On January 6, 1907, Theodore M. Davis, a wealthy American financier, and his hired archaeologist, a young Englishman, Edward R. Ayrton, opened a mos unusual tomb in Egypt's Valley of the Kings. The tomb, designated KV55, was unimpressive, with a single chamber and side niche, but its contents were extraordinary.
The largest object was a wooden shrine, sheathed in gold, that had been made for the funeral of Queen Tiye, the mother of the late 18th Dynasty pharaoh Akhenaten (r. 1350-1333 B.c.). This pharaoh's name could be read on two of the four clay bricks found on the tomb's floor. In the niche were four jars, orignally inscribed for Kiya, a secondary wife of Akhenaten, mismatched with stoppers bearing exquisite portraits, probably of one or more of Akhenaten's daughters. The strangest of the tomb's contents was an elaborate coffin, also originally for Kiya as attested by reworked yet still decipherable inscriptions, but adapted for a male burial by the addition of a beard and the alteration of the inscriptions. The face on the coffin had been broken off and the royal names on it, which might have been identified its occupant, removed.
In the century following its discovery, Tomb 55 has been hotly debated especially the identify of gthe remains in the coffin and how that person into the royal family and succession at the end of the 18th Dynasty. "It is probably true to say," notes Aidan Dodson of Bristol University, "that there are as many interpretations as Egyptologists who have written about the notorious Tomb 55. But it matters: the tomb provides part of the key to what was actually going on at the end of Akhenaten's reign -- and perhaps at the end of Tutankhamun's as well." Results of an examination of the skeleton by British Museum Egyptologist and physical anthropologist Joyce M. Filer, published here in detail for the first time (page 26), may help close the book on Tomb 55's mysterious occupant.
Akhenaten, who came to the throne as Amenhotep IV, promoted worship of the solar sdisk, the Aten, over Amun, the god of Thebes, alienating that deity's powerful priesthood. In his fifth year he changed his name to Akhenaten ("Servant of the Aten"), and the following year founded a new capital, which he called Akhetaten ("Horizon of the Aten") and which is known today as el-Amarna. Very late (or very early -- as usual, scholars disagree) in his reign, Akhenaten had Amun's name purged from monuments, particularly in Thebes -- in was war between the pharaoh and the Theban preisthood. After Akhenaten's death, Tutankhaten reverted to the worship of Amun and changed his name to Tutankhamun. Akhenaten's own monuments were later cast down or obliterated, perhaps in the first years of the 19th Dynasty (1297-1187 B.c.), and he was called the "criminal of Akhetaten".
Debate over who the mummy is or isn't has continued for nearly a century. Is it the "heretic" pharaoh Akhenaten? Could it be Smenkhkare, who some scholars think was coregent during Akhenaten's last years; husband of Meretaten, oldest of the Amarna princesses; and possibly Tutankhamun's brother? Or is there some other explanation?
Davis believed that the Tomb 55 mummy was that of Queen Tiye, but this was wishful thinking. The shrine was undoubtedly hers; her name could be read on a surviving portion of the gold on it. Akhenaten apparently had it built for her burial at Amarna. When Amarna was abandoned after his death, the shrine, coffin, and other objects from the royal tombs there were moved to the Valley of the Kings, some ending up in Tomb 55. But Davis' indentification was soon discredited when examination by anatomist Grafton Elliot Smith showed the mummy was that of a man. Arthur Weigall, Chief Inspector of Antiquities at Luxor when the tomb was found, argued that it was Akhenaten's, which would explain the coffin's defacement -- priests or workers of the Valley of the Kings had entered the tomb and obliterated the name and face of the "criminal of Akhetaten". Smith, however, concluded that the man was in his early twenties at death, too young for Akhenaten, who died in his mid-thirties (we know he was in his teens when he ascended the throne and that he ruled for 17 years).
The interpretation of royal names -- carved into monuments, engraved on funerary objects, and written on dockets listing commodities -- is key to sorting out the late 18th Dynasty succession and identifying the mummy. Egyptian rulers had five names, the most important being what scholars term the prenomen and nomen, written in cartouches. For example, Tutankhamun's full name was Nebkheperure (prenomen) Tutankhamun-Heqaiunushemay (nomen with an epithet). Some queens also used epithets with their single cartouches, so that Akhenaten's principal Nefertiti was, in full, Nefertiti-Nefernefruaten. Two other royal names known from the end of the 18th Dynasty are Ankhkheprure Smenkhkare and Ankhkheprure Nefernfruaten. Three basic scenarios have been proposed to account for these names and for Nefertiti's absence from the record after year 13 of Akhenaten's rule:
1. Nefertiti dies in year 13 or later of Akhanten's reign. Smenkhkare (a.k.a. Nefernefruaten, a male co-regent during akhenaten's last three years, predeceases him; Tutankhmun' succeeds Akhenaten. The Tomb 55 body in Smenkhkare.
2. Smenkhkare, a male co-regent, predeceases akhenaten, who is suceeded b Nefertiti, ruling under her name Nefernefruaten; Tutankhamun succeeds her. The Tomb 55 body is Smenkhkare.
3. Nefertiti becomes co-regent in year 12-13, as Nefernfruaten; after Akhenaten's death she rules under the Smenkhkare; Tutankhmun succeeds her. The Tomb 55 body is Akhenaten.
The two basic questions are, is there evidence that a male co-regent named Smenkhkare existed, and, who is the body?
Several objects found in Tutankhamun's tomb bear the name of other royal family members. These include four miniature fold coffins that held jars containing Tutankhamun's internal organs. Names, inscribed inside the coffins were reworked, apparently first from Smenkhkare to Nefernefruaten, and certainly then to Tutankhamun. From the way that this was done, it would suggest that Smenkhkare and Nefernefruaten were names borne by the same individual. In addition, the face portrayed on these and on Tutankhamun's middle coffin does not match other representations of him. On the basis of the texts of the miniature gold coffins, this must be the face of Smenkhkare. He also appears in a tomb painting at Amarna; a relief block bears his name, as do some finger-rings and stamped bricks. A battered limestone head from Amarna has also been claimed to represent him.
The Tomb 55 skeleton's age may be key to its indentification. Akhenaten as in his mind-thirties at death, but examinations of the Tomb 55 bones from Smith to the 1960s yielded estimates in the early twenties. Then, at a 1988 Egyptological conference, University of Michigan orthodontics professor James E. Harris and Fawzia H. Hussein of the Anthropological Laboratory, National Centre, Cairo, claimed a middle-to-late thirties age, just right for Akhenaten. That study, however, has never been published. Joyce M. Filer, latest to examine the bones, places the age in the early twenties at most, precluding their indentification as Akhenaten's. In addition to the Tomb 55 body, there are other late 18th Dynasty royal mummies. The best-known is Tutankhamun, which has been linked by blood type and by skull shape to the Tomb 55 body. Mummies found in 1898 have been identified as Amenhotep III and tiye, Akhenaten's parents and Tutankhamun's grandparents, but both indentifications have been questioned, especially the second. An alternative, speculative proposal is that the suposed Tiye mummy may be Nefertiti, but from the context of the fnd it is pretty clear that it is of a much earlier lady and has nothing to do with Akhenaten's family. Finally, two mummified fetuses from Tutankhamun's tomb were possibly carried by his wife Ankhesenamun.
DNA analysis might clarify relationships among these mummies, but just before an Egyptian-Japanese team took tissue samples from Tutankhamun's mummy last spring, the Egyptian government abruptly halted the work for what it said were national security reasons. Press reports, however, pointed to concern that some people might misinterpret the results to further claims that Akhenaten was the biblical Moses. This far-fetched link -- it assumes, among other things, that our understanding of Egyptian chronology is off by a number of centuries -- has been made in Moses; Pharaoh of Egypt, authored by Egyptian-born amateur historian named Ahmed Osman, and other books. While if is understandable that such creative interpretations might make the government skittish, the more solid evidence there is, the less room there will be for such wild claims.
For now, we can say that there is artifactual evidence for a male ruler from the end of the 18th Dynasty who is not Akhenaten and is not Tutankhamun. We can also say that the body in Tomb 55 belongs to the immediate family of Akhenaten and Tutankhamun, but it is too young to be the former, and we have the mummy of the latter. Returning to he scenarios explaining the royal names, the evidence fits best the first case: Smenkhkare (a.k.a. Nefernefruaten), a male co-regent during Akhenaten's last years, predeceases him; Tutankhamun succeeds Akhenaten. The second case seems needlessly complex, and is apparently disproved by the evience of the names in the miniature coffins. The facts fit least well with the third case: there is evidence for a royal male and body to go with it, so equating Nefertiti with Smenkhkare as Akhenaten's successor beofre Tutankhamun leaves the body unexplained.
The most straightforward interpretation of the inscriptions, artifacts, and bones is that the body from Tomb 55 is Smenkhkare. This means that Tutankhamun, like his father, came to the throne only through the early death of an older brother. The early deaths of both Smenkhkare and Tutankhamun without heirs spelled the end of the 18th Dynasty.
Mark Rose is the executive editor of Archaeology.
Archaeology March/April 2002, pgs 22-27
