Predecessors of Cleopatra

by Leigh North

Several of his daughters, as well as his wife, waited on Khu-n-aten in his last illness; Nefertiti survived him and may have lived till the time of Horem-heb, or even to that of Sety I. The tomb of the king was seven miles from the river in one of the great valleys which open on the plain of Tel-el-Amarna, the situation resembling that of Amenophis III at Thebes. That he was mourned deeply, at least by those nearest and dearest to him, there can be little doubt, yet his children soon turned from the religion he had tried to establish, to the earlier worship, in its form of devotion to many gods, under the semblance of various animals. The slabs found at Memphis, the stele at Sakkarah, and the remains of the great temple at Tel-el-Amarna, twenty-five feet square, the enclosure nearly half a mile long, all speak of this king.

Statues of him, his wife and Queen Tyi have been found, a beautiful and perfect one of the king is in the Louvre, and there is a death mask, which, among his various names, speaks of him as the “lord of the sweet wind.” Fragments of the stele with which his palace was decorated are to be seen in some of the museums in Europe, also in the museum of the University of Pennsylvania, and perhaps at other points in this country.

It seems to have been the sons-in-law who took chief authority, after Khu-n-aten’s death, and not the queen. She survived her husband for years. Her palace had a court, or harim, with glazed tiles, the walls painted with scenes, and the floor with pools, birds, cattle and wild plants. In the court was a fine well with a canopy on carved columns, and round coping, and an inscription with the queen’s titles. In the temple offerings of flowers were made and hymns sung to the accompaniment of harps, it was perhaps a return to the practice of the earliest times, and one writer suggests that its simplicity points to the Vedism of India. The queen and her daughters are shown waiting on the king in his illness. There is a fine fragment of a statue of the queen at Amherst college, and a gold ring and some other personal belongings at other places. With the death mask of the king in the University of Pennsylvania are some fragments from Tel-el-Amarna giving the names and title of Queen Nefertiti. Khu-n-aten is thought by late discoveries to have reigned seventeen or eighteen years.

As usual authorities differ, some giving Ai as the immediate successor of Khu-n-aten, others placing before him several kings, and numbering him just before Horem-heb, Horem-hib or Horus, the last monarch of the Eighteenth Dynasty. Some again refuse to recognize the heretic king and his descendants at all, and consider Horem-hib, who had returned to the polytheistic creed, as the true and direct successor of Amenophis III. It seems likely, however, that the eldest daughter, Mut-aten, born in the fourth year of her father’s reign was married just before his death to Re’smenkh’ka and that her husband was, for a time, co-regent. Both his and her name have been found on a tomb, these tomb inscriptions always throwing great light on this history of the time to which they refer. If, as estimated, she was thirteen at the time of her marriage and twenty-five at her husband’s death, he reigned over twelve years.

The second daughter, Mak-aten, died before her father, between her ninth and eleventh years; her tomb is in a side chapel of her father’s and the family are shown mourning for her, but she appears in the picture of the six princesses. Anknes-aten or Ankh s’en’pa’aten was born in the eighth year of her father’s reign and was ten years of age at his death. In her sister’s reign she was married to Tut-ankh’aten and changed her name to Ankh’s’en’amen, “her life is from Amen,” showing that already the changes her father had made were discarded. A few rings belonging to her remain, but with the exception of these relics nothing more is known of the other daughters, also nothing is known beyond figures and names on general monuments. Of Ras’ Ra’smenka or Ra’smenkh’ka’ser’kheperu, husband of the eldest daughter of Queen Nefertiti it is believed that he abandoned the palace in his third year of sovereignty and perhaps went to Thebes; there are few remains of him, but the dates are estimated as 1368-1358 B. C.

Tut’ankh-Amon or Twet-Ankh-Amon, “the living image of Aman” and husband of Anknes-amon, transferred his residence to Thebes (which, after all, had suffered little from the rivalry of Tel-el-Amarna), hastily finished the great hall and had it decorated with reliefs, representing the great festival which occurred at Luxor on New Year’s Day, when the sacred boats were brought up in procession, on the Nile, from Karnak, and carried into the temple. In these reliefs, of course, the king’s name largely figured, but, in the not uncommon fashion of these various monarchs, his brother-in-law, who later succeeded him, King Horem-heb, freely substituted his own name. A picture of King Tut’ankh Amon holding court and receiving a negro queen, either as a visitor or as offering tribute, was found on the wall of a tomb. The royal lady was depicted in a chariot, drawn by oxen and surrounded by her servants, a prototype of a later visit of the Queen of Sheba to King Solomon. From the north also came the ruddy princes of the land of Ruthen, with curly black hair and in rich dresses. The two governors of the South and North, Hi and Amenhotep, also came; they had served under Amenophis III and must have been of ripe years. Brugsch calls it “a large and lively picture of the manners and riches of the South and of the North in the fifteenth century, before Christ.” All bring rich gifts and ask for peace and friendship between themselves and the great Pharaoh.

King Ai was probably husband of one of the daughters, though his wife is elsewhere spoken of as the foster-mother of King Khu-n-aten, which seems rather hopelessly to mix up the chronology. In this case she is spoken of as Thi, the beloved name of that king’s own mother. They are also called respectively “the dressers of the king,” and “the high nurse, the nourishing mother of the godlike one.” Ai’s fine tomb at Tel-el-Amarna gives an account of his marriage. The tomb was never entirely finished; it is described by one traveller as having a sepulchral hall, beautifully painted, with colors still fresh and brilliant, with the sarcophagus standing in the middle, among the pictures, the king painted red and the queen of a pale yellow, are shown gathering lotus flowers; also the king being presented by the goddesses Mat and Hathor to Osiris. Perhaps two wives shared the honor of sovereignty with King Ai, or the second may have been espoused after the death of the first, and it seems likely the latter was much her husband’s junior.

Maspero gives a description of the palace of King Ai, also pictured on the walls of the Tel-el-Amarna tombs. He calls him the son-in-law of Khu-en-aten. “An oblong tank with sloping sides and two descending flights of steps, faces the entrance. The building is rectangular, the width being somewhat greater than the depth. A large doorway opens in the front, and gives access to a court planted with trees, and flanked by storehouses, fully stocked with provisions. Two small courts, placed symmetrically in the two further corners, contain the staircases, which lead up to the terrace. This first building, however, is but the frame which surrounds the owner’s dwelling. The two frontages are much adorned with a pillared portico and a pylon. Passing the outer door, one enters a sort of central passage, divided by two walls, pierced with doorways, so as to form three successive courts. The inside court is bordered by chambers, the two others open to right and left upon two smaller courts, whence flights of steps lead up to the terraced roof. This central building is called the ‘Akhonuti,’ or private dwelling of kings and nobles, to which only the family or intimate friends had access.”

All this, of course, varied in different cases with the taste of the owner, and the long, straight wall in front was sometimes divided and ornamented with colonnades and towers.

The old religion was resuming its sway, and the priests of Amon regaining their lost influence. They accepted the rule of Tut’ankh-Amon, whose monuments are said to extend only from Memphis to Thebes, and still more that of Ay, who was a true worshipper of the old gods. His reign, however, is spoken of as “feeble,” and the principal monument of the time is a shrine, high up in the face of cliffs, behind Ekhmin. King Ay seemed to have a special passion for tomb building, as there are no less than three attributed to him. The first at Tel-el-Amarna, the last at Thebes, coincident probably with his complete change of religious views and associations.