THE KING TUT PENIS HEIST

But talking of Dick, how could I resist this story from New Scientist, even though Stephen Colbert ran something about it last night? Some bastard has stolen Tutankhamen’s penis…

“I spotted a note admitting that the penis in question is no longer attached to the king's body. I smelled a conspiracy. Could ancient Egyptian embalmers have replaced the royal member to hide the fact that their king's manhood was somewhat lacking? What's more, the front of Tut's chest is missing, so it's impossible to check whether he did indeed have breasts. Was this part of the mummy's anatomy sabotaged too? I called John Taylor, who looks after the mummies collection at the British Museum in London. When Tut's mummy was first unwrapped in 1922, he reassures me, "the penis was there and was attached". The breakage must therefore have occurred in modern times, perhaps during a particularly brutal autopsy. (The wayward penis was reported missing in 1968, before it was discovered again during a CT scan in 2006, lying in the loose sand around the mummy's body.) The chest cavity was also damaged in modern times, probably by Cooper's team in 1922.” (Click here for the whole story)

Click here for The Bangles (yeah, it’s the obvious choice but, what the fuck, it’s Thursday)