Museum to unveil the findings from DNA samples taken from the world's most famous pharaoh.
The announcement will be "about the secrets of the family and the affiliation of Tutankhamun, based on the results of the scientific examination of the Tutankhamun mummy following DNA analysis," Hawass said.
The tomb of the boy king, who reigned from the age of nine and died under as yet unknown circumstances at about 19, was unearthed by British archaeologists in the Valley of the Kings in 1922, causing an international sensation.
In August 2008, Egypt's antiquities authorities said they had taken DNA samples from Tutankhamun's mummy and from two fetuses found in his tomb to determine whether the still-born children had been fathered by the boy king.