The Twelfth Dynasty is also interesting to us as being contemporaneous with the birth of the Jewish nation, the time of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
A stele bears the names of the daughters or aunts of the deceased king Sebek-hotep II adoring Min, and their names are Anhetabu and Anget-dudu, born of Queen Nen-na. The parents of Sebek-hotep II are spoken of as “the divine father Men-tuhotep III” and royal mother, Anhet-abu, after whom evidently one of the daughters or grand-daughters was called. The name Sebek-hotep was a favorite. The father of Nefer-hotep and Sebek-hotep III was Ha’ankh’s,his mother Kema, his wife Sebsen and he had four royal children. A statement of facts probably, but with little accompanying detail. Sebek-hotep IV had for his queen Nub-em-hat and his daughter was Sebek-emhat, and there is a certain Pernub, probably of this family, descended from Queen Ha’ankh’s.
Queen Nub’kha’s was the wife of Sebek-em-saf, whose tomb was among those discovered in 1881. It was first rifled in the Twentieth Dynasty and is referred to in papyrus of the time of Rameses IX, of which the Amherst and Abbott papyrus give accounts. Like so many of the queens our only knowledge of her is from her tomb and that from the deposition of the robber who violated it, which is thus given. “It (the tomb) was surrounded by masonry and covered with roofing stone. We demolished it and found them (the king and queen) reposing therein. We found the august king with his divine axe beside him and his amulets and ornaments of gold about his neck. His head was covered with gold and his august person was entirely adorned with gold. His coffins were overlaid with gold and silver within and without and incrusted with all kinds of precious stones. We took the gold which we found upon the sacred person of this god, as also his amulets and the ornaments which were about his neck and the coffins in which he reposed. And having found the royal wife we took all that we found upon her, in the same manner and we set fire to their mummy cases and we seized upon the furniture, their vases of gold and silver and bronze, and we divided them among ourselves.”Death was deservedly the penalty for such offences, but probably the sinner felt a certain relief in making a “clean breast” of it, or perhaps fancied in some strange way that his wicked exploit conferred a sort of distinction upon him.
A stele gives the genealogy of this queen as daughter of the chief of the judges Sebek-dudu, who, rich or poor man, had four wives. The queen is called on a stele in the Louvre “great heiress the greatly favored, the ruler of all women, united to the crown,” thus showing that the kings did not always marry princesses. In the Fourteenth Dynasty, up to this writing, no queen’s name has been discovered. Weaker rulers followed, and thus Asiatic invaders, the Hyksos, an alien race, mistakenly supposed by Josephus to be Hebrews, were able to overpower and usurp the government, ruling in some places simultaneously with, and in others expelling the native sovereigns. They were called shepherd kings or princes. Some of their statues remain, but as they were frequently re-inscribed by later kings, there is doubt about some of them. All traces of the queens are, so far, lost during this period. Whether these strange invaders kept their women in the seclusion usual in the East or whether once existing relics have been destroyed, we know not. Beside the few portrait statues of the kings no royal consort appears, and they are of a different style of art. Joseph is thought to have been the prime minister of one of the Hyksos rulers and an inscription found which reads: “A famine having broken out during many years I gave corn to the towns during eachfamine,” is believed by some to relate to him. But it was not the wont of the Egyptian monarchs to celebrate the achievements of their slaves and such early memorials, if existing, would probably have been destroyed when the Hebrew race was enslaved by their oppressors.
Petrie gives the approximate dates of 2821 B. C. to 1928 B. C. for these various reigns.
Between the Fourteenth Dynasty, of which we last spoke, and the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Dynasties, to which this chapter brings us, occurs the third chasm in the monuments, and as they are the chief dependence in learning the history of Egypt, the information in regard to this intervening period is very meagre. Egypt was ruled with special favor shown to the central portion, and weaker monarchs had succeeded the great Amenemhats and Usertesens. Foreigners, the so-called Hyksos, or Shepherd Kings, overran and took possession of the country and conquered it, almost without battles, proceeding later to destroy the temples and kill the inhabitants.
Among these kings’ names are that of Salatis, or Shaloti, and a certain Apepi, of the Turanian type, a bust of whom is in the British Museum, and another at Gizeh, while it is to one of these rulers that Joseph is by some believed to have been the favored minister, but, as has been said before, no queen appears amongst them.
After the lapse of five hundred years Egypt awoke from its partial lethargy and, throwing off the yoke of these invaders, asserted its independence under a line of native rulers. Battles werefought and won, and the Theban princes again held sway. King Ta’a ruled, perhaps tributary to the Hyksos, revolted and partially liberated himself from thral, but it remained to his descendant Aahmes to completely accomplish this object. It seemed somewhat characteristic of the Egyptian monarchs that they did not know how to hold their conquered territory. Again and again they won battles and subjected foreign peoples only to lose what they had gained, to be once more fought for by their warlike successors.
The divisions into dynasties is said not to have been made by the Egyptians themselves, but to have been used by historians for the greater convenience of indicating the families who, together or in succession, held the sceptre.
No woman’s strength had been able to struggle up through the previous oblivion, but she now once more takes her place beside the king and shares with him honors, both divine and human. “Divine spouse,” a term not used before, is applied to the queens of this era, who were regarded as the mothers of the race and worshipped for generations after.
It was sometimes inscribed on the monuments in Egypt that “the sons of Misr” were all born equal, but this had about the same relation to facts that the vaunted “Liberty, Equality and Fraternity” sometimes bore. In the Twelfth Dynasty, below the crown and royal family came, first, the class of priests; second, the soldiers; third, the husbandmen, gardeners, huntsmen and boatmen; fourth, tradesmen, shopkeepers, artificers in stone and metal, boat builders, stone masonsand public weighers; fifth, shepherds, poulterers, fishermen, fowlers, laborers and the people at large—distinctly a succession of classes. Laborers wore only an apron and short trousers of coarse woven grass cloth.
The times were changing; this we learn from the numerous remains of this period, on the sculptured and painted monuments and the papyri, of which many have been discovered. The temples were growing in importance and the kings were buried more in grottoes than, as formerly, in monuments. The military man succeeded the farmer, and the priests gained in power. The wall paintings give pictures of festivals, with music and dancing, and less of the agricultural life previously so much dwelt upon.
It is interesting to know that the horse, in so many countries the useful and often beloved companion of man, seems to have been first introduced into Egypt in the Eighteenth Dynasty. After that he often figures in battles, and draws the state chariot in which both kings and queens take their pleasure. On the wall of a tomb at Thebes, that of a certain Hui of the Eighteenth Dynasty, is the picture of a queen drawn by two piebald bulls, like the modern Abyssinian breed. This, presumably, is just before the period when horses were in general use. To this time is also attributed the introduction of the pomegranate, the beautiful Eastern fruit of which poets have often sung; and earrings were then said to be added to the previous list of adornments, as the result of foreign example—they first took theshape of broad disks, and later, under the Twentieth Dynasty, became large rings.
In the Seventeenth Dynasty we have mention of a Queen Ansera. Of her private history we know nothing, but after her death she extended her hospitality to a number of her royal connections, for the great discovery in the summer of 1881 brought to light the mummies of many kings and queens gathered together in her tomb. Among these were the celebrated King Rameses II, by some thought to be the oppressor of the Israelites; Queen Aahmes-Nefertari, first of the Eighteenth Dynasty; Queen Merit-Amen, Queen Hout-timoo-hoo and Queen Sitka, also belonging to this dynasty, besides others of later date.
A certain confusion for a long time existed between the two queens, Aah-hotep and Aahmes-Nefertari, but the late history of Professors Petrie and Mahaffy has rendered the details of this period somewhat clearer. Different authorities have varied the name and spelling of Queen Aah-hotep. Thus we have in addition to the spelling above given, Aahotep, Aah-hetep or Ahhot-pou. It has the pretty meaning, “gift of the moon,” and she seems to have been a Theban princess, and first to have married an Egyptian, perhaps not of royal rank, and then Seqenenra, whose mummy has been found, showing that he had been wounded in battle. He was of the Berber type—tall, slender and vigorous, with small, long head and fine black hair. The reasons for this chronology are said not to be very strong. Aahmes was perhaps son of the first, Nefertari, daughter of the second, so the lawful heir, and Aahmesthus married his half-sister. If Kames, at first thought to be the husband and later the son of Queen Aah-hotep, was the elder brother, he had a short reign, followed by Aahmes and Nefertari.
Queen Aah-hotep had several children and was a wonderful woman, according to some accounts, with the longevity of a Mertytefs. A Theban stele of Kames shows that in the tenth year of Amen-hotep I, that Aah-hotep, the royal mother, was still active, revered and honored, taking a share in the government and perhaps regent in the absence of the king, at eighty-eight years of age, and she seems still to have been alive during the reign of Tahutmes or Thothmes I. Hence she had seen the whole of the revolution which again set the native princes upon the throne, during the reigns of son, grandson and great grandson. Petrie says of her, she was “one of the great queens of Egyptian history, important as the historic link of the dynasties and revered along with her still more celebrated and honored daughter, Nefertari.” Peculiarly close, and perhaps personally tender, relations seem to have existed between these two, who were both mother and daughter and mother-in-law and daughter-in-law. And children and grandchildren appear to have paid highest respect to Queen Aah-hotep.
The esteem of the son for his mother in the time of the Old Empire seems to have been great, as the Frenchman of to-day is said to be especially devoted to his. The family groups representing the living or dead, and sometimes both, frequently give the king, his wife and his mother, while the father rarely appears; though this isprobably more apt to be the case when the royal dignity has descended on the maternal rather than the paternal side.
Queen Aah-hotep was evidently much beloved by her martial son and grandsons, for the latter lavished upon her dead body all sorts of jewelry and ornaments to be buried with her. This large collection has been found and preserved, and, until the discovery of the parure of some of the princesses of the Twelfth Dynasty, was the finest specimen of the skill of the Egyptian craftsman that had come down to modern times. The body was found in the ancient necropolis of No, buried only a few feet below the surface. This, of course, was not the original place of sepulture, where the latest authorities believe it was placed, not by the Arab plunderers of the other royal tombs, but by pious hands, to preserve it from destruction, in the unsettled state of the country. Brugsch thus describes it: “The cover of the coffin had the shape of a mummy and was gilt above and below. The royal asp decked the brow. The white of the eye is represented by quartz and the pupils by black glass. A rich imitation necklace covers the breast and shoulders; the uræus serpent and the vulture—the holy symbols of the Upper and Lower land of Kemi—lie below the necklace. A closed pair of wings seem to protect the rest of the body. At the soles of the feet stand the statues of the mourning goddesses, Isis and Nepththys. The inscription in the middle row gives us the queen Aah-hotep, as servant of the moon.”
The mummy of Queen Aah-hotep was discoveredby rummaging Arabs in 1860, but was captured and confiscated by the authorities, who opened the coffin and took away what it contained. The rumor of this theft had spread, and Mariette, the great Egyptologist, who was in charge of the museum at Boulak, put his hand on the coffin and the jewels, but was not able to save them all. He believed that the queen was not originally buried where the Arabs discovered her, but thinks that towards the close of the Twentieth Dynasty she had been carried off by bands of robbers, spoken of in the Abbott papyrus, and hidden by them to despoil at leisure. Their design, however, was frustrated, as they were probably caught and executed, and their secret perished with them, until rediscovered hundreds of years later. As may be seen, the theories of the authorities on these subjects differ somewhat, as is so frequently the case. But to the latest researches and opinions perhaps should be attached the greatest weight, since they have the advantage of their predecessors’ views and the benefit of the most modern discoveries.
A fine illustration of female clothing and adornment is given in the standing statue of the Dame or Lady “Takarshit.” She wears a short wig, in rows of curls, and an embroidered band across her head, a very scant, narrow, and short robe, which almost makes us wonder how she had free play for her limbs (this, too, is embroidered in rows with religious subjects), and she has bracelets and chains on her wrists and arms. The face is older than the figure, as the Egyptians in sculpture would occasionally unitethe beauty of youthful form with that of the more mature head and countenance.
The list of Queen Aah-hotep’s treasures, habited, as we can picture her to be, in the garb just described, is a long one. On the gilded coffin lid she is represented with face uncovered and body enveloped in wings of Isis. This goddess was a special object of worship at this time, as later in the Ptolemaic period also. Among the most interesting of the trinkets is a little golden boat set on a wheeled wooden carriage and manned with small figures, the central one of which is her son, King Kames, or, as it was originally thought, her husband. He is going to Abydos, and holds in his hand an axe and a sceptre. There is also another little silver boat with its crew of rowers. A diadem as small as a bracelet for the wrist was found attached to the head of the queen, and terminated in tiny sphinxes, with the name of Aahmes engraved in letters of gold upon a groundwork of lapis-lazuli. A funeral collar, prescribed by the ritual, has designs of animals in chased gold, the figures outlined by fine gold wires, like Chinese cloissonne, between paste and colored stones. The coloring of all this enamel is particularly rich. There are three massive gold bees, possibly intended as the decoration for some order; also silver bees. A necklace with hanging ornaments in the shape of red and blue almonds. A box in the form of a royal cartouch as a large seal guarded by two sphinxes. A magnificent chain with the head of a goose at either end, the name of King Aahmes on theneck and the scarabeus or sacred beetle hanging from it.
Necklaces of gold and silver, rings and bracelets, the former with little figures of the gods, or amulets of various sorts hanging from them, were much worn; and it is said that after the Twenty-sixth Dynasty, owing to Phoenician influences, the bracelets usually terminated in lions’ heads. These amulets were supposed to preserve the wearer from harm, both in a present and a future world, and the gods themselves, strange to say, sought such protection. The “evil eye,” still thought to exist in our comparatively modern life, as witness the Salem witchcraft craze, was especially dreaded, and there were various designs to ward off its ill effects. Among these were outstretched fingers; “Ut-a’” eyes, sometimes with wings and hands, holding a disk, in different substances; the right symbolized the king, as the sun, the left, the queen, as the moon, and, either sculptured or worn, guarded the owner from this particular form of harm.
The heart amulet and the scarab or scarabeus was very common. Many curious notions prevailed about this insect. It was believed to be of only one sex, and women ate it to induce fecundity. The fact that the male and female closely resemble each other and share in the care of their offspring probably was the foundation of this idea. A remarkable example of a scarab was taken from the mummy of Tahut’mes III. It was of steatite, glazed, of a greenish purple hue, in a hold frame bound across. There was a figure of Tahut’mes kneeling, with crown onhead, and the whip, signifying authority, in his hand, while with the other he made an offering to the god. A dog was represented in front and a hawk behind him, and a gold loop was attached to hang the scarab to the chain on the neck. All Egyptians loved jewelry, the men as well as the women wearing necklaces, collars, etc., of gold, silver, beads and precious stones. Great use was made of carnelian, lapis lazuli, jasper, etc., and ladies would occupy themselves, as do the blind of our own time, in stringing glass beads and bugles into network, which in these latter days is used to trim the clothing of the living, while with the Egyptian it was chiefly for the adornment of the dead.
A chapter from the Book of the Dead was found on a scarab of the time of Mycerinas. These scarabs seem to have been of three classes; the first merely for ornament, the second for historic record, and the third for funeral purposes. They sometimes bore the names of kings earlier than those with whose mummies they have been found. A signet ring was of special importance and a necessary article among the belongings of either king or queen, as also of many others of less elevated rank. It was the same thing as the signing of a personal name at the present time—they sealed instead of signing, and when an Eastern monarch wished to send special orders he would sometimes intrust his signet ring to the bearer in token of authority. This ring was of gold or less valuable material, according to the rank of the owner. Many examples of a pretty class of ring made of faience, in blue, green,purple, etc., and manufactured at Tel-el-Amarna, the city built by Amen-hotep IV, formerly called Khu-n-aten, in the latter part of the Eighteenth Dynasty have been found, and are among the collections in various museums.
Some of these collections have sets of ornaments belonging to ancient kings and queens. Berlin has that of an Ethiopean Candace. The Louvre that of a Prince Pzar, with griffins and lotus. Also a ring of Rameses II, with little horses standing on the bezel. At Gizeh are heavy earrings of Rameses IX, with filagree chains and uræus, and bracelets of Pinotem in gold encrusted with stones, like those made to-day in the Soudan. The later discoveries of this sort, belonging to the latter period of the Egyptian Empire, show Greek influences. But the most extensive, tasteful and finely wrought of these objects was the parure of Queen Aah-hotep. Chains to the women were as essential as rings to the men; a woman was indeed poor if her jewel box held only one.
As the North American Indian slays the favorite horse and lays beside his dead chief bows and arrows for use in the “happy hunting grounds,” so the Egyptian placed in the tomb of his revered and beloved things that he used in daily life. At one time it was even the custom in the case of a king to kill some of his slaves, whose souls might accompany and attend upon him, but this cruel practice was not kept up. For service in another existence, food, furniture and personal belongings surrounded the dead in his grave, as they had done the living in his household;and, in the case of a woman especially, all her feminine appliances for the toilette and many of her ornaments and jewels were included. Some were what had belonged to her in the past, some were newly prepared for the future state. Even faded flowers hundreds of years old have been discovered, and fruit has been found with mummies of the Eleventh Dynasty.
One museum possesses a sarcophagus of a priest of Maut and a prophet of Queen Aah-hotep. To her the priests of Amen rendered divine honors. On the inside of the coffin are invocations to the divine Amenophis II (a descendant of the queen’s), and also to both Queens Aah-hotep and Nefertari Ahmes. The coffin of the former was not so gigantic as that of the latter, and somehow one pictures her as rather smaller and more feminine looking than the daughter who succeeded her in the royal honors, with the thick eyelashes blackened with kohl, the straight brows, the almond-shaped eyes and the other features characteristic of the Egyptian face. Into the future life in which the Egyptian believed so ardently she stepped, after a long pilgrimage in this world, accompanied by all the little devices which had made her comfort and pleasure here, to be honored and revered as she had been accustomed to be in the lower world.
Among the valued amulets was the buckle, or “Tie,” made of jasper, carnelian, porphery, red glass, faience and sycamore wood, more rarely of gold. The red material stood for the blood of Isis, and this amulet was put on the neck of a mummy for its protection. Such wereusually without inscription, but two found together would occasionally be inscribed with a chapter from the Book of the Dead. The “Tet,” made of gold, sometimes had plumes, when it signified Osiris and meant firmness. This also was for protection. Serpents’ heads guarded from their bites in another world. The vulture amulet was of gold, but was not common. It referred to “Mother Isis,” and bore such inscriptions from the Book of the Dead as “His Mother, the mighty lady, makes his protection and brings him to Horus.” This was sometimes suspended from the usual gold collar worn by the dead. The “anck,” or life sign, was something like a small cross with an oval ring on top instead of the upper arm, and was very frequent. The amulet “Nefer” was for good luck. “Maut,” always worn by the god Ptah, was a frequent emblem of Hathor. Frogs, disks, plumes, etc., were of this list. Some of these, and more, probably surrounded Queen Aah-hotep.
In a pectoral on her breast King Ahmes was represented, while the two divinities Amen and Ra poured the water of purification on his head; they stand in a little green temple. Bracelets for the ankle or upper arm were simple rings of gold, massive, solid or hollow, edged with threads of gold to represent filagree. Others worn at the wrist, like ours, were formed of beads of gold, lapis lazuli, carnelian and green feldspar, mounted on threads of gold and disposed in squares in which half was a different color. The fastenings were two gold plates united by an aiglet of gold, the cartouch of Ahmes engraved lightly at thepoint. Some of the bracelets were more complicated but not so fine in workmanship—three parallel bands garnished with turquoise. There was also a vulture, the queen’s special ornament, with outstretched wings; also the heads of sparrow-hawks. Some of the ornaments were attached to the cloth in which the mummy was wrapped by rings. But for what we may call the trousseau of a bride of the tomb, jewelry was not sufficient. Arms, with which she was to protect herself, or be protected, from the evil spirits of another world, were also provided and placed with her. There was a unique specimen of a baton, bent at the extremity and adorned with a spiral of gold. Such forms as this are found to-day among the inhabitants of Nubia and the Soudan, but probably have not the same meaning. An axe was ornamented with gold and precious stones, inlaid, and with a picture of the warlike Aahmes slaying an enemy. Handles of knives in ebony were carved with the lotus. There were poinards with female heads, and sheaths with raised ornaments of damascened gold and inscriptions. On the blade on one side was “The beneficent god Ra-neb-pebti, life giver, as the sun, ever.” On the other, “The son of the sun and of his side Aahmes-nakht—life giver and always.” One hatchet had a handle of horn and a silver blade. A poinard had a yellow bronze blade and silvered handle, and there was also a clasp of bronze with holes left for ostrich feathers.
To these were added a large variety of toilette articles, vases and jars of various sorts for spices,unguents, etc. Alabaster jars in tombs are as ancient as the Fourth Dynasty, and examples are also known inscribed with the name of Unas, Pepi I, Men-tu-em-saf, Amasis I, Tahutimes II, Amenophis II, Rameses II, and Queen Amen-eritis.
The god Bes, said to be introduced from Punt, presided over the toilette. He had a squat, hideous figure, and a face which was doubtless chiefly appreciated from its contrast to that of his fair votaries. He bore a double character, one side being military or martial in aspect, the other a sort of Bacchus or god of Pleasure, and it was in this last, probably, that he was regarded as a suitable guardian for the preparations for feasts and revels. Toilette articles, of which a number were found with the body of the queen, were mirrors, tweezers, hairpins of wood, bone, ivory and metal, and occasionally combs of wood and ivory, though these last are believed by some authorities not to have been introduced till later. There were also kohl pots and little tubes and jars of various forms. Tiny hands of ivory on a stick for scratching the back were sometimes found.
The mirrors, from three to twelve inches in diameter, had handles ornamented with flowers, particularly the well-beloved lotus, and heads of the goddess Hathor and the god Bes. Vases and jars found in the tombs were of various shapes, for wine, oils, spices, unguents, scents, etc., but transparent glass ones are not found earlier than the Twenty-sixth Dynasty. The kohl pots were to hold stibium and antimony of copper to stain the eyelids and eyebrows and givethe eyes a wide-open appearance; also for such purposes were little hollow tubes of wood, glass, ivory and alabaster, a column with a palm leaf and figures of Bes. Sometimes the tubes were double, with movable covers on a pivot and accompanied by a stick of bronze wood to apply the unguent. The wicked Jezabel in the Bible is said to have “set her eyes in stibium,” which was, however, a common Eastern practice.
Fine examples of such articles, with the pre-nomen of Amenophis III and his wife Tyi, and of Tut-arch-Amen and his wife Anknes-Amen, have been found. Hematite pillows or head rests, generally uninscribed, and papyrus sceptres mounted in mother-of-emerald and faience, may perhaps be added to this list and not exhaust it. Thus was the queen, surrounded by all the paraphernalia of life, laid in her last resting place. The Egyptian, as has been before said, spent much of his time in preparing and providing for a future existence, and it is through his death, as it were, and on tombs and monuments that we attain to any realistic knowledge of his living days.
The queen is believed to have had a number of children besides Aahmes and Nefertari, whose personality stands out pre-eminent among them. Of these are Birpu, who appears on a statuette, Amenmes and Uazrmes. Of Nebt’ta, one of the daughters, a scarab is known. And Mut’nefert, subsequently queen, may also have been of this family.
Queen Mertytefs’ name calls up this active, capable ruling spirit of the household and thecourt. Queen Nitocris comes before us as the beauty of her time—the Mary Stuart of an early age, lovely, captivating and admired, but not blameless in her life story. Queen Sebek-nefru-ra is associated with father and husband in works of public usefulness and benefit. But Queen Aah-hotep seems to bear with her an atmosphere of femininity and tenderness. A devout worshipper of the gods, we can picture her as a frequent attendant upon the services and offerings in the temples. At home, a woman perchance with some foibles and weaknesses and a truly feminine love for ornamentation, and yet a mother who won an undying affection. Lamentations and mourning doubtless followed her to the tomb, and upon her inanimate form was lavished a wealth of adornment which bespoke the clinging tenderness of the royal son whose name is found so often inscribed upon her ornaments.
Aahmes, also called Amosis, son of Queen Aah-hotep and an Egyptian father (whose history is as yet unknown), was one of the greatest warriors and most noted kings of Egypt, and regarded as the savior of his country, since he freed it from the long thrall of an alien race. Ambition was evidently a ruling passion with him, but he appears to have been devoted and even tender to those he loved. His wife, the Princess Nefertari-Aahmes, or Aahmes-Nefertari, was long supposed to be the daughter of an Ethiopian king, and therefore not of kin to him, since her pictures on the monuments show a black skin, though Caucasian features.
Nefertari Aahmes.
Nefertari Aahmes.
Later researches have proved her to be his half-sister, the daughter of his mother, but not of his father. She was evidently the first daughter of Queen Aah-hotep’s marriage with Sequenenra, and with a more direct title to the succession than her husband, so that there were state reasons as well as private ones for the marriage. From Sequenenra, therefore, he being of the Berber type, she took her coloring and the right of succession, and she may perhaps be said to have been three-quarters black. The name signifies“good or beautiful companion,” and she was regarded with great veneration on earth and shared with her mother, and mother-in-law, divine honors after death.
Thebes, which had risen to political consequence in the time of the Eleventh and Twelfth Dynasties, was now the royal city, the safest home of the royal family, and was said to have stood to Ethiopia, as well as to Egypt, as Rome did to mediaeval Christendom. It was in Upper Egypt, the sacred city, and devoted to the worship of the god Amen, or Amon, whom the Greeks regarded as their Jove. From here went out the great war chariots and the bands of soldiers to battle, and often, especially at this period, to conquest.
“The chief peculiarity of the Egyptians,” says a writer who is an authority, “is the remarkable closeness of their eyelashes on both lids, forming a dense double fringe, which gives so animated an expression to their almond-shaped eyes.” The very ancient and still existing custom of blackening the edges of the eyelids with antimony (kohl), which is said to serve a sanitary purpose, contributes to enhance this natural expression. The eyebrows are straight and smooth, never bushy. The mouth is wide and thick-lipped, and very different from that of the Beduin or inhabitant of the oases. The high cheek bones, the receding forehead, the lowness of the bridge of the nose (this last in some pictures of the statues of Queen Nefertari-Aahmes being noticeable), which is always distinctly separated from the forehead, and the flatness of the noseitself are the chief characteristics of the Egyptian skull; but as the jaw projects less than those of most of the other African colored races, it has been assumed that the skull is Asiatic and not African in shape. A headless statue at Karnak and statuettes at various places exist. They suggest a queenly bearing, and from these and the general description we must form our mental picture of this dark-skinned lady. A light complexion was much admired, but Queen Nefertari-Aahmes was of different type, and perhaps set the fashion of her own style of beauty; at one place she was painted yellow, and one authority claimed that she was only black in a mythological sense, but it now seems to be agreed that to a Berber father she owed her tint.
The two names, Nefruari and Nefertari, appear to be interchangeable, and probably bear the same relation to each other as Mary and Maria. We can see plainly the difference ’twixt our Jacks and Johns, our Marys and Marias, but the alteration of a single letter in a foreign tongue leaves us somewhat bewildered, and the Nofruaris and the Nefertaris, the Nefrits and the Nofrits, etc., are often very puzzling, and, unless great care is taken, may lead to serious complications and mistakes.
Our knowledge of this period comes largely from two sources, the tomb of a naval officer in the service of Aahmes and the discoveries of comparatively late years, which have brought to light many of the very bodies of the kings, queens and princesses of this and subsequent lines. Even in death the truth of the proverbseems to hold, that “uneasy lies the head that wears a crown,” and not in what was intended to be their last resting places, but in collections and museums, are gathered many royalties whose eyes looked out on the light of an ancient world.
Aahmes, son of Abuna, directly or indirectly the king’s namesake, was an officer of the ship called “The Calf,” and later served on one named “Ruling in Memphis,” which perhaps celebrated the reconquering of the ancient capital. Of his early life there are some amusing records: “I was too young to have a wife, and slept in the semt cloth and shennu garment.” This was about 1586 B. C., and his age perhaps twenty. Nor, following the example of his sovereigns, does he hesitate to blow his own trumpet “As soon as I had a house,” says the martial hero, “I was taken to a ship called the ‘North’ on account of my valor.” Apparently, he could face the enemy early in life, but not a fair lady. Diospolis, or Thebes, “hundred-gated Thebes,” was now the chief city, and Officer Aahmes saw active service, but survived and was rewarded by his monarch. The chronicle reads: “I brought very many prisoners. I do not reckon them,” and, further, that he was “presented with gold seven times in the face of the whole land.” The story of his exploits on his tomb throws much light upon the history of the time.
In the summer of 1881, in a pit, near Thebes, was found a concourse of mummies, the bodies of many kings and queens, among them Queen Nefertari-Aahmes. The existence of royal tombs had long been suspected from the various articleswhich had found their way into the market, and the authorities were at length able to secure the Arab who was the chief purloiner. He and his accomplices long obstinately resisted all inducements, even that of imprisonment, to reveal their secret, but finally yielded, and the bodies of various sovereigns of the Seventeenth, Eighteenth, Nineteenth and Twentieth Dynasties (the Twentieth was missing) were found.
The experienced archeologist can tell from the appearance of a mummy case to what period it belongs. The oldest mummy in the world, until recently, about which there was no doubt, is that of Saken-em-saf, son of Pepi I, of the Sixth Dynasty. The mummies of the Eleventh Dynasty are poorly made, brittle and yellowish; those of the Twelfth Dynasty are black, and from these to the Seventeenth are also inferior. But those of the Eighteenth are so finely embalmed that the limbs are pliable and bend without breaking. At Thebes they were generally painted yellow. Alexander the Great is said to have been buried in honey, as was the case with others. Bitumen was used towards the time of the Ptolemies, and grew hard with age. Later still, pieces of wood were inserted, with the face painted upon them.
The “Book of the Dead,” so often spoken of, and whose reputed author was the god Thoth, was a sort of Bible to the Egyptians, and contained minute directions in regard to burial rites. It was written in chapters, and was an accretion, taking shape gradually, some parts being much older than others. It was seldom or never collected in one roll. It is said that a fairly completecopy was ninety feet long and about fifteen inches wide. It was written on papyrus; chapters of it were buried with the dead, and extracts were inscribed on scarabs and other objects and used in the same way. The book is a storehouse of information as regards Egyptian theology and practice, and translations of it exist in several languages besides English. Figures like small mummies and called Ushabti, or Ushebti, “little servants,” to accompany and attend upon the departed, were buried with them. This was probably a survival of the original custom of killing some of his slaves at the tomb of the master. In the Thirteenth Dynasty these images were made of granite or wood; in the Eighteenth of faience, or made in moulds, and from the Twenty-fourth to the Twenty-sixth Dynasty they were not much used, and later were carelessly made. They were often inscribed with the Sixth chapter from the Book of the Dead.
The coffins of the Eighteenth Dynasty were larger than the previous ones, and were shaped in the form of a mummy, with inscriptions running from the breast to the feet. Of such colossal size was that of Queen Nefertari-Aahmes that it took sixteen men to move it, and it was over seven metres in height. After the Eighteenth Dynasty the cases were again smaller. The queen’s was made of innumerable layers of linen, saturated and hardened together by some kind of glue, was painted blue and yellow with a mesh-like effect, and the features, necklace, bracelets, etc., picked out in blue. The face, evidently a portrait, was large and round, with a sweet expression,and she wore an extensive wig, with the plumes of Amen and Maut. In each hand she held the royal “ankh,” or life sign, and the helmet and plumes, also the investiture of Osiris, were befitting the wife of a warrior and one who was regarded as a goddess.
There was also the coffin of the Lady Rai, nurse of Queen Nefertari, in green garnished with bands of yellow. Within were inscriptions to the goddess Maut, in honor of Ra, and other inscriptions with the name of Ra, but the body had disappeared. There has been found also the little blue coffin of the Princess Sitamon, daughter of Aahmes and Nefertari.
The theories and ideas of the Egyptians seem utterly strange to us. So strong was their belief in a future existence that their whole life in this world was a preparation for it, and the greatest care was taken that every portion of the body should be preserved—that no limb or member should be lacking in another world.
The Egyptian was, according to his own idea, archeological authorities tell us, a composite being, composed of several different entities, of which each had its functions and its own life. There was, first, the body, then the double, or “Ka,” images of which are found so constantly in the tombs and reproduced in paintings and statues, as we remember that of Queen Mertytefs and her Ka, before described. This double bore, in miniature, the form and lineaments of the departed, and was a sort of second example of the body in a less dense material than the corporal body. A colored projection but an aerial one ofthe individual. It represented the departed, feature for feature, male or female, adult or child.
After the double came the soul, “Ba” or “Bai,” which the popular imagination represented under the figure of a bird; and after the soul the luminous particle of light, “Khau,” detached from the divine fire. None of these were imperishable, and the man left to himself would die a second time and fall into nothing. By embalmment the body was preserved from destruction, and by prayers and offerings the other portions of this strange and composite whole. The double remained always with the mummy, the others went and came. The places of sepulchre for the sovereigns were the numerous pyramids, usually having sides to the points of the compass and a door to the north; these were frequently enlarged and altered by succeeding monarchs, as that of Mycerenas was so extended and beautified by Queen Nitocris that it often bore her name, instead of its first builder.
The stele were originally false doors by which the living world was supposed to communicate with the dead. Food for the departed was often placed before the door, and later represented upon it, which by incantations became real. At last the stele were used only as a place for inscriptions. This applies merely to funerary stele. Sometimes there was a statue or bas-relief in the stele.
To the pyramids were added grottoes, rock, tombs and caves, not alone for royalty, and the mastabas built of brick, like a truncated pyramid, and so named by the Arabs because they resembledthe long, low seat used in Oriental houses. Naturally, the more important the person buried was deemed the more indestructible were the materials of his tomb, and the more care was taken to preserve them. Not many tombs were found before the Fourth and Fifth Dynasties until the later discovery of the burial places of the kings of the First Dynasty. It is the mastabas and smaller tombs at Gizeh and elsewhere that teach us about the earliest period in Egyptian history, those at Thebes later, and Beni-Hasen the Middle Empire. The monuments and temples were the canvas upon which the self-glorifying kings painted their own history, and it is the absence of these, as has been before shown, which leaves the period in comparative darkness. It is the tomb of Ty in the Fourth Dynasty and those of Beni-Hassen in the Twelfth which are so invaluable in giving the pictures of the daily life during their respective eras.
We read of a stele or tablet (which in the Eighteenth Dynasty were usually rounded at the top) on which at the left is seated the figure of King Amosis or Aahmes and “the divine spouse of Amen, the royal spouse, Aahmes-Nefertari,” also at the left are seated King Amenophis I and his spouse, Aahmes-Nefertari. “Is it the same queen?” questioned Mariette, yet the spelling and the faces are different. There is also a stele bearing the name of King Aahmes and his mother, Queen Aah-hotep. Another statue is spoken of, whose pure profile recalls the handsome portraits of Seti I. It represents the god Amen standing. On the base we read in red ink, withthe legend of Amenophis I, “the royal spouse whom he loves, Aahmes-Nefertari.”
The mourning color of the Egyptians, as now of the Burmese, was yellow, and it is curious to observe how varied in this respect are the customs of different lands. With us, and all over Europe, since the days of Rome black is the usual, as it seems the most natural, trapping of woe; but it is stated that until 1498 white was worn in Spain for the members of the family, as it or yellow now is in China. In Turkey the mourning color is a bright violet, while formerly purple and violet were assumed for the kings and cardinals of France. In Bokara and other parts of Asia deep blue is used, and in Syria and Armenia, sky blue. In Persia it is pale brown, the color of winter leaves; in the Soudan, grayish brown, the color of the earth; and among the South Sea Islanders a black and white striped goods serves for this purpose.
By different nations, too, various days in the week are observed for public worship. The Christians keep Sunday, the Greeks Monday, the Persians Tuesday, the Assyrians Wednesday, the Egyptians Thursday, the Turks Friday, and the Jews Saturday.
At the time of a death, in token of grief the mourning women would leave the house where the body was lying, put dust and mud on their heads and faces, and with bare bosoms run through the streets, striking themselves and uttering lamentations. Some of the pictures show even little children thus testifying sorrow, and there is something both pathetic and ludicrousin the scene. At the death and funeral of a member of the royal family great ceremony was observed. The people wept, the temples were closed, and no festival was kept for seventy-two days. The mourners fasted and went round with mud on their heads and their garments knotted together, like girdles, below the breast. They marched in procession, singing funeral dirges. The statement is somewhere made that women of quality were not embalmed immediately, but in so warm a climate the process could not have been long delayed.
From the use of bitumen, “mumia,” the word “mummy” is derived. There were several methods of preservation, varying in expense with the dignity of the deceased and the financial ability of the survivors. The work of preparation for the tomb was, especially in the case of the wealthy and high-born, costly and protracted, and all details were prescribed. The person who, in the service of the embalmer, commenced the task by making a long cut in the side, was, as a matter of form, it is generally believed, driven away with sticks and stones, but some authorities deny this. The organs were then removed through this opening, embalmed and placed in jars, each under the protection of its special god, the four children of Horus. Mesta, with the head of a man, was for the stomach, and, under the protection of Isis, thus justifying a modern theory that a man can be influenced largely through his appetite and is most amiable after dining. The jar Hapi, with the head of an ape, held the smaller intestines, under the protection of Nepthys. Thejar Tuan-antef, with the head of a jackal, was for the heart, guarded by Neith. Qubhsennuf was hawk-headed and held the liver. Examples of all these may perhaps be seen in the New York Metropolitan Museum among the Egyptian antiquities and other places. On a box for funerary jars is a figure of Isis, and the inscription, “Says Isis, the divine mother, queen of heaven, first of the gods: ‘I am come that I may be for thy protection, Osiris Chonsu.’”
The body was laid in liquid natron for seventy days, and was then stuffed with spices and natron and sewed up again. Various trees have been supposed to furnish the frankincense used by ancient peoples, the Indian Olibanum among them. The Egyptians used it in their religious rites, burning it on the altars of Osiris, Isis and Pasht, while it was exacted as tribute from some of the conquered nations. It was also used by the Jews in their sanctuary. All parts of the tree emit an agreeable odor, something like lemon, the sap hardens into the gum used in commerce, being extracted by incisions in the bark, as is the case with maple sugar. It is an evergreen, the leaves are prettily notched, the flowers small, pink and star-like, and the fruit also very small and three-sided. It grows in Persia and Arabia.
After the body was thus prepared, the skull, from which the brains had been drawn through the nose, was filled with plaster and the nostrils plugged with small rolls of linen, and obsidian eyes placed in the sockets. The Book of the Dead provided a formula for all this. The eye of Horus was placed upon the breast, which signifiesthe transformation by which life is preserved and constantly renewed, and was consecrated to the god Ptah. A scarab was laid on the neck, the nails were stained with henna, rings were placed on the hands and chains and necklets on the throat. The bandages were narrow strips of linen inscribed with texts.
When the head was bandaged, an attendant recited this petition: “O most august goddess, O lady of the West, O mistress of the East, come and enter into the two ears of the deceased! O doubly powerful, eternal, young and very mighty lady of the West and mistress of the East, may breathing take place in the head of the deceased in the nether world. Grant that he may see with his eyes, that he may hear with his two ears, that he may breathe through his nose, that he may utter sounds with his mouth and articulate with his tongue in the nether world. Receive his voice in the hall of truth and justice and his triumph in the hall of Seb, in the presence of the great lord of the West. O Osiris (this addressed to the deceased), the thick oil which comes from thee furnishes thy mouth with life and thine eye looketh into the lower heaven, as Ra looketh upon the upper heaven. It giveth thee thy two ears to hear that which thou wishest, just as Shu in Hebit heard merely that which he wished to hear. It giveth thee thy nose to smell a beautiful perfume, like Seb. It giveth thee thy mouth well furnished by its passage (into the throat) like the mouth of Thoth when he weigheth Maat. It giveth thee Maat (Law) in Hebit, O worshipper in Hetbenben, the cries of thy mouth are in Siut.Osiris of Siut comes to thee, thy mouth is the mouth of Ap-not in the mountains of the West.”
The god Osiris, so often referred to, was the great (unseen One), the immortal divine spirit, and was always associated in the Egyptian’s mind with the thought of immortality. He was usually colored blue, the tint of the sky perhaps suggested perpetuity and immortality. The Egyptians from the earliest times seem to have worshipped one divine spirit under a thousand manifestations.
The coffins and covering were of wood, with human head and face; painted with figures of gods, names and titles of the deceased, and cartouch of the king. Inside was frequently a purple ground, painted with yellow figures of apes, lions, etc., adoring Ra. The face on the coffin was often a likeness, and the coffin was painted inside and out with figures of protecting gods. Another coffin, more coarsely made and with less of detail in its paintings, was placed over the first to preserve it. A lady’s coffin sometimes contained spoons with female heads and various toilette articles, mirrors, pins and cases for henna, stibium and other cosmetics, while miniature figures, the little “ushebti,” like troops of slaves, mounted guard. Sometimes these were hollow and contained chapters from the Book of the Dead. An ordinance required that the nearest city should embalm persons who were drowned or seized by crocodiles.
The funeral procession included players on lyres, flutes, harps and servants carrying inverted bouquets, a red calf for sacrifice and white geese. A sort of court was held before the body was depositedin the tomb, in which those who had accusations against the deceased were allowed to present them. If these were sustained, the mummy was sent back to the house; but if not, the priest cried “Approved! Let the good be entombed, and may their souls dwell in Amenti, with Osiris. Judgment is passed in her favor! Let her be buried!” The dead sometimes carried a papyrus on which his good deeds were written. The mummy was placed recumbent or upright in the tomb, and the soul was received by Horus and conducted to Amenti, where a sort of Cerberus kept the gate of Truth. The goddess of Justice, with scales of gold, weighed the virtues of the deceased, which the god Thoth wrote down on a tablet, like the scribes of their daily life, and, after reading, Osiris presented him with the ostrich feather, the emblem of Truth, while Isis led him to the abode of the gods, where he dwelt in perpetual honor and happiness.
Very poetical are some of the tomb inscriptions relating to the future state. “The Shining One cometh who dwelleth in Netat, the Master who dwelleth in Tini (Thinis), and Isis speaks upon thee. Nephthys holdeth converse with thee, and the Shining Ones come up to thee, bowing down even to the ground in adoration at thy feet, by reason of the power of the writing which thou hast, O Pepi, in the region of Sa (Sabu?). Thou goest forth to thy Mother Nut (i.e., the sky), and strengthen thy arm, and she maketh a way for thee through the road to the sky” (perhaps referring to the Milky Way) “to the place where Ra (the sun-deity) abideth. Thou hastthen opened the two gates of heaven, thou hast opened the two doors of Quobhu (i.e., the celestial deep), thou hast there found Ra and he watcheth over thee, he hath taken thee by thy hand, he hath guided thee into temples of heaven, and he hath placed thee upon the throne of Osiris.” We are reminded of some parts of the book of Job or some of the picturesque speeches of our own North American Indian.
Nefertari-Aahmes was a devout worshipper of the gods, like her mother before her, and made valuable gifts to the temples, so these funeral rites were doubtless observed with great care and ceremony, especially as she had many children, some of whom survived her, to pay the last tributes of love and respect. The list is given as Meryt-amen, the eldest daughter, who died young; Sat-amen, a second daughter, who died as an infant; Sa’pair, the eldest son, of whom some statuettes and memorials remain, though he also appears to have died young and did not succeed his father; Aah-hotep, doubtless named after the beloved grandmother, and who also became queen later; Amenhotep I, who succeeded his father, and Sat-Kames, a daughter. Besides Nefertari-Aahmes, the king seems to have had another royal wife, called Queen Anhapi, who bore him a daughter, Hent’ta’mehu, and a secondary wife, whose name is preserved as Kasmut, and who bore him Tair and other children. Queen on earth and goddess in heaven though she might be, Queen Aahmes-Nefertari had the common human experience of sorrow; she lost a number of children, and though holding the firstplace, and doubtless having her own establishment, shared her husband’s attention and affection with various rivals. Yet human ambition could reach no greater height; she was recorded as “the royal daughter, sister and great royal wife, royal mother, great ruler, mistress of both lands.” The ancestress and foundress of her race, she had a priesthood of her own, a large sacred shrine, and was worshipped like the great gods at Abydos, Karnak and Thebes. She is believed to have outlived her husband, and to have reigned temporarily for her son, who was associated with her and worshipped with her at Thebes. “She sits enthroned with her husband,” says one writer, “at the head of all the Pharonic pairs and before all the royal children of their race, as the specially venerated ancestress of the Eighteenth Dynasty.” Her title of wife of the god Amen expressly designated the chief priestess of the tutelary god of Thebes.
The wife and children of Aahmes often adopted or combined his name with their own and encircled it with their cartouch. The king was called “the golden Horus, the binding together of the two lands.” His coffin and body were found at Deir-el-Bahri. The coffin was of the new style, plain in outline, less massive and shaped to the figure behind, painted yellow, picked out with blue, instead of gilt. The body was fairly preserved, the head long and small, with thick and wavy hair, not shaved, as later. The muscles were strong and vigorous, and he might have been something over fifty at the time of his death. Not a long life, but that of a warriorwas perhaps necessarily a hard one. The mummy case of the queen was one of the largest and most magnificent ever discovered, and at the time it was found contained also the mummy of Thothmes or Tehutimes III, which, left unexamined and not properly cared for, decomposed, and had to be buried. A headless statue of Queen Aahmes-Nefertari, smaller statuettes, scarabs and a bas-relief or a statue in which she appears with her son Amenophis I exist. So king and queen passed from earth to the delights of heaven, and, as Curtis expresses it, exchanged “the silver for the golden goblet.”
Amenhotep, Amenophis or Amenothes, son of Aahmes and Nefertari-Aahmes, succeeded his father, and married his sister Aah-hotep II, or some say Nefutari, of whom, beyond her name, we know little or nothing. The king was about twenty, she probably younger, at the time. Like his father before him, he was a warrior, and is pictured holding captives by the hair, probably Lydians. His children are given as Uaz’mes, Aahmes, Tehutimes I, Neb’ta and Mutnefert, whose statue is at Karnak. The first two are on the tomb of a certain Peperi, where the king holds Prince Uaz’mes on his knee.
The mummy of the king is among those that have been discovered. It was clothed in an orange robe, held in place by bands of linen. There was a mask of wood and painted pasteboard identical with the outside. He was enveloped from head to foot with long garlands, among which a wasp had crawled, attracted by the flowers, and thus preserved for centuries.According to the traditions, he also was a devout worshipper of the gods, and accorded divine honors. So for all these had come the day when they drew towards “the land that loveth silence.”
With Hatshepsut, or Hatsu, some 1600 B. C., we come to the most celebrated of all the Egyptian queens, not perhaps excluding the world-renowned Cleopatra, and her reign bears also a noteworthy feature, an especial ornament to a woman’s brow—it was a reign of peace. Her father and brothers, especially the younger, were warriors, but she was not. To the male of all species the fighting instinct more particularly and rightfully belongs. No wars of defence, none of aggression and conquest, disturbed the peaceful course of her rule. The arts flourished, and friendly expeditions sought distant shores to gain fresh knowledge of the outer world, to extend the hand of fellowship, and to exchange in the ordinary channels of commerce the products and manufactures of one land for those of the other.