The Search For Nefertiti

Joann Fletcher, presenter of BBC2's 'Ancient Egypt: Life and Death in the Valley of the Kings' has written an enthralling account of Nefertiti, one of Egypt's most compelling and mysterious figures. Wife of the controversial pharaoh Akhenaten, she lived through perhaps the most tumultuous period in the country's long history. The so-called Amarna Period has long held a fascination - not just for the enormous changes it brought to the religion, art and administration of Egypt, but for the many mysteries which surround it. Mysteries, that is, until now. Leading Egyptologist Dr Joann Fletcher has taken a fresh eye to the evidence and arrived at one of the most dramatic discoveries in recent times. Working with a team of leading experts, she has identified a long-forgotten mummy as the body of a female pharaoh of the Amarna Period, whom she believes is Nefertiti herself. Lying for over three thousand years in an unused side chamber of Tomb KV.35 in the Valley of the Kings, it tells a story which will forever change the way in which we view Nefertiti - and indeed women throughout Egyptian history. Now at last we see the full significance of her role as co-regent and later Pharaoh of Egypt, as well as understanding the astonishing luxury and decadence of her life in Amarna - a life she led as the country around her began to disintegrate.

Nefertiti - wife of the most unusual of pharaohs Akhenaten - has long fascinated us. In this book, Dr Joann Fletcher and a team of experts have helped identify the body which has been considered missing for more that 3000 years and the story it confirms casts Nefertiti in a new light.

Little is known about Nefertiti, the Egyptian queen whose name means “a beautiful woman has come.” She was the wife of Akhenaten, the pharaoh who ushered in the dramatic Amarna Age, and she bore him at least six children. She played a prominent role in political and religious affairs, but after Akhenaten’s death she apparently vanished and was soon forgotten. Yet Nefertiti remains one of the most famous and enigmatic women who ever lived. Her instantly recognizable face adorns a variety of modern artifacts, from expensive jewelry to cheap postcards, t-shirts, and bags, all over the world. She has appeared on page, stage, screen, and opera. In Britain, one woman has spent hundreds of thousands of pounds on plastic surgery in hope of resembling the long-dead royal. This enduring obsession is the result of just one object: the lovely and mysterious Nefertiti bust, created by the sculptor Thutmose and housed in Berlin’s Neues Museum since before World War II. In Nefertiti’s Face, Egyptologist Joyce Tyldesley tells the story of the bust, from its origins in a busy workshop of the late Bronze Age to its rediscovery and controversial removal to Europe in 1912 and its present status as one of the world’s most treasured artifacts. This wide-ranging history takes us from the temples and tombs of ancient Egypt to wartime Berlin and engages the latest in Pharaonic scholarship. Tyldesley sheds light on both Nefertiti’s life and her improbable afterlife, in which she became famous simply for being famous.

For over a decade Nefertiti, wife of the heretic king Akhenaten, was the most influential woman in the Bronze Age world; a beautiful queen blessed by the sun-god, adored by her family and worshipped by her people. Her image and her name were celebrated throughout Egypt and her future seemed golden. Suddenly Nefertiti disappeared from the royal family, vanishing so completely that it was as if she had never been. No record survives to detail her death, no monument serves to mourn her passing and to this day her end remains an enigma - her body has never been found. Joyce Tyldesley here provides a detailed discussion of the life and times of Nefertiti, Egypt's sun queen, set against the background of the ephemeral Amarna court.

An exciting archeological exploration of ancient Egypt that examines the potential for discovering the remaining “lost” tombs of the pharaohs. Tombs, mummies, and funerary items make up a significant portion of the archeological remains that survive ancient Egypt and have come to define the popular perception of Egyptology. Despite the many sensational discoveries in the last century, such as the tomb of Tutankhamun, the tombs of some of the most famous individuals in the ancient world—Imhotep, Nefertiti, Alexander the Great, and Cleopatra—have not yet been found. Archeologist Chris Naunton examines the famous pharaohs, their achievements, the bling they might have been buried with, the circumstances in which they were buried, and why those circumstances may have prevented archeologists from finding these tombs. In Searching for the Lost Tombs of Egypt, Naunton sheds light on the lives of these ancient Egyptians and makes an exciting case for the potential discovery of these lost tombs.

The story of the world's greatest civilization spans 4,000 years of history that have shaped the world. It is full of spectacular cities and epic stories—an evolving society rich in inventors, heroes, heroines, villains, artisans, and pioneers. Professor Joann Fletcher pulls together the complete story of Egypt, charting the rise and fall of the ancient Egyptians while putting their whole world into a context to which we can all relate.Fletcher uncovers some fascinating revelations: new evidence shows that women became pharaohs on at least ten occasions; and that the ancient Egyptians built the first Suez Canal and then circumnavigated Africa. From Ramses II's penchant for dying his grey hair to how we know that Montuhotep's chief wife bit her nails, Fletcher brings alive the history and people of ancient Egypt as nobody else can.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A “compulsively readable” (Diana Gabaldon) novel teeming with love, betrayal, and religious conflict that brings ancient Egypt to vivid life, from the author of Cleopatra’s Daughter “Meticulously researched and richly detailed . . . an engrossing tribute to one of the most powerful and alluring women in history.”—The Boston Globe Nefertiti and her younger sister, Mutnodjmet, have been raised in a powerful family that has provided wives to the rulers of Egypt for centuries. Ambitious, charismatic, and beautiful, Nefertiti is destined to marry Amunhotep, an unstable young pharaoh. It is hoped that her strong personality will temper the young ruler’s heretical desire to forsake Egypt’s ancient gods. From the moment of her arrival in Thebes, Nefertiti is beloved by the people, but she fails to see that powerful forces are plotting against her husband’s reign. The only person brave enough to warn the queen is her younger sister, yet remaining loyal to Nefertiti will force Mutnodjmet into a dangerous political game—one that could cost her everything she holds dear.

A thrilling novel set in ancient Egypt in which a savvy detective is secretly assigned to unravel the mysterious disappearance of the world's most enigmatic queen.

Egypt's sun queen magnificently revealed in a new book by renowned Egyptologist, Aidan Dodson During the last half of the fourteenth century BC, Egypt was perhaps at the height of its prosperity. It was against this background that the “Amarna Revolution” occurred. Throughout, its instigator, King Akhenaten, had at his side his Great Wife, Nefertiti. When a painted bust of the queen found at Amarna in 1912 was first revealed to the public in the 1920s, it soon became one of the great artistic icons of the world. Nefertiti's name and face are perhaps the best known of any royal woman of ancient Egypt and one of the best recognized figures of antiquity, but her image has come in many ways to overshadow the woman herself. Nefertiti’s current world dominion as a cultural and artistic icon presents an interesting contrast with the way in which she was actively written out of history soon after her own death. This book explores what we can reconstruct of the life of the queen, tracing the way in which she and her image emerged in the wake of the first tentative decipherment of Egyptian hieroglyphs during the 1820s–1840s, and then took on the world over the next century and beyond. All indications are that her final fate was a tragic one, but although every effort was made to wipe out Nefertiti's memory after her death, modern archaeology has rescued the queen-pharaoh from obscurity and set her on the road to today’s international status.

In this stunning novel of passion, power, and redemption, a forgotten princess in ancient Egypt must overcome her family’s past and remake history—from the internationally bestselling author of Nefertiti and Cleopatra’s Daughter. “Moran’s careful attention to detail and her artful storytelling bring these people to vivid life, imbuing ancient history with suspense and urgency.”—The Boston Globe The winds of change are blowing through Thebes. A devastating palace fire has killed the Eighteenth Dynasty’s royal family—with the exception of Nefertari, the niece of the reviled former queen, Nefertiti. The girl’s deceased family has been branded as heretical, and no one in Egypt will speak their names. But this changes when she is taken under the wing of the Pharoah’s aunt, then brought to the temple of Hathor, where she is educated in a manner befitting a future queen. Soon Nefertari catches the eye of the Crown Prince, and despite her family’s history, they fall in love and wish to marry. Yet all of Egypt opposes this union between the rising star of a new dynasty and the fading star of an old, heretical one. While political adversity sets the country on edge, Nefertari becomes the wife of Ramses the Great. Destined to be the most powerful Pharoah in Egypt, he is also the man who must confront the most famous exodus in history.