ACCORDING to legend, the pharaoh Tutankhamun brought down a curse on all those present at the opening of his tomb. But now the boy king of Egypt has finally met his match — the curse of the Millennium Dome.

Plans for a grand exhibition of the teenage pharaoh’s treasures at the venue have been thrown into doubt because Egyptian officials will not allow the artefacts to be displayed next to a proposed casino.

The dome’s owner is hoping to be granted a licence for Britain’s first Las Vegas-style gambling venue next month.

However, Cairo’s most senior antiquities official has described such a move as a “disaster”, claiming this weekend that it would “insult the dignity” of Tutankhamun.

“If there is a casino in the dome, I will not send the exhibits to London,” declared Zahi Hawass, the secretary-general of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities.

“It’s insulting. These Egyptian artefacts have dignity and therefore we should keep this dignity. I will never — [even] if they give us a billion dollars — show an Egyptian exhibit next door to a casino.”

The new “King Tut” exhibition is due to arrive in London next November — 35 years after artefacts from the pharaoh’s tomb first went on display at the British Museum. Organisers are hoping for a repeat of the success of the 1972 exhibition which drew 1.7m visitors and led to eight-hour queues.

The story of the pharaoh, who died around 1324BC, has been a source of fascination since Howard Carter, the British Egyptologist, discovered the burial chamber in the Valley of the Kings in 1922.

The unprecedented find was heightened by the untimely deaths of some of Carter’s archeological team, including Lord Carnarvon, his chief benefactor. It led to speculation that the tomb was cursed.

Tutankhamun has now come up against the malediction of the dome, which has stood empty for six years on the Greenwich peninsula, southeast London. The venue cost almost £1 billion to build. After it closed, tens of thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ money has been used each month to maintain it.

Its ill-starred history has been blamed on Peter Mandelson, the minister responsible. But his own misfortunes soon multiplied when he was sacked twice and dispatched into political oblivion at the European commission.

The dome’s owner Philip Anschutz, an American billionaire, wants to host the “King Tut” exhibition, but he has also set aside space at the site for Britain’s first supercasino. Greenwich council is on a shortlist of seven locations bidding for the lucrative licence.

Next month an independent advisory panel will recommend to Tessa Jowell, the culture secretary, its preferred venue.

The dome’s ill fortune has been compounded by the jinx of Two Jags. The casino bid has been mired in controversy since it emerged that John Prescott, the deputy prime minister, stayed as a guest at Anschutz’s Colorado ranch and was given a cowboy outfit while his department was responsible for regenerating the Greenwich peninsula.

Hugo Swire, the shadow culture secretary, joked: “I think the effect of a hex from the deputy prime minister is worse than anything the pharaohs could muster.”

Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG) has threatened to withhold £350m of investment at the dome if the casino is not given the green light.

Hawass’s ultimatum confronts AEG with a dilemma if it wins the gambling licence. For the six-month Tutankhamun exhibition to go ahead, the company will not be able to open a casino at the dome until well into 2008.

“They can make the casino after the exhibition leaves London,” said Hawass.

Paradoxically, the history of gambling is thought to have begun in ancient Egypt, with written references dating from 1500BC. Artefacts salvaged from the city of Thebes appear to be dice. But under ancient Egyptian law, gambling was punished by hard labour.

Earlier this year Hawass vetoed plans for the Tutankhamun exhibition to be displayed at a South African resort after he discovered that it included a casino.

David Campbell, president and chief executive of AEG Europe, said: “We hope that Tutankhamun is going to come to London in November next year.”

If the exhibition deal does fall through, an alternative location may yet be found. In the new exhibition’s current American tour, 140 artefacts including a crown and a miniature gold coffin storing Tutankhamun’s mummified liver have gone on display at museums.

One exhibit that will not travel to London is Tutankhamun’s famous death mask which is too fragile to leave Cairo.

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