Bust of Nefertiti

When Victor Loret, a French Egyptologist, found a trio of unwrapped, unidentified mummies lying side-by-side in Amenhotep II's tomb KV35, he described them as an older woman, a little prince and a young man. Later, it was determined that the "young man" was a woman, baldness having confused even a Frenchman like Loret:

"The last corpse nearest the wall seemed to be that of a man. His head was shaved but a wig lay on the ground not far from him. The face of this person displayed something horrible and something droll at the same time. The mouth, running obliquely from one side nearly to the middle of the cheek, bit a pad of linen whose two ends hung from the corner of the lips. The half-closed eyes had a strange expression; he could have died choking on a gag but he looked like a young, playful cat with a piece of cloth. Death, which had respected the severe beauty of the woman and the impish grace of the boy, had turned in derision and amused itself with the countenance of the man."

The female mummy who retained a "severe beauty", has, in recent years, been identified as Queen Tiye, Chief Wife of the pharaoh Amenhotep III, and mother of Amenhotep IV, who later became Akhenaten. A sample of hair from the head of this mummy was compared with a lock of hair within a small case discovered in the tomb of Tutankhamen. The two samples were a perfect match. Since the identification has been challenged for several reasons, this mummy is still referred to by Egyptologists as the "Elder Lady".

The young mummy in the middle, referred to as "the young prince", has as yet to be identified. However, the young prince bears a striking resemblance to the elder lady and may be the mummy of Prince Thutmose, the eldest son of Amenhotep III. Prince Thutmose died at an undetermined age and was succeeded as heir by his brother, Akhenaten.

The man-who-proved-to-be-female mummy, known as the "Younger Lady", has been thought by Egyptologists to be either Nefertiti or Princess Sitamun, a daughter of Amenhotep III. Fletcher was drawn to KV35 during an expedition in June 2002 after studying and identifying the wig found on the floor by the younger woman by Loret as a Nubian style wig worn by royal women during Akhenaten's reign. She also identified other clues that suggest this mummy may indeed be Nefertiti, such as a double-pierced earlobe, which Fletcher claims to be a rare fashion statement in Ancient Egypt. She also points to the mummy's shaven head, and the clear impression of the tight-fitting brow-band worn by royalty. " Think of the tight-fitting, tall blue royal crown she is wearing in the bust, something that would require a shaven head to fit properly."

The age of this mummy cannot be determined with certainty, but the mummy does hold clues to its place in the chronology of Ancient Egypt. The process by which this woman was mummified seems to date her to the latter part of the Eighteenth Dynasty. The unusual shape of her skull puts her in the Amarna period, where this skull shape was either artificially fostered or a genetic condition. The skull of the younger lady corresponds closely to those of Tutankhamen and the mummy of a young individual from KV55, the so-called tomb of Queen Tiye.It is also like the heads of the Amarna princesses, as seen in art from the period.

The bone structures of the younger lady and Nefertiti, as seen in the famous bust in the Berlin Museum, are strikingly similar. Each has a slender neck and a strong, but beautiful jawline. Seen from the front, the mummy's jaw appears quite square in the manner of the likeness of Nefertiti. Also very alike are the noses that descend in an almost unbroken line from the brow and the angle of the eye sockets in relation to the nose. The eyelids are long in both cases.

"There is a puzzle," Fletcher said, and explained that when Egyptologist Grafton Elliot Smith first examined the three mummies in 1907, he noticed the younger lady was missing her right arm. Nearby, he found a detached right forearm, bent at the elbow and fingers were clenched. The mummy suffered from ancient plunderers looking for jewelry and other valuables. Like the other two mummies, the younger ladies skull was pierced with a large hole, and the chest had been hacked away. Worse,the face, which would otherwise have been excellently preserved, had been mutilated cruelly, its mouth and cheek replaced by a gaping hole. Using cutting-edge Canon digital x-ray machines, jewelry was found within the smashed chest cavity of the mummy. Also, a woman's severed arm was discovered beneath the remaining mummy wrappings. The arm was bent at the elbow in pharaonic style with the fingers still clutching a long-vanished royal scepter.

The mutilation of the face, chest, and arm of the mummy of the younger lady are only the most visible of atrocities. There are others, some of which are just now coming to light with the careful analyses and x-rays taken of the mummy. Fletcher and her team noticed something peculiar about the way in which the feet of all three mummies have been treated. It has long been presumed that the grave robbers had hacked away at the mummies as they plundered for jewels. However, firsthand evidence discovered by Fletcher shows the bodies were carefully and intentionally mutilated after having been unwrapped.

"We are trying to work out what weapons would have been used to inflict these wounds. Metal and bronze were precious commodities. Who would have had access to these metals? Someone systematically damaging the mummy with sharp blades that cut straight through to the bone." Ancient Egyptians believed that damage to the body after death could render the body incapable of living again in the afterlife, as the soul lived within the mummified body. By depriving a body of its mouth, the soul was robbed of the breath of life; by disfiguring the feet, a body would be unable to walk into the afterlife. " It is that calculated damage that sends a chill through your spine. People were trying to condemn them to damnation," Fletcher says.

At least one of the injuries inflicted (to the mummy of the young lady) may have been done in life and resulted in severe blood loss. Nothing is known about the manner and timing of Nefertiti's death. The physical evidence collected makes sense given the historical context: About 14 years into Akhenaten's reign, Queen Nefertiti mysteriously disappears and a feminine-looking pharaoh shows up in the iconography of Ancient Egypt. Fletcher believes it is none other than Nefertiti, wielding full pharaoh power. Maybe the priests were so outraged by the controversial religion put forth, and their gods being kicked out of the temples and replaced by the Aten that not only killed her but also erased her identity in the afterlife. It is a melodramatic scenario, but quite possible.

Egyptologists are not as convinced as to the identification of the younger lady's mummy. Some see the identification as interesting, one that will no doubt cause endless speculation. Others express doubt that the remains are those of the legendary queen. What is known about this mummy indicates that it is one of the young females of the late 18th Dynasty, probably a member of the royal family. However, physical evidence known and published prior to this expedition indicates the unlikelihood of this mummy being Nefertiti.

It has been asserted that the identification of the mummy of the younger lady and Nefertiti is based solely on the facial resemblance between the mummy and Nefertiti's bust, and on artistic representations of the Amarna period in which the queen lived. The physical resemblance is not significant because all statues of the Amarna period have the same characteristics. Amarna art was idealistic and not realistic. In the Egyptian Museum, there are five or six mummies with the same characteristics as that of the younger lady mummy.

Controversy swirls around Nefertiti as it surely always has. It makes sense that Nefertiti be removed from Amarna, where she was probably entombed, and given a safe haven in the tomb of an ancestor of her husband's family, Amenhotep II. Perhaps we ought to let go of our romantic notions about this royal lady, take another look at the younger female from KV35 and concede that death is something against which even the greatest beauty rarely prevails.