法老王的「威脅格式」－－法老王的詛咒？

Curse of the Pharaohs? The Ancient Egyptian Threatformulae of the Pharaohs

一般大眾對於埃及的第一印象不外乎是金字塔、木乃伊，以及法老王等等。透過西方考古學家在埃及進行的田野考古，相關人員進而相繼死亡之後，關於法老王的詛咒之類的消息不脛而走，再加上透過媒體、書籍和電影的大肆宣傳，法老王的詛咒更加深入人心。本文先以法老王的「威脅格式」為重點，討論其主要的目的和使用方法，與今日大眾所認知的「法老王的詛咒」一詞是否相同？進而深入研究在古埃及是否真有相關的文獻記載來證明「法老王的詛咒」的存在？再者探討「法老王的詛咒」源起的前因後果。利用舉例的文獻來討論法老王詛咒的存在的真實性，並且證明「法老王的詛咒」一開始就不存在，只是子虛烏有的傳聞而已。

The so called 'curse of the pharaohs' remains till today mysterious. It was brought to people's attention due to the mysterious deaths of some people of the Howard Carter's archaeological team and other personnel related to Carter's Discovery, after the tomb of the king Tutankhamun was opened in 1922. The ancient Egyptians indeed used some so called threat-formulae to protect their own tombs, corpses, sarcophagi and grave goods. However, the use of threat-formulae is not attested in the inscriptions from the royal tombs. Such formulae are just found in the royal decrees and boundary stelae. In this paper, I will discuss the threat-formulae from the pharaohs and analyze whether the curse of the pharaohs really exists.