Cairo — Belief in “curses’’ attached to certain antiquities is ridiculed by Mr, R. Engelbach, keeper of the Cairo museum and one of the world’s greatest authorities on ancient Egypt.
Latest of the ‘‘accursed” remains to be returned to Egypt is a piece of bone, claimed to be part of Pharaoh’s skeleton which has been blamed for a series of accidents which have befallen Sir Alexander and Lady Seton, of Edinburgh.
Mr. Engelbach said today that he had never encountered or heard of an authentic incident which might be construed as the outcome of a curse. When he was Chief Inspector of Antiquities at Luxor, heads, hands, feet and other part of mummies were sent to him from all over the world by people who requested that these relics should be reburied as they were accursed.
By the time he left Luxor, his garden had become quite a large sized cemetery.
Ever since he has worked in the museum, scarabs, amulets, bits of corpses, etc, have been arriving by post. All without exception, behave in an exemplary manner when they arrive at the museum.
‘Two very fine shawabti figures were sent to my house by a certain British diplomat,’’ said Mr. Engelbach, “‘with a letter stating that they used to move about at night.” I had them in my bedroom for some days, but their behaviour was beyond criticism, and since their registration in the museum they have given no cause for complaint.”’
St. Croix Avis, Christiansted, St. Croix, USVI, September 15, 1937