Shoes of Tutankhamun

Among the most personal treasures found within the Tomb of Tutankhamun, were his sandals; over eighty pairs of them, discovered neatly stored in a wooden trunk and immortalised in Harry Burton (1879-1940)’s evocative black-and-white photographs. As expected, several pairs were in remarkably delicate condition, and yet, through painstaking modern restoration, their splendour lives again.

Some of the footwear was humble, woven from plant fibres for everyday use, while others dazzled with gold leaf, bead work, and intricate inlays of coloured glass. These sandals created with such splendour, you might think they were straight from Yul Brynner’s feet in The Ten Commandments; yet no, these are shoes were no Hollywood prop, but over three thousand years old and once worn by the Boy King himself.

Tutankhamun’s Celestial Dagger

Their craftsmanship reveals not only royal luxury but also the duality of life and afterlife in Ancient Egypt; practical footwear for the living world, and divine regalia for ceremony and even for the eternal journey beyond.

Harry Burton’s Lens: Capturing Fragile Footsteps

While the Tomb of Tutankhamun was discovered in November 1922, the careful documentation of its contents unfolded over several years. It was during this painstaking process that Harry Burton, the skilled photographer, turned his large-format camera upon the Boy King’s sandals.

Working under Howard Carter’s direction, Burton captured them in atmospheric, softly lit compositions that revealed both their splendour and their fragility. Some pairs (particularly those woven from papyrus or linen) crumbled upon exposure to air, the ancient fibres too delicate to survive. Others, of leather and gold leaf, endured just long enough for his lens to preserve them in exquisite clarity.

Tutankhamun: The Tomb that Changed the World

Through Burton’s quiet artistry, even the most fragile fragments were granted immortality. His photographs stand not merely as records of excavation, but as portraits of loss and preservation; the last glimpse of Tutankhamun’s royal footsteps before time reclaimed its hold.

Harry Burton (1879–1940) was the gifted English photographer of the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Egyptian Expedition, whose meticulous and atmospheric images of Tutankhamun’s tomb captured the discovery in timeless detail and remain among the most iconic archaeological photographs ever taken.

Restoring a Pharaoh’s Step

A century after Burton’s lens first captured their fading beauty, the boy king’s sandals have once again been given new life. Under the skilled hands of Mohamed Yousri and the restoration team at the Grand Egyptian Museum, fragments once deemed beyond repair have been patiently revived. Threads of linen have been re-aligned, beads and gilded inlays reattached, and delicate leather surfaces gently stabilised after millennia of slumber.

What Burton recorded as fragile ghosts of splendour now gleam once more beneath the museum’s protective light. Each shoe, whether humble or divine, tells a story of artistry, devotion, and the endurance of Egypt’s ancient spirit. Some are woven from plant fibre for the king’s daily use; others, of gold and tooled leather, are ceremonial pieces worthy of eternity.

Through this union of early documentation and modern science, the footsteps of Tutankhamun have been preserved across three thousand years; from the camera’s flash in the Valley of the Kings to the luminous showcases of the Grand Egyptian Museum, where visitors may now stand before them and marvel at the enduring grace of a boy who walked like a god.

The Sandals of Dominion

Among Tutankhamun’s remarkable collection of footwear, few pairs command attention quite like the brown leather sandals adorned with images of bound Nubian and Asiatic captives. Crafted from finely tooled and dyed leather, they are masterpieces of symbolism and craftsmanship. Upon the insoles, the subdued figures lie trussed and helpless beneath where the king’s heels would rest; one representing Egypt’s southern enemies, the other her foes from the north and east.

Each step, then, was an act of cosmic and political assertion: the king, embodiment of divine order, treading upon the forces of chaos. The artistry is astonishing; cut and inlaid leather of varying hues, delicate stitching, and traces of gilding that glimmer still after more than three millennia. These were no ordinary sandals of the palace courtyard, but regal statements in miniature; propaganda for the sole.

Carter’s Notes: The Sandals Beneath the Baskets

Howard Carter’s meticulous diary entry No. 397 records of the remarkable pair of sandals, as they found tucked discreetly beneath baskets within the Antechamber; unseen in Burton’s photographs, yet described in exquisite detail.

Carter documents that they were, fashioned of wood, stucco, bark, green leather, and gold foil, and were true masterpieces of marquetry. Upon each sole, he writes that bound African and Asiatic captives were depicted beneath the arch of the foot, surrounded by decorative bands of bark and gold, with additional symbols of conquest (the four bows of Ancient Egypt’s enemies) positioned beneath the toes and heel.

Carter’s calm precision brings these fragile relics vividly to life. Even a century later, one can almost see the shimmer of gold beneath dust and time and the king’s enemies forever trampled underfoot, and the artistry of Ancient Egypt’s craftsmen undimmed by the centuries.

Today, these sandals stand as quiet yet powerful relics of royal ideology, where even the act of walking was transformed into a declaration of sovereignty.

Tutankhamun’s Feet

What size shoe did Tutankhamun wear?

The average length of Tutankhamun’s sandals is about 24.5 centimetres (9.6 inches). In modern sizing, that would make him approximately a UK size 5–6, or US men’s size 6–7, EUR 38–39, so roughly the shoe size of a petite modern adult male or a teenager.

This aligns neatly with what we know of the young pharaoh himself: Tutankhamun died around 18 or 19 years old, stood roughly 5 feet 6 inches (1.68 m) tall, and had a slender build.

Did Tutankhamun have a “clubfoot”?

The theory that Tutankhamun suffered from a clubfoot (talipes equinovarus) arose from the 2005–2010 CT scans and genetic studies led by Dr. Zahi Hawass and the Egyptian Mummy Project. Radiological analysis suggested deformities in his left foot, a curved spine, and necrosis of the bone consistent with Köhler’s disease, alongside evidence of a fractured leg. Over one hundred walking sticks found in his tomb were cited as possible proof that the young king needed assistance to walk.

However, some scholars and medical experts caution against overstating the diagnosis. Many of the “walking sticks” were ceremonial or symbolic of kingship, and the CT imagery, while detailed, is not definitive evidence of congenital deformity. Moreover, there’s growing discomfort around the way modern discussions often fixate on Tutankhamun’s supposed “disabilities”; as if to define him by them. Critics argue that this fascination sometimes strips the Boy King of his humanity and dignity, reducing him to a medical case rather than a person who ruled, loved, and was mourned.

The Mummy of Tutankhamun

In truth, we may never know precisely how impaired Tutankhamun was. The physical traces suggest fragility, yet his artistic and political legacy speaks of endurance and dignity. Whether or not his gait was uneven, the young pharaoh still walked (in gold sandals) into eternity.

Tutankhamun’s Daughters

Intriguingly, this question of royal infirmity may not have ended with Tutankhamun himself. The mummy known as KV21a, found in a nearby tomb and often proposed as his sister-wife, Ankhesenamun, also displays a striking deformity of the feet; twisted sharply inward, with one appearing severely clubbed. Some have suggested this may reflect a congenital condition, echoing the ailments observed in Tutankhamun’s remains, and perhaps hinting at the effects of generations of close royal intermarriage.

Is this the Mummy of Ankhesenamun, wife of Tutankhamun?

Yet, as with Tutankhamun, the truth is uncertain. The distortion could just as easily stem from the post-mortem compression and flooding that affected the burial chamber, rather than from life itself. In this, both mummies remind us how fragile the line can be between pathology and preservation; and how the royal dead, even in their silence, continue to challenge our understanding. Whether deformity or distortion, Tutankhamun and his queen still walk, side by side, through the corridors of speculation and wonder.

What do Tutankhamun’s shoes say about his health?

Although modern CT scans have suggested that Tutankhamun’s left foot may have been deformed, possibly showing features of clubfoot or necrosis of the bone, none of the more than eighty pairs of sandals found in his tomb display an obvious asymmetry or adaptation for such a condition. The shoes vary in material but their construction is strikingly uniform and symmetrical.

Specialist footwear researcher Dr. André J. Veldmeijer, who examined many of the surviving examples in detail, found no clear anatomical modification to fit an impaired limb. Instead, the variations among the sandals seem to relate to status and symbolism, not medical need: practical styles for earthly life, ornate ones for divine display, and golden pairs for the afterlife.

If Tutankhamun truly suffered a deformity, it is possible that he walked with the aid of one of the over one hundred canes found in the tomb; rather than through any bespoke alteration to his footwear. In short, the king’s sandals were made not for a disability, but for royalty: designed to honour a god-king, even if the mortal boy within walked with pain.

The Sandals for Eternity

Not all of Tutankhamun’s footwear was meant for mortal steps. Among the most hauntingly beautiful pieces found upon his mummy were the sheet gold sandals, accompanied by delicate finger and toe stalls, each hammered from thin sheets of gleaming metal. These were not practical shoes, but funerary adornments, fashioned solely for the journey into the afterlife. To wear them in life would have been agony; rigid, unyielding, and wholly unsuited for movement, yet in death they symbolised eternal perfection.

The golden sandals were placed upon the king’s feet before the body was wrapped, their form imitating the woven plant-fibre shoes of daily use, as if to grant the dead the comforts of life transfigured into divine splendour. Each finger and toe was sheathed in its own shimmering cover, sealing the body in precious metal as an image of completeness and immortality.

The Mummy of Tutankhamun’s Great Grandmother Thuya

When the mummy was unwrapped in 1925, these exquisite pieces were removed; a standard practice at the time, though one modern Egyptology would no longer undertake. In contrast, the mummy of Thuya, Tutankhamun’s great-grandmother, still wears her golden sandals and stalls in situ, revealed only through the silent precision of modern CT scanning.

Today, Tutankhamun’s funerary sandals glimmer once more under the protective light of the Grand Egyptian Museum, no longer bound to a body but to memory, eternal shoes for eternal steps, crafted not for walking the earth, but for treading the fields of eternity.