Word: ay
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...accent grave can make pronunciation a little tricky, leading some members to occasionally say SAH-BLEE-AY. “I don’t want to pronounce the ‘r,’” Chavez jokes. “I think it would sound better without...
This leaves Ay. The Prime Minister, who served in the same role under Tut's father, had been de facto King while advising the young Tut and had won the boy's trust. (Tut became Pharaoh when he was 9.) Ay may have coveted the throne himself--a position he in fact assumed after Tut's death. Wall paintings in Tut's tomb show Ay performing the Opening of the Mouth ceremony at Tut's funeral, which is reserved for the heir apparent...
...widow may also provide evidence against Ay. A cuneiform document reports that a letter was sent from an unnamed widowed Egyptian Queen to the Hittite King in what is now Turkey, pleading that one of his sons be sent south to marry her. The writer's fear was that she would otherwise be forced to wed one of her "servants." Ankhesenamen, as onetime Queen, would surely have seen Ay as a servant. Some people, including Cooper and King, believe that an ancient ring bearing her and Ay's names indicates that the two were in fact married, a move that...
Additionally, it has never been proved that Ankhesenamen wrote the letter to the Hittite King; some scholars believe the author was not Tut's widow but his father's. Similarly, the ring bearing Ay's and Ankhesenamen's names may indicate little, since in ancient Egypt there were no such things as wedding rings. "The ring merely shows an affiliation," says Eaton-Krauss...
However firm or flawed the case is against Ay, it's unlikely to put the speculation to rest. Other 21st century tools--which can search for diseases or provide images more detailed than X rays--might shed more light, and King and Cooper would have liked the chance to use them too. "Criminal behavior is criminal behavior," Cooper says. "It doesn't matter if it's today or 3,500 years ago." The statute of limitations on some crimes, it appears, will never...