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Tutankhamun's name in hieroglyphs: King Tut's two cartouches, sign by sign

13 October 2026

Tutankhamun wrote his name in two cartouches. The short one is his throne name, Nebkheperure: a sun disc, a scarab, three plural strokes and a basket. The long one is his birth name, Tutankhamun, followed by a title, "ruler of Upper Egyptian Heliopolis".

He became king at about nine and died at about nineteen, in the 1320s BC. His tomb was found almost intact in 1922, so these two cartouches survive on hundreds of objects. Learn them once and you can pick him out on gold, wood, glass and stone.

His throne name is Nebkheperure

The throne name was taken when a king came to the throne. It is written nb-ḫprw-rꜥ, said "neb-kheperu-ra", and means "Lord of forms is Ra".

The sun disc (N5) sits at the top because it is the god Ra, and a god's name was placed first out of respect. It is still read last. Below it the scarab (L1) with the plural strokes (Z2) writes ḫprw, "forms". The basket (V30) at the bottom is nb, "lord".

So the reading order runs basket, scarab, strokes, sun, against the order the signs appear in. The four signs are stacked to fill the oval neatly, which is why the small strokes tuck in beside the beetle.

Sun Scarab beetle Plural strokes Basket

His birth name takes ten signs

The birth name is twt-ꜥnḫ-imn, "tut-ankh-amun", "Living image of Amun". It takes ten signs. It opens with the god's name, again placed first for respect: the flowering reed (M17), the game board (Y5) and the ripple of water (N35) spell imn, Amun.

Next comes twt, "image": a bread loaf (X1), a quail chick (G43) and a second loaf. The ankh (S34) is ꜥnḫ, "living". The last three signs are a title: the crook (S38) is ḥqꜣ, "ruler", the column (O28) stands for the city of Heliopolis, iwnw, and the flowering sedge (M26) is šmꜥ, Upper Egypt. Scholars differ on whether "Upper Egyptian Heliopolis" means Thebes or Armant, just south of it, which was also called iwnw šmꜥ.

Vowels were not written, so spellings differ in modern books: Tutankhamen and Tutankhamon are the same name.

Flowering reed Game board Ripple of water Bread loaf Quail chick Ankh Crook Column Flowering sedge

Tutankhaten became Tutankhamun

He was born Tutankhaten, "Living image of the Aten", in the years when Akhenaten put the sun disc above every other god. Early in his reign the court turned back to Amun and the old temples. His name changed with it, and so did his queen's, from Ankhesenpaaten to Ankhesenamun.

In writing, the change is one sign group. The Aten group, which ends in a sun disc, gave way to the reed, game board and water of Amun. The golden throne from his tomb carries both forms.

After his death his names were taken over too. On the Opet festival reliefs he had carved at Luxor Temple, his cartouches were later replaced, mostly by those of Horemheb.

The Grand Egyptian Museum holds most of his names

Most of the treasure is now at the Grand Egyptian Museum in Giza: the gold mask, the coffins, the gilded shrines, the throne and the chariots. Nebkheperure appears on almost every piece, often inlaid or chased in gold.

In the Valley of the Kings, his own tomb (KV62) keeps one painted room. On its north wall the next king, Ay, performs the Opening of the Mouth for him, and both kings' cartouches sit above the scene. The young king's mummy is still in the tomb.

At Saqqara, the tomb Horemheb built as a general shows him serving under Tutankhamun. In the colonnade of Luxor Temple, look for recut cartouches where traces of the earlier signs still show.

Cartouche

The throne name is the easier cartouche to draw

The throne name is the easier one to start with. Draw the oval first, then the sun at the top, the scarab in the middle with three strokes beside it, and the basket as a flat half-bowl underneath.

Write Nebkheperure in a cartouche

Questions

Why does Tutankhamun have two cartouches?

Every king had five names. Only two, the throne name and the birth name, were written inside a cartouche. The others, such as his Horus name, are written outside one and are rarer on objects.

Is King Tut his real name?

"King Tut" is a modern nickname that caught on in the press after the tomb was found in 1922. The Egyptians wrote twt-ꜥnḫ-imn, and Egyptologists say it as Tutankhamun.

How can I tell which cartouche is which on an object?

Count the signs. Four signs with a scarab is the throne name. A longer cartouche with an ankh and a crook is the birth name. They are often shown side by side.

Glossary

ankh: The sign of life, ꜥnḫ, a cross with a loop on top. Gods hold it out to kings in temple scenes.
birth name: The name a king was given at birth, written in the second cartouche after the title "son of Ra". Egyptologists also call it the nomen.
cartouche: An oval ring drawn around a royal name, a loop of rope tied at one end. Kings wrote their two main names in cartouches.
coffin: A box for the body, of wood or stone, often shaped like a person and painted with spells, names and gods. Rich burials nested several coffins inside a sarcophagus.
mummy: A body dried and wrapped in linen so that it would last. Egyptians believed the spirit needed it in the afterlife.
relief: A carving on a flat surface. In raised relief the background is cut away. In sunk relief the figures are cut into the stone.
scarab: The dung beetle, sign of the rising sun and of the word ḫpr, "to come into being". Carved scarabs were used as seals and amulets.
temple: The house of a god, where priests served the god's statue. Temples for dead kings kept up their offerings after death.
throne name: The name a king took when he came to the throne, written in the first cartouche after the title "King of Upper and Lower Egypt". Egyptologists also call it the prenomen.
tomb: A burial place: a pit, a mastaba, a pyramid or rooms cut into rock. Its chapel was where the family brought offerings.
Upper Egypt: The south of Egypt, the narrow Nile valley from around Memphis to Aswan. It is called upper because it is upstream.
Valley of the Kings: A desert valley on the west bank at Luxor where the New Kingdom kings were buried in tombs cut into the rock, Tutankhamun among them.