Continuity mistake: In the scene where Jonathan picks up the scarab, it breaks open and the beetle inside starts to crawl under his skin. We see Brendan Fraser tear Jonathan's shirt and cut the beetle out of him. However, in the very next scene, we see Jonathan walking into the temple, his shirt is intact and there is no blood to be seen. (01:37:05 - 01:38:30)
Factual error: In the gunfight on the Nile-boat, you can often see (and hear) Rick fire his revolvers 20-24 times in totum without reloading. The guns he has would only take 6 rounds per gun (MAS 1873 revolvers).
Continuity mistake: In the scene in the library, when Evie is putting back the books. She leans over to put the book back, but it falls to the ground and she is balancing on the ladder. When the camera cuts back to show the whole ladder, the book is nowhere to be found on the floor. (00:13:00)
Continuity mistake: In the scene where Imhotep's priests first pop up, Jonathan is on Rick's left, and the guy in black is on his right. But in that split-second shot that shows them starting to fire, they are on the opposite sides. [In the director's commentary he does mention this but says it's because they had to cut some scenes out due to time, still a mistake but has a reason.] (01:39:20)
Continuity mistake: In the scene where Evie & her brother meet Brendan's character for the first time, the guards bring Brendan out with both arms shackled together in front. After he kisses Evie the guards pull him away and one of his hands is suddenly free - he quickly tucks it behind his back as he's dragged off. (00:19:35 - 00:21:15)
Continuity mistake: On the DVD version of the movie there are some deleted scenes - one would have explained two mistakes that occurred towards the end of the movie. Mistake one was that there was a hole in the ground when Jonathan and Rick are at the base of the statue of Horus. You can see the hole clearly when Rick lights the TNT - but without the missing scene there is absolutely no reason for that hole to be there and it just sort of appears. (01:42:30)
Factual error: The city at the beginning of the film where the Pharaoh lives is named as Thebes, and you can see the Sphinx and the pyramids in the background, but these are in Giza, not Luxor, as Thebes is now called. (00:00:30)
Factual error: Due to the Earth's rotation, the mirror system used to light the tombs would only provide light for about 4 minutes before needing readjustment (tested by the Mythbusters). This would be fine when there were plenty of priests around to adjust them constantly but the light level never changes even though we see Rick and Evie for several minutes at a time.
Factual error: I counted five canopic jars, one of which has the head of a lion. In ancient Egypt there were only four canopic jars - Hapi, the baboon-headed god representing north, Imseti, the human-headed god representing south, Duamutef, the jackal-headed god representing east and Qebehsenuef, the falcon-headed god representing west. None have lion heads. (00:04:20)
Continuity mistake: Ardeth Bay removes the Lewis gun from Winston's plane after it crashes in the desert. If you look at the gun, it has the correct 97 round drum (it's really noticeably thick) with a leather carrying handle on top and no paint marks on it - this is correct for aircraft use. Aside from the fact we never see Ardeth Bay remove any spare magazines for it (which would also have been of the 97 round variety), which would have left the gun with little if any ammunition after shooting at the wall of sand, by the time they all arrive in the treasure room, the magazine suddenly changes to the 47 round variety (thinner than the 97 round magazine), which does not have the leather carrying handle, and has the painted marking on the top of it to enable the magazine to be more easily changed at night.
Continuity mistake: When Evie wakes up with the rat on her, she rolls over and sees Anck-Su-Namun's body and screams. A split second before the camera cuts, you can see a large crack form in the top-left corner of the table Anck is on. The next time you see the table, the crack is gone. Clearly, it was unintentional damage done to the set that was later fixed. (This mistake has been fixed in the 4K version, which seems to have the crack painted out, but it's still visible in older DVD/Blu-Ray versions).
Continuity mistake: In the scene where the Americans are running from the mummy in the cave, the American with the glasses falls to the ground and his glasses fall off. You see the glasses fall in front of him and after he says "My glasses" you see that another pair of glasses are being thrown from behind him near his right shoulder. (01:01:20)
Visible crew/equipment: In the scene where Brendan Fraser and the Americans are talking in the bar before the water turns to blood, there is a shot of two of the Americans and Fraser. Off to the left, you can see a hand dip in and out of frame. This is the First AD's hand. The director said he was checking his watch. (01:10:55)
Continuity mistake: In the scene where Imhotep's sarcophagus is opened: Rick and Jonathan stand the sarcophagus up against the wall, and Evie steps a few paces away and stands in front of it. Then the "lid" falls on the floor, where Evie was standing. Then Evie approaches the juicy corpse of Imhotep from an angle. Next she is seen stood directly in front of him, where the lid should be, yet the lid has mysteriously disappeared.
Continuity mistake: When the two teams are racing towards the city of the dead on horses and camels you can see that Evy's knees are exposed as she passes Rick, yet in the next shot they are completely covered by her dress. (00:38:55)
Continuity mistake: When Imhotep's priests break out of the ground, we see a shot of Ardeth, Jonathan and O'Connell starting to shoot them. It flashes back to the priests and then back to the trio and we only THEN see Jonathan reach over and grab some revolvers from beside O'Connell to start shooting.
Continuity mistake: When the biplane dives from the sandstorm created by the mummy, it shows Evelyn looking towards the plane, with the city of the dead behind her. The plane is seen, from her viewpoint, to be flying away when it crashes. However, after the plane sinks O'Connell and his friends walk in the same direction that the plane was flying, presumably AWAY from the city of the dead but the camera shows them walking towards it.
Continuity mistake: During the scenes when Rick, Evelyn, and Jonathan are walking through the passageways by torchlight, Rick's leather wrist bracer disappears and reappears.
Visible crew/equipment: During the fire/gunfight on the boat, you can see earplugs being used by the Americans while they are firing their weapons. (00:32:00)
Other mistake: When Evie is in the library and all the book cases start to tumble over, if you look at one of the corner book cases you can see a piece of paper landing on it and the books are clearly painted on a flat piece of cardboard. (00:13:30)
Suggested correction: Why does it matter. They added a fifth. No reason after making up a lot of history and a cover to cover book instead of a scroll for us to suddenly go, hmm, they gave the ten plagues of God in the Bible to an Egyptian priest? Lions are cats. Therefore worship, plus the lioness goddess who slew through the land once. They can certainly add that and might make it a nicer play on the mummy's power and deadliness comparatively to the canopic heads and their gods.
A better excuse is the fact that the earliest found canopic jars are from the 11th dynasty (2200 BC) whilst the jars in the movie are way older than that (2700 BC) and could have represented anything they wanted and be more than 4. Someone should make a correction like that.
lionhead
There is no real excuse. It is simply an inaccuracy and the trivia section to include it as such. It certainly "does matter".