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Every day, the world presents you with hundreds of headlines. What do you believe? Who do you trust? The Financial Times cuts through complexity with clarity, accuracy and global perspective. Its journalism is guided by independence, not agendas. That's why leaders in business, policy and culture turn to one trusted source for facts, for insight, for what matters next. Source FT Read more and subscribe@ft.com you're listening to the Monocle Daily, first broadcast.
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On 26 November 2025 on Monocle Radio.
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Is the latest Ukraine peace deal going anywhere? Why is the President of the United States so insistent that we haven't had enough rush hour films and the country offering dull holidays? And Andrew Mullett. The Monocle Daily starts now. Hello and welcome to the Monocle Daily. Coming to you from our studios here at Midori House in London, I'm Andrew Muller. My guests Alena Hlivko and John Everard will discuss the day's big stories. And our on this day historical series will recall the most famous archaeological discovery of all time. Stay tuned. All that and more coming up right here on the Monocle Daily. This is the Monocle Daily. I'm Andrew Muller and I am joined today by Alena Hlivko, founder and CEO at St James Foreign Policy Group, and John Everard, former British Ambassador to Belarus, Uruguay and North Korea. Hello to you both.
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B
Hello there.
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C
Hello, John. You have been out of late doing something you definitely couldn't have done in North Korea. That's right.
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B
I've been knocking on doors persuading those who hadn't yet registered to vote to do so over quite a wide area of the borough I live in. It was quite an experience. I mean, when most of us get the notification that we have to register and you click a button, your smartphone does it. For you. People who don't either, it's because they don't speak English. And you walk into all kinds of immigrant houses, massive overcrowding, every known housing regulation just violated. People who think they're above the law, slam doors in your faces, swear at you and say nothing to do with the British state. And eventually these people get fined. But that's outside my pay grade. And people who simply are too confused. It's extraordinary how many people are simply not on top of their lives. I mean, I'm not talking here about people with mental health issues. I mean, you get those too. But people who simply cannot organize themselves to pick up the form that's been put through the post, put in the codes and register, you have to sort of stand them there with them and do it on the spot. You realize that what feet of clay our democracy has. I mean, the whole thing rests on getting these people to register and to vote. And it really is quite shaky.
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C
Is it doing wonders for your faith in democracy as an idea?
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B
John, I don't know about doing wonders. The fact that we're going out, canvassing, persuading people to register, yes. Does encourage me. And frankly, having seen some of the alternatives, thanks. I'll take the sake of democracy.
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C
Aldeona, we will shortly be discussing your homeland, which is in the news again. But you were there relatively recently. You come and go reasonably frequently. What's your and I realise that Ukrainians are not a monolith any more than any other people. But as a general assessment of the mood on your last visit.
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A
So last time I've been to Ukraine was in October. I've been to Ukraine twice in October, in fact, for work in Kyiv, talking to policymakers. And then I returned back to my hometown, southwest of Ukraine to see my brother who was on leave from the army, and the mood was quite interesting. Policymakers, on the one hand were quite staying mobilized, professional, upbeat, definitely knowing what the objectives are, but also very realistic about the resources that they have to keep fighting the war. When I spoke to some of my friends and relatives back home, especially my brother who just returned from the front line, the mood there is quite dire. The exhaustion is really obvious. The resources are very thinly spread across the front line. Both human resources with very little professional troops left and the one who come in who get mobilized are really far from getting into the shape of a professional soldier quickly. So that's quite disappointing. And then, of course, even civilians on the ground who couldn't be further away from the front line on the border of Romania, only getting an occasional missile and a drone. Now that is considered a luxury in Ukraine. When you get air raid alerts maybe three times a week, that means you're really lucky and you're living a peaceful life. Even those people are really, really tired. And of course, in the last two weeks, some of my friends have been texting me that they've had electricity for two hours a day.
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C
And to remind our listeners, Ukraine's winters.
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A
Are cold, very much so I think it's definitely below zero now. They've had their 1st, 2nd and 13th snow already, so it's not an easy winter ahead of us.
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C
Well, we will start in Ukraine and its prospects for peace, and if so, when and in what form. The document being scrutinised by various diplomatic HUD what started as a 28 point plan brandished by US President Donald Trump, which appeared to many unnervingly close to what Russian President Vladimir Putin might have sent to Santa Major territorial concessions from Ukraine, exclusion from NATO of Ukraine limits, if admittedly pretty expansive ones on the size of Ukraine's future military. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has not rejected it outright, doubtless hoping not to lose the US entirely. But Ukraine's fellow Europeans are unenthused. European Commission President Ursula von der lion declaring that Russia is not serious about peace. Alena first of all, how careful should Ukraine be about this? This is not the first idea for peace that has been slapped on the table and others have been found wanting.
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A
It's very interesting when it first appeared I remembered the days of the minsk agreement in 2014 and 15 during Russia's first invasion as they call it in Ukraine and even those terms were much better. They were then develop by the so called Normandy format. Germany, France, Ukraine and Russia. So that was still a negotiation where Zelensky and Putin, sorry Poroshenko back then and Putin met and tried to figure things out. Even those peace agreements were more reasonable where seeing this document and then seeing so much proof online that it was bluntly translated from Russian language and now seeing the recent reports that Witkoff just advised Putin's aid on how to trick Donald Trump into making certain decisions and how to speak to him and how to persuade him, it gives me very little hope that this one's biggest and most reliable democracy in the world is turning completely unprofessional to say the least.
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C
John, there is a specific aspect there that Aliona strikes and that I did want to ask you about. Given your own background in the diplomatic, it's odd enough I think that a character like Steve Witkoff occupies role he does. He is a real estate developer. But what we have understood these phone calls published by Bloomberg that Witkoff was literally coaching the Russians on how to get President Trump to agree to anything. For all that Witkoff I don't think told the Russians anything the rest of us didn't know or couldn't have guessed, which is just massively suck up to him and tell him how wonderful he is. But nonetheless have you ever heard of.
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B
The like people coaching people on how to psychotox people? Yes, happens all the time. Getting caught and getting recorded doing it. Not a good idea. I think Vitkoff's credibility as an honest broker is now completely blown. A man is quite clearly hopelessly pro Russian. Trump has done what Trump always does in these situations. He's come out and defended him and I suspect that in a couple of weeks, a month or so, he will be moved on to another job. But diplomatic aspects, I mean, the 28 points is the kind of document that you would fail a second year undergraduate on. I mean, it is a complete mess as a diplomatic document. Badly drafted. It commits various third parties to doing things over which the United States has no power. The European Union, it says, has this, that and the other. Nobody ever consulted them. NATO, ditto. It is not actually a serious diplomatic document, which leaves me wondering whether this is about Ukraine at all. I suspect that Witkos brief was to come out with something nice and incendiary that would fill the airways for a week so that everybody forgot their Epstein files. And he succeeded brilliantly. I mean, who's talking about Epstein now?
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C
Well, nobody other than you, John, but just to follow that up, do you think there is. Do you think there is an element of design to fail here, not just as a distraction from the Epstein story, but also to allow Donald Trump at some future juncture to go, well, I. To make peace, because that's what I do. And the Ukrainians were uncooperative, so the hell with them.
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B
Yes, that's possible. Designed to fail, possibly the other way. Trump has let himself be persuaded fairly easily to drop key provisions in the document to which the Russians were deeply attached. The document 28 points started out, down to 19 were told. Russian radio this morning was saying that the big difficulty is over the borders. Surprise, surprise, lots of happening. And it looks as if the fate is going to come on the Russian side. Putin, Zelensky has a certain amount of wriggle room. I mean, he still runs more or less a democracy, corrupt, as we found out, but he can negotiate, Putin can't. The moment Putin gives an inch, his right wing will barbecue him. And so if you give Putin anything less than the full 28 points, he's bound to refuse. And that gives Trump his out on.
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C
The subject of wiggle room that President Zelenskyy may have. Aliona, how much does he actually have? Because as John correctly points out, and which is where I suspect this whole thing might unravel. Russia wants territory. If there is to be peace, Putin has to be able to tell the Russian people, look, I've got something. For the last four years of this, Zelenskyy has said all along that this is a red line for him, that he wants Ukraine's borders restored and recognised, and not unreasonably, because those are Ukraine's borders. Is he able to sell any amount of concession to Ukraine's people after four years of extraordinary sacrifice, is that actually something he could sell? Can he say, maybe with a nod and a wink, look, it's only temporary. Look at Germany, we'll get it back eventually. Could he actually make that pitch to Ukrainians?
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A
I think, in short, yes. Ukrainians are sadly very well educated in all the intricacies of the war, from supplies on the front line to the number of deceased and forever lost people and injured, because everybody has a family member or a friend who's died or who never came back and is still missing or who's in Russian captivity. And imagine having that stress for four years and then getting bombarded and running into a basement every night, three, four times a night. You're lucky if you're able to sleep at least one night peacefully in most cities in Ukraine. And then on top of that, freezing winters, and on top of that, you still have to face daily challenges like incredible inflation. The prices for food have risen vastly. The health care system is completely beaten down. Imagine we're all struggling with healthcare here, even in the peaceful and quiet west, what it's like to be in the war zone. People's lives have been put on hold for so long that everybody's reaching their limits. And I think with that understanding, there was a clear readiness. Seeing the international situation, seeing that there are simply not enough weapons and financial aid that Europe can give Ukraine, there's nothing that United States can give. Going further, I think it's as clear as it gets that if anything, the American aid will only be dwindling down, regardless of any minerals deals or drones deals or whatever else Ukraine can offer to the United States. So it's becoming very clear that we will have to concede something. But concessions doesn't mean capitulation. And that's one thing that Ukrainian people are very certain about. Because as much as it hurts now, one thing that probably is the dearest to Ukrainian mentality is family. And while we're losing family members now, the one thing that we would stand ready to keep sacrificing it is to protect our children for future aggression. And many people just know, and whoever I speak to be frontline soldiers or just civilians, they're saying if we don't end this now on reasonable terms, they will rearm and they will come back in five years, in 10 years, and this will be our children fighting. So living in this constant awaiting from the aggressor to strike again is simply not an option in Ukraine. So in that sense people would not be ready to capitulate and to completely give up territories. So de facto, yes, de jure, absolutely not. Nobody's ready to sign off the territories to Russia legally.
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Well, a reminder to our listeners, there is more on this in the foreign Desk explainer which should be live shortly after this show or early tomorrow morning. We will move along. Here in the United Kingdom today has seen the much ballyhooed and much rewritten on the fly budget of Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves announced twice. Once by the Chancellor to the House of Commons as is usual and once 40 minutes earlier by someone at the Office for Budget Responsibility pressing send prematurely and releasing their forecast of the consequences before the Chancellor had begun speaking in mean in Berlin rather. Meanwhile, the Bundestag has been holding its annual general debate, a feature of Germany's own budget week as both countries are inevitably preoccupied with domestic concerns. Will the war on Europe's doorstep be overlooked? John, as far as we can tell, because these are both wrangles very much pitched to domestic concerns. Are Germany and the UK still all in on Ukraine, do we think?
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Yes, we do think so. I mean both Chancellor Richard Reid and Federal Chancellor Merz today made very strong speeches saying we are just that way behind Ukraine and we will support Ukraine to the end for as long as it takes. That in the midst in both cases are some quite sharp exchanges on the lack of money to do anything very much so it was quite a courageous thing to come out and say.
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C
I mean that notwithstanding. Aliyon, is this an addition to the Ukrainians long list of concerns that eventually yeah, when domestic country, domestic economies are struggling, that's what people will focus on. And whatever a government in the United Kingdom or Germany says, it's not Ukrainians whose votes they're going to need next time out.
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A
Absolutely. I think there's a clear understanding of that. There's a huge amount of gratitude that basically Europe mostly has subsidized Ukrainian budget for the last few years and Ukraine again going back to budgetary problems. Ukraine is facing a whole of $65 billion in Ukrainian budget for 2026 and is really hoping that that decision on the 19th of December from the European Council will come through. But corruption scandals that are so loud and obnoxious definitely do not help to create consensus in Europe over that issue. There's of a bit big understanding that this is not just Ukrainian war because my fear is not just as a Ukrainian but now as a Brit that if Russia gets a ceasefire and they will leave Ukraine alone for the Time being, because the country is weakened as it is already and they will certainly meddle in political situation going further, but they will be rearming for Europe, for vulnerable states like the Baltics, potentially maybe Poland, seeing that the US is no longer present in that area, they could be looking at striking Europe. I think if anything, defence should be prioritizing these budgets, as painful as it is.
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Because John, an amount of push may come to shove on this because if there is any kind of peace deal, it is generally understood that foreign troops will be deployed to Ukraine in some capacity. The United Kingdom and France reiterating this week the willingness that they will send troops to uphold any peace deal that might be agreed. How is that likely to play with voters?
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Do we think that's a difficult one? It hasn't really been fully explored either here or in Germany or France, as far as I know. I suspect that it would actually receive quite a lot of support depending on how many troops go and if we start getting body bags. But sympathy for Ukraine and support for the Ukrainian cause, I think it's both very broad and very deep across Western Europe. And if it came to boots on the ground, we'd back it.
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C
But Macron does seem to be hedging somewhat. Alena. He said that any French troops that go would be stationed in Kyiv or Lviv at the maximum. Any air power would not be based in Ukraine. It would be flown out of Ukraine's neighbours or probably out of France directly. Is there a concern there about. Again, he's thinking about his domestic audience and I'm sure he's seen the polling as Sakiya Starmer has, that far right populists who tend towards the Ukraine sceptical are in the ascendant.
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And I think again a very important point to make that Ukrainian authority does understand that, that there is no need to push too far not to antagonize the whole of society and basically bring a whole anti Ukrainian wave into governments across Europe. Because that would scupper not just Ukrainian security and coalition of the willings efforts, but the EU accession for Ukraine and later, maybe even NATO one day, who knows. But there is so much ambiguity. Of course nobody wants to put lives at risk, but it will again depend on which conditions Russia will be brought to this ceasefire and whether they need to be made. They need to be disincentivized from attacking Ukraine in all other means that Europe can deploy so that it doesn't start attacking its soldiers. Because one thing Russia definitely doesn't want is to start a war with NATO because it would lose it in a heartbeat.
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Well, to the United States, where US President Donald Trump is attempting to moonlight as a Hollywood movie producer. The hours between golf engagements don't fill themselves, etc. Apparently, in response to heavy presidential hinting in the ear of gazillionaire mogul Larry Ellison, majority shareholder of Paramount skydance, Rush Hour 4 has, as they say in the trade, the green light. The film had been iced, not, as might have been assumed, because Rush Hour one through three all sucked out loud, but because franchise director Brett Ratner was struggling for collaborators due to allegations of sexual misconduct. It is obviously a total mystery as to why someone of Donald Trump's impeccable record of propriety should be so sympathetic to such a fig. Everyone denies everything and so forth. John, are you excited for Rush Hour four?
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You're not really? No. I mean, firstly, I have a deep sense that any film that Donald Trump likes, I'm most unlikely to appreciate. I think we're just not on the same page. And there's something almost pathetic about this, you know, going back.
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Oh, all right, all right.
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B
Straight up pathetic.
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The word you wanted was deeply, I think.
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Yes. Okay, let's start with deeply pathetic. The, you know, this trying to turn cinema back to the 1990s, to the good old days of blood and gore, when it was okay to make racist jokes, sexist jokes, and you could have lots of good knock around fun as red blooded males like Donald Trump will thump along to it. Anyway, completely blind to the fact that America in 2025 is a completely different country from the one that produced all these films. And you get the sense of old men sitting in bubbles, a lot of them probably wearing cardigans, watching these things and clapping together. I think it's rather sad.
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C
I mean, I don't mind Aliona. I will admit a cinematic car chase in context, but my understanding of the Rush Hour franchise is that it's all car chase and not a lot of context. But Brett Ratner has also recently directed an epic biography of Melania Trump for Amazon, mgm, owned by Jeff Bezos. Of course, there is kind of a pattern emerging here, isn't there, of the rich and the powerful trying to please the king.
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A
I guess so. And that's what we're seeing with American business, especially the tech billionaires. They go in and they violate everything that they seem to have stood for. All of their liberty and freedom and non conformism just goes out the window as soon as there's the bull in the china shop. Sadly, I missed that Melania Trump documentary.
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C
Or maybe it's not out yet. You've still got that to look forward to.
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A
Oh, no, thanks.
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C
I mean, we could arrange some sort of joint screening at Monocle Live.
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B
Do you hear that? Silent.
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C
Yeah, I'm just having ideas over here. But, John, even if we agree that it is deeply, profoundly pathetic, is. Is it possible to discern something slightly sinister afoot because it is a recurring feature of all autocracies. And behold, as I explain the former ambassador to North Korea about how autocracies work, but that they do seek to co opt the culture. They. They realize that it is important that it does shape opinion and that it can be used to burnish the image of the great helmsman.
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B
Yes, it's a dangerous track to go down. I mean, I don't think America is quite at the North Korean level yet.
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C
Oh, they're just getting started.
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B
They're just getting started. Okay. It gets dangerous. Not when the autocrat starts to suggest, quote, unquote, various films, but when he starts to stop films. I mean, if you get sort of trump like films out there, I mean, I'm not sure how many people would watch them, but. Okay, provided he doesn't actually prevent people making films of which he disapproves. I don't think you're quite at that stage yet.
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C
Just finally on this, I did want to ask you each in turn if there is a particular film franchise that you would be happy to sit through a third, fourth or fifth or sixth or however many installments of Aleona do you. Do you have? It may be Rush Hour. I don't know. I took it for granted that you were not a big Rush Hour fan.
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A
I was sitting here all along just thinking, gosh, I really like that film. No, I think I'll be a very girly girl. And I would go for a reboot of Pride and Prejudice, which is already filmed. And I'm looking forward to seeing it because I have a major crush on the main actor there. So there you go.
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C
Okay. That's a perfectly noble reason, John.
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B
Cheating slightly. Not a film, but a TV series. One Foot in the Grave. I've got to the age where this is starting to look much more like documentary than drama. And whenever it comes through on Catch up tv, I'm always riveted by it. Great stuff.
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C
Well, to Sweden now, where tourist authorities are leaning into the reality that nobody is ever likely to mistake Stockholm or Gothenburg for Rio de Janeiro in Carnival week, especially not at this time of year. A new ad campaign by Sweden is seeking to make a virtue of the Cold and dark by actually inviting tourists to come and be bored. Or at least to engage in such low octane pastimes as walking through forests, gazing into the skies, dangling a fishing line through a hole in the ice, etc. I'm not sure, Alena, if you're the target audience for this. I mean, as a Ukrainian, cold and dark, you get enough of that at home, right? But would you be excited by the idea of going to Sweden in the middle of winter and not really doing anything?
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A
You know, I think it's that Stockholm syndrome kicking in because actually I would really enjoy that and sometimes I have days in Westminster, which I'm sure John would appreciate going back to his diplomatic service where I do just want to go and stare into the hole in the ice. And that would bring me peace.
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C
I mean, and right. Their slogan, Sweden not so much. Well, Stockholm not so much a holiday as a syndrome. John, have we come to. And the thing is, I think it's fair to say, obviously Alena would have no idea what we're discussing, but we are old enough to remember what boredom was like. I mean, I can remember proper boredom, which is to say I was a child in Canberra in the late 1970s when it was routinely described as Australia's largest above ground cemetery. But that was properly done. Nothing opened at the weekends. There were like two TV channels, both of which closed at 10 o' clock with a playing of the national anthem and there was nothing on them before that anyway. I mean, it was properly dull. Whereas now you don't have to be bored anymore. There's always an option.
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B
Then was the days, Andrew. That's right. Black and white television, the test car.
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C
You're right.
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B
I mean, life was much, much slower in those days. Bored. Yes, I guess so. But you had time to reflect, to sit and stare at that hole in the ice, if that's what you wanted to do. Go and watch the Northern lights if you're in the right. The big question though that I'm left with over all this is if you want to sit in and get bored, there are much cheaper places to do it than Sweden, aren't they?
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C
You're suggesting somebody needs to launch the bargain boredom option.
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B
That's it. The bargain basement boredom, the BBB somewhere in Southern Europe.
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C
Which actually does bring me to the last question I wanted to ask you, which is to try and identify the dullest place you've ever been. Now, Australia, where I'm from, off offers a number of contenders for this. There was a competition in Australia many years ago that a newspaper ran to try and discover which was actually Australia's dullest town. And I remember it was won by a town, I think, in remote New South Wales called Gadougou, where somebody wrote in and said that every hour we wander over to the petrol pump to see if the numbers have changed. But. But my, My. My own. My own personal. From my own personal experience, I'm going to nominate London's in Denmark, which was the first place that big. Hello to all our listeners in L, which was, I think, one of the first trips I did overseas for Monocle magazine. There's a company in Lundeskov which makes the blades on wind turbines, which it was actually pretty interesting. But the town itself I had an evening of. I went to a local bar, or possibly the local bar, asked the barman, what do people do for fun in L? He replied, we have a potential.
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A
That sounds fun.
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C
I mean, I. Anyway, so that's. That's. That's Lundeskopf. They have a pond. Aljona. What? Can you remember anywhere just really transcendentally dull that you have visited?
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A
I'm gonna get in so much trouble, which I will blame you for, because I keep hearing from my American friends. Can you please stop posting, you know, not nice things about Donald Trump and saying not nice things about America? But here I go again. One of the dullest places I've ever been to in my life was in Huntsville, Alabama.
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C
Huntsville, Alabama. I've been elsewhere in Alabama, but not Huntsville.
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A
I mean, that's the kind of, you know, I guess, rural America where you just go out the front door and unless you have a big truck and a purpose to go somewhere on that truck listening to country music, there's just literally nothing to do.
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C
That sounds like my idea of fun, though. But they've got a rocket base in Huntsville.
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A
See, you know more than I do.
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C
And they've got a prison that Merle Haggard wrote a song about.
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A
I should have gone seen the prison. There you go.
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C
John, can you rival either Lunderskov in Denmark or Huntsville, Alabama?
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B
Not anywhere that I've actually been. Somewhere I'd love to go. The town of Dull in Canada, which gloriously is twinned with a town of Boring in, I think, somewhere in Australia. And every year they celebrate Dull and Boring Day. I'd love to be there.
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C
I think boring is in Oregon.
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B
Oregon. I beg your pardon. Thank you.
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C
This does ring a vague bell, so. But you've never been anywhere you would. Character. Are you one of those insufferable people who can find the joy in anything. I mean, how much fun can Pyongyang be on the weekend?
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B
On a weekend? Amazing fun. I mean, you can sit then in the middle of the Tedong river on the ice, staring at it anytime you like.
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C
Sounds fabulous. John Everard, Sweden. Visas are a bit trickier. John Everett Gerard Naliono Hlivko, thank you for joining us. Finally, on today's show, our on this Day historical series recalls one of the most momentous openings of a door in modern history. In late 2025, just a few weeks ago, as of this broadcast, Egypt opened the long delayed Grand Egyptian Museum in Giza, on the outskirts of Cairo. Among the astonishing treasures contained therein are those with which the pharaoh Tutankhamun was delivered into eternity in around 1323 BC or so. These are doubtless spectacular, even for museum visitors who have bought a ticket with a fair idea of what they're going to see. Tutankhamun's gold funerary mask has a reasonable claim to be placed among the most recognisable objects on earth. Imagine, though, seeing that and all Tutankhamun's other stuff without having any preconceived idea of what it would look like or even being certain that any of it existed. Imagine being the first person to gaze upon it for the thick end of 33 centuries. On November 26, 1922, Howard Carter became exactly, exactly that.
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D
At first, I could see nothing, the hot air escaping from the chamber causing the candle flame to flicker. But presently, as my eyes grew accustomed to the light, details of the room within emerged slowly from the mist. Strange animals, statues and gold. Everywhere the glint of gold.
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C
Carter had been bitten early by the Ancient Egypt bug as a chronically ill child. The youngest of 11. Growing up in Norfolk, he'd been indulged by a local family of eccentric aristocrats who had a large private collection of Egyptian artifacts. By the time he was 17, they had arranged for him to learn on the job at excavations at various locations in Egypt. By the time Carter was 25, he was inspector of Monuments for Upper Egypt for the Egyptian Antiquities Service. Tutankhamun had also acquired seniority at a young age. He became the 13th pharaoh of the 18th dynasty when he was around eight years old. In another sense, Tutankhamun never acquired seniority at all. He died before he was 20, though not before fathering two children and presiding over what is regarded as something of a Golden Age. By 1922, Carter's Egyptological pursuits had been disrupted by a falling out with and resignation from the Egyptian antiquity. Service, Service and World War I, during which he stayed in Cairo as an interpreter spook attached to the intelligence department of the British War Office. But he'd acquired a patron with a comparable fascination with ancient Egypt and capacious pockets. George Herbert, 5th Earl of Carnarvon. Carter's team, led by Egyptian foreman Ahmed Jerichar Ghass, Hassan Hussein Abu Awad and Hussein Ahmed, had been digging a while in the area known as the Valley of the King Kings, without much result, and were on the verge of packing it all in when on November 4, they discovered what looked like the top of a staircase blocked with rubble. When this was cleared, it revealed a closed door. As Carter recorded in his diary, towards.
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D
Sunset, we had cleared down to the level of the 12th step, which was sufficient to expose a large part of the upper portion of a plastered and ceiling sealed doorway. Here before us was sufficient evidence to show that it really was an entrance to a tomb, and by the seals, to all outward appearances, that it was intact.
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C
Carter, not wanting his patron to miss the moment, had the stairway filled back in and cabled Carnarvon, telling him to get himself to Egypt as swiftly as possible. This being olden times, Carnarvon reached Cairo on November 20th. On this day, nearly 103 years ago, Carter made a small breach at the top left corner of the door, lofted his candle and peered inside. Carnavan asked, can you see anything? Carter replied, wonderful things.
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D
Two strange ebony black effigies of a king. Gilded couches in strange forms, lion headed, hatha headed and beast infernal. Strange black shrines with a gilded monster snake appearing from within. Finely carved chairs. A golden inlaid throne, a lovely lotiform wishing cup in translucent alabaster. A confusion of overturned parts of chariots glinting with gold.
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C
And that, it turned out, was only the antechamber. Howard Carter spent another decade meticulously cataloguing the contents of Tutankhamun's complete tomb. More than 5,000 items, it remains the most famous archaeological discovery of all time. By way of illustrating the daunting length of Carter's Shadow, early in 2025, archaeologists found the first pharaoh's tomb since Carter first glimpsed Tutankhamun's treasures. It belonged to one of Tutankhamun's ancestors, Pharaoh Thutmose ii. There was, however, nothing in it. And that is all for this edition of the Monocle Daily. Thanks to our panelists today, Alyona Livko and John Everard. The show was produced by Monica Lillis and researched by Joanna Moser. Our sound engineer was Elliot Greenfield. I'm Andrew Muller here in London. The Daily is back at the same time tomorrow. Thanks for listening.
- [35:01]
D
Sam.