The blue-and-gold braided beard on the burial mask of famed pharaoh Tutankhamen was hastily glued back on with epoxy, damaging the relic after it was knocked during cleaning, according to conservators at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.

The museum is one of the city's main tourist sites, but in some areas ancient wooden sarcophagi lay unprotected from the public, while Pharaonic burial shrouds, mounted on walls, crumble from behind open panels of glass.

Tutankhamen's mask, which is more than 3,300 years old, and other contents of his tomb are its top exhibits.