The tomb, discovered near the Valley of the Kings in Luxor, southern Egypt, belonged to King Thutmose II of the 18th Dynasty, who lived nearly 3,500 years ago.
The Egyptian Antiquities Authority said it had discovered the ancient tomb of King Tutmoses II, the first royal burial found since Tutankhamun's tomb in 1922, AFP reported.
The tomb, discovered near the Valley of the Kings in Luxor, southern Egypt, belonged to King Tuthmosis II of the 18th Dynasty, who lived nearly 3,500 years ago.
Tutmos II was an ancestor of Tutankhamun himself, and his half-sister and queen consort was the pharaoh Hatshepsut.
Her gigantic temple stands on the west bank of the Nile at Luxor, a few miles from where the tomb of Thutmose II was discovered.
Although preliminary research suggests its contents were moved in ancient times - the tomb remains without the iconic mummy or the gilded splendour of Tutankhamun's find - the Ministry of Antiquities has called the discovery "one of the most significant archaeological breakthroughs in recent years".
The tomb was excavated by a joint Egyptian-British mission led by the Supreme Council of Antiquities and the New Kingdom Research Foundation.
The tomb's entrance was first discovered in 2022 in the mountains of Luxor, west of the Valley of the Kings, but was then thought to lead to the tomb of a royal consort.
However, the team then discovered "fragments of alabaster jars inscribed with the name of Pharaoh Thutmose II, identified as the 'deceased king,' along with inscriptions bearing the name of his wife, Queen Hatshepsut," confirming whose tomb it was.
Shortly after the king's burial, water flooded the burial chamber, damaging its interior and leaving fragments of plaster depicting parts of the Book of Amduat, an ancient text about the underworld.
The ministry said some funerary furniture belonging to Tuthmosis II was also removed from the tomb, a "first-of-its-kind find." | BGNES