Howard Carter was a British archaeologist, who made one of the richest and most-celebrated contributions to Egyptology: the discovery (1922) of the largely intact tomb of King Tutankhamen.
Background
Howard Carter was born in Kensington on 9 May 1874, the son of Samuel John Carter, an artist, and Martha Joyce Carter (née Sands). His father trained and developed Howard's artistic talents. Carter spent much of his childhood with relatives in the Norfolk market town of Swaffham, the birthplace of both his parents.
Education
He was educated privately and in 1891 was sent to Egypt under the auspices of Lord Amherst of Hackney as a draftsman with the Egyptian Exploration Fund. The following year he obtained his first digging experience under Professor Flinders Petrie at Tel el Amarna.
Career
He remained with the Exploration Fund, on the staff of Professor Édouard Naville at Deir el-Bahari, until 1900, when he was appointed Inspector General for the Antiquities Department of the Egyptian Government. Working under Sir Gaston Maspero and Sir William Garstin, he installed electric lighting at Abu Simbel and the Tombs of the Kings at Thebes, and as assistant to Theodore M. Davis in excavation work in the Valley of Tombs was largely responsible for the discovery of the tombs of King Mentuhotep I, Queen Hatshepsut, and Thutmose IV. In 1903, shortly after being transferred to Sakkara as inspector for Lower and Middle Egypt, he was dismissed from the department as the result of an unfortunate incident with a group of disorderly French tourists, and for several years devoted his time to painting water colors of Egyptian scenes. In 1906 he became associated with the 5th Earl of Carnarvon in excavation work at the Theban Necropolis which resulted in the discovery of the tomb of Amenhotep I, the Valley Temple of Hatshepsut, the cemetery of the Eighteenth-Dynasty queens, and the cliff tomb of Princess Hatshepsut. Further digging was interrupted by World War I, but as soon as conditions permitted he persuaded Lord Carnarvon to continue exploration in the Valley of Tombs. Finally, in November 1922, he made what was possibly the most important archaeological discovery in Egypt, the tomb of Tutankhamen of the Eighteenth Dynasty. The tomb of the boy king, unopened for over three thousand years, yielded a wealth of art objects, furniture, and jewelry which Carter spent some ten years in packing, preserving, and recording for the National Museum at Cairo. He died in London on March 2, 1939, and left several works which described his explorations in Egypt.