Monday, November 8, 2010

Nefertiti ..Hell hath no fury

Nefertiti lived up to her name, 'a beautiful woman has come'.Although Nefertiti was not born of royal , she had grown up close to the royal family.Today, scholars still don't know exactly why she so suddenly disappeared from history more than 3,000 years ago.Until 1822, when scholars learned how to read hieroglyphics, she simply ceased to exist.The move to Amarna was a success and life seemed good.Akenhaten's temple at Armana All you need is love The reason for this may have been simple: love.And when Akenhaten ordered colossal statues of himself, he would order statues of equal size for his 'Great Wife'.Some evidence suggests that her father was the powerful courtier Ay, advisor to three pharaohs, including Akenhaten, Nefertiti's husband.

Then, in the twelfth year of Akenhaten's reign and at the height of Nefertiti's powers, she vanished from history altogether.When Akenhaten moved the government from Thebes to Amarna, Nefertiti moved with him.Hell hath no fury.Like him, Nefertiti would prove to be a key player at court.Carved images on ancient temples show her Egypt's enemies - previously only a role given to the pharaoh.Found again Despite this breakthrough, Nefertiti remained faceless for almost another century, until 19 A German archaeologist called Ludwig Borchardt was digging through the remains of Amarna and found a life-sized bust of the long-dead queen.The vanishing All appeared well.Nefertiti was seen as second only to the pharaoh himself.Their home life appears to have been a happy one.The most powerful woman in Egypt since the Pharaoh Hatshepsut 100 years earlier, Queen Nefertiti was as influential as she was beautiful, a partner in power with her king, Akenhaten.She was a full participant in important religious ceremonies: when Akenhaten appeared in public to make religious offerings to Aten, the sun god, Nefertiti performed them with him.

In an age when marriages were arranged for political reasons, the partnership between Akenhaten and Nefertiti seems to have been unusually romantic.She bore Akenhaten six daughters and images still exist of the pharaoh and his wife kissing and playing with their children.As Borchardt recorded in his diary, "Description is useless, see for yourself.During her marriage to Akenhaten, Queen Nefertiti stood with him at the head of the new regime.Nefertiti is also the only Egyptian queen that we know to have been lovingly described by her husband, the pharaoh.

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