King Tut's face was bared to the public Sunday, the first time the iconic pharaoh has been displayed since he was buried in a golden tomb around 1323 B.C.

The face of the mummy of King Tut is seen in his new glass case in his underground tomb in the famed Valley of the Kings in Luxor, Egypt, on Sunday.
(Ben Curtis/Associated Press)

The mummified body of the Egyptian boy king, just 19 when he died, was removed from its sarcophagus and moved to a climate-controlled case to prevent deterioration.

In the move, the protective linen covering was lifted, but it was not replaced over the king's feet and face as he was put into the new case.

"The face of the golden boy is amazing. It has magic and it has mystery," Egypt's antiquities official Zahi Hawass said, and now "all the tourists who will enter this tomb will be able to see the face of Tutankhamun for the first time."

"I can assure you that putting this mummy in this case, this showcase, can make the golden boy live forever," he said.

Tutankhamun's tomb is in the Valley of the Kings — where many Egyptian pharaohs were buried, including some who have yet to be found — on the west bank of the Nile, across from the city of Luxor.

A golden mask covered King Tut's face.
(CBC)

Experts are concerned that the heat caused by the visits of thousands of tourists are destroying the mummy.

"Their breathing will change the mummy to a powder" within 50 years, Hawass said.

Tut was discovered by the British archeologist Howard Carter in 1922. The king was dubbed the golden boy because of his golden tomb and the golden mask that covered his face.

Historians have suggested he was not a very powerful or important king, but the discovery of his virtually undisturbed tomb has made him world famous.

He has been extensively studied by archeologists. A CT scan in 2005 ruled out foul play as the cause of his death. A child king who took the throne at age eight, historians had speculated that he had been murdered in a power struggle.

The current theory holds that he died of an infection caused by a broken thigh.

A fibreglass reconstruction of King Tut in 2002, based on computer models generated from 1969 X-rays of his mummified corpse, produced a likeness that bears little resemblance to the golden funeral mask.

Also in 2002, an Australian researcher debunked the mummy's curse, the idea that members of the Carter expedition died prematurely.

A museum tour of Tut's treasures drew more than four million viewers to four U.S. cities, and will open in London on Nov. 15, before returning to the United States.