egyptian queens! what a picture their name seems to call up of old time splendors—of the light of eastern skies, the soft breath of eternal summer—of the great river nile as a beneficent deity, of monuments and palaces, gardens and waving palm trees—houses with gorgeous coloring, of princes and slaves—all mingled on the tapestry of time!
in an age sometimes called “the woman’s era,” when woman has become a subject of analytical study to herself and to man, it may be interesting to turn from the varieties of the “new woman” to the very old. even on the borderland of mythology she asserts a strange individuality and is vitalized for us in the pages of history and legend.
the western woman on the stage of life is ever a prominent figure. the eastern has held a place in the background, giving glimpses only of her real self, always a veiled form, with dark, shining eyes, merely suggestive of beauty and charm. it may be matter of surprise, therefore, to some, that in the most ancient of lands—or among the most ancient of peoples, eastern beyond dispute, woman held an almost modern[16] place. in this, in some respects, advanced civilization, religiously, politically and socially she took her share in the world’s work and pleasure, and was deemed, not the ignorant child or inferior of semitic lands, but the friend, the associate, the equal of man.
the queen was the companion of her royal spouse, not his mere slave and toy. from the time of the second dynasty she frequently ruled, as the king’s guardian in youth, as regent in his absence, or as independent sovereign after his decease, or in right of heredity. the succession was continued on the maternal equally with the paternal side, and it was at times through the female, and not through the male parent, that the king traced his right to the throne.
among the nobility also the same custom, to a degree, obtained. the son of the eldest daughter was sometimes the heir. thus we read in the time of sneferu of his “great legitimate daughter, nefret-kari,” and her son was “high treasurer.” in the hieroglyphic system after female appellations, such as queen, wife, mother, daughter, and the like, the figure of a seated woman appears usually on a modest stool.
on the monuments the queen is always treated as an official personage, she shares the king’s honors and her name, like her husband’s, is enclosed in a cartouch. we know more of her public than of her private life.
as a rule, to which there were exceptions, the king had but one legal wife, of high or royal birth, the daughter of “the god,” as the late king was called, and hence she was in many instances,[17] in the strange egyptian fashion, her husband’s sister. one needs surely a different standard from the christian to judge of the morals of egypt. the marriage of a brother and sister, so abhorrent to our ideas, was frequent in the royal family, nor does nature herself, at that period, seem to have set upon it the same mark of disapprobation that one might expect. it began in the heavens with the gods, who, according to egyptian mythology, did not dwell on earth, and why should not humanity follow their example. osiris and isis were both brother and sister, husband and wife. nor could the gods any more than men get on without magic. even the statues of the former wore amulets as a protection against evil and death, and used mystic formulae to constrain each other. isis was above all the mistress of magic and famous in incantations.
to her royal spouse the queen is spoken of as “thy beloved sister who fills the palace with light,” or “thy sister who is in thine heart, who sits near thee at the feast,” or “thy beloved sister with whom thou dost love to speak.” a love song in which the woman seems the wooer is preserved and we give one stanza.
“thou beloved one my wish is to be with thee as thy wife;
that thy arm may lie upon my arm.
will not my elder brother come to-night?
otherwise i am as one who lies in the grave.
for art thou not health and light?”
[18]
the other ladies of the harem are also occasionally called sisters. “sutem mut” was the royal mother, “sutem hempt,” the royal wife. under the old empire the queen was spoken of as “she who sees the gods, horus and set (that is possessor of both halves of the kingdom), the most pleasant, the highly praised, the friend of horus, the beloved of ra, who wears the two diadems.” in the new empire she was designated as “the consort of the god, the mother of the god, the great consort of the king.” she was eligible to all but the highest offices of the priesthood and held forth or played the sacred sistrum to the gods, sometimes dedicating herself to one deity, while her husband served another, and she deemed it the greatest honor to be called “the concubine of the god.”
all women desired the name of hathor, isis, the goddess of love and fecundity, as in the middle ages the name of mary, the mother of christ, was specially cherished. other popular names under the old empire signified “beautiful,” “strong,” etc. under the new we also find “beautiful,” and in addition the names of trees, somewhat in japanese fashion, with their “cherry blossom” and “plum blossom,” as “beautiful sycamore,” or, hardly admirable in the eyes of the greeks or ourselves, “large headed,” which some of their coiffures and head ornamentations seemed to suggest.
the sons and daughters of the late king were always called the children of the god. the education of both was conducted by the most learned men of the kingdom, frequently priests,[19] and this tutor was spoken of as the “nurse.” the custom of entrusting the royal ladies to such severe training reminds us of the preceptors and studies of queen elizabeth and lady jane grey. the queen held property in her own right. at one time the revenues from the fisheries of lake moeris were appropriated to her. a talent a day, or upwards of 700 pounds a year. also the returns from certain cities; as, for example, the taxes on wines of the city of anthylla, were a queen’s dowry for her dress, and this privilege was continued to the queens of persia after cambyses conquered egypt.
after death, at least from the eighteenth dynasty, divine honors were frequently paid to the queen, and especially was this the case of queens aah-hotep and nefertari, the ancestresses of the race of kings who drove out and succeeded the hyksos, the usurping rulers, and restored egypt to its native sovereigns.
the palaces were usually of brick, as the temples were of stone adorned with gorgeously painted walls and furnished with carpets, rugs of skin and ebony and ivory chairs and couches. the queen was attended by slaves, and some favored maid or official bore beside her a fan of ostrich plumes. she wore in later periods the double crown of egypt and presided beside the king at feasts, where men and women, with unveiled faces (veiling being an introduction of the persians), enjoyed themselves together. they decorated each other with flowers, which already in profusion adorned the drinking vessels, listened to music and watched the dancing[20] of female slaves, the feats of jugglers, etc. monkeys were sometimes trained to act as torchbearers, and we can imagine the confusion occasionally engendered when one or another of them, bursting, so to speak, the bands of conventionality, reverted to his naturally mischievous impulses and cast his flaming torch into the midst of the festivities. lions, leopards, dogs, and the specially sacred cats were all numbered among the pets.
the cat, it is said, was created in the ark, hence the garden of eden, “where the comforts of home were incompletely organized,” lacked that ornament of the domestic hearth. but by the egyptians she was, above all, valued and adored. they mourned for her as for a dear and familiar friend, and woe to the man who, even by accident, compassed her destruction. she is most pleasingly set forth by one who evidently admired and appreciated her:
“a little lion, small and dainty sweet
(for such there be),
with sea-grey eyes and softly stepping feet,
she prayed of me.
for this, through lands egyptian far away,
she bade me pass;
but in an evil hour i said her nay;
and now, alas!
far-travelled nicias hath wooed and won
arsinoe,
with gifts of furry creatures white and dun
from over sea.”
[21]
till the end of the eighteenth dynasty there was little change in female attire. a fine linen garment, through which the limbs could be plainly seen, extended from below the breast to the ankle, sometimes supported by straps over the shoulders, and sometimes so narrow as to require not even these. colored robes were used less frequently. to the man was left in those days, as to the male bird, the gayer plumage. the woman contented herself with the use of oils and cosmetics, blackening her brows and eyes, leaving her hair flowing, bound by a fillet, or with braided locks, or a wig, and encircling arms and limbs with innumerable chains and bracelets. the queen wore a royal head-dress, with the asp, emblem of the sun-god ra, over her forehead, and the vulture, dedicated to maut, mother of isis, above. the golden disk is said to be an emblem of the eternal sunshine, the entwining asp of the winding nile, and the outspread wings of upper and lower egypt, extending along the river.
mrs. stevenson mentions innumerable texts which refer to the god as hidden in the disk, whilst a winged goddess makes light with her feathers, with which light and heat are always associated. the mother goddess of thebes, mut, in the shape of a vulture, spreads her wings and says, “i cover thy couch and give life to die back of thy neck.” and the mother of the sun-god at the moment of birth brings her own life “to the back of his neck in flame.” the disk amulet was put under a mummy to preserve the vital heat the winged disk, emblem of[22] heaven, was, in primeval times, conceived as a bird, which, under its embodiment as the hawk, had come to dwell in the sun. “in the eighteenth dynasty this symbol over monuments was supposed to guard and protect, and played in egypt the role that the winged bull of the assyrians played on the banks of the euphrates.”
a poetic fancy has thus painted the queen:
“her form i know; in airless chambers
of vast old tombs it lives to-day;
the quaint, stiff lines, the rigid posing,
the vivid colors, fresh and gay,
of raiment striped and barred and fluted,
and tasseled waist and sandaled feet,
that lightly trod, in air and sunshine,
the dust of some egyptian street.
her face, i guess at line and color,
slow almond eyes, with sidelong glance,
and full, calm lips, with curving corners,
just touched with sleepy scorn perchance,
and straight, low brows, close bound for beauty,
with beaten gold and burning gem,
and the small asp, upreared for striking,
afront the quaint old diadem.
so richly worn, so darkly splendid,
looks out her face from shadowland,
some night methinks i scarce should wonder
to see a living presence stand
just in the shaft of light thrown dimly
from this old swinging lamp—to hear
[23]
a voice that speaks the tongue of rameses
fall sweet and strange upon my ear.”
pen, pencil, brush, and i may add imagination, have depicted for us the royal surroundings. the reigning queen had, like all sovereigns, her tasks to perform. reports from all parts of the kingdom to receive, the regulation of laws, the commerce and the domestic affairs of her dominions. luxury surrounded her, attendants and slaves waited upon her bidding. gold, silver, precious stones and valuable stuffs composed her furniture, her table-service and her attire. scribes indited at her dictation and royal papyrus bore the impress of her signet, upon which vermilion was rubbed from a small cushion, while blue and a somewhat different stamp was used in religious matters. she dwelt among columns, statues and sphinxes, and, always adorned with flowers and jewels, wore over her shoulders, when in the character of a priestess, the leopard skin of the sacrificer. as special honor to any subject she would bestow upon him a chain of gold and put a ring on his finger. her throne of ivory was sometimes said to have been so finely carved that a breath would move the foliage represented upon it.
such in general outline was the position of the egyptian queen. but when we approach the individual the difficulties in the study of personality are manifold. frequently hundreds of years pass and no queen’s name appears—the roll of dynasty after dynasty is searched in vain. in most cases this is enhanced by many names[24] being applied to the same individual, as they are derived from ancient egyptian, greek, persian, or other sources. to this one adds what is called the “ka” name, a sort of religious addition to the original cognomen.
a parallel to all this might be found in the case of the duke of argyle, date 1734, who was also known as john campbell, maccallum more, and ian roy cean. the titular, family, and by, or nick-name, signifying “red-headed.” a person searching the archives of scotland a thousand years hence might be as bewildered in such a case as the egyptian student is now.
different authorities give dates hundreds of years apart, different names to the same person, and different spelling to the same name. some of the queens were taken for men, and only in later and more exhaustive researches was their sex and position ascertained. nor is this to be wondered at, when the various parts of speech applied to them are of the male gender. yet here and there a fragment is discovered and we learn something, at least, of many of them.
the partial list extends from the earliest times to the roman period. late discoveries give us fragmentary remains from the first dynasty, but mertytefs of the fourth seems the first distinct personality, and the roll, virtually beginning with her, ends with the last and most celebrated cleopatra. two of these figures at least stand out with wonderful clearness, the great hatasu, of the eighteenth dynasty, and this same cleopatra, and while of many others we know much less, we in some cases possess their[25] veritable jewels and ornaments, and in others their actual mummies.
we are working, as it were, to restore a mutilated mosaic. some of the pieces are altogether gone, many others broken and discolored. from here and there we gather a fragment for our task of restoration. they may vary in shape, they may vary in tint, the recompleted whole is diverse from the original, but it approximates—it gives us an idea of what the perfect design has been, and with that, for the present, we must rest content.
