58-Sarcophagus Fragment of Nefertiti?

King Akhenaten shook the religious foundation of Egypt by eliminating the worship of many gods in favor of one, the Aten sun disk. Akhenaten gave the Aten several didactic names mirroring a royal titulary with its pair of cartouches, placing the god on the same level as the king. Akhenaten was the only intermediary between the people and his sole god in his new religion. In this way, Akhenaten asserted his absolute authority over the religious life and afterlife of the Egyptian people.

Carved in sunk relief, from right to left, are one of Akhenaten’s cartouches and two Aten cartouches.

The partial cartouche gives Akhenaten’s prenomen or coronation name, Neferkheperure-Waenre. The hieroglyphs above read, “the King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Son of Re.” The middle cartouche displays the Aten’s later didactic name, “Re lives, the ruler of the two-horizons who rejoices in the horizon.” The last cartouche gives the Aten’s earlier didactic name, “in his name being the light (Shu) which is the Aten.”¹ Inscribed under the two cartouches of the Aten is, “Given life, for ever and ever.” Under the cartouche of Akhenaten is the phrase, “Given life.” When viewed with the aid of RTI (reflectance transformation imaging), the signs under the Aten’s first cartouche are visible and give the god’s earlier didactic name “Re-Horakhty who rejoices in the horizon."²

Marc Gabolde has suggested that the fragment belongs to a sarcophagus lid from Royal Tomb, Amarna number 26, based on its material, inscriptions, and base curvature.³ Among the sarcophagus fragments from Tomb 26 are those that form the cartouche of Neferneferuaten-Nefertiti.⁴ Since this granite fragment does not belong to any of the excavated lids of Akhenaten, Tiy, or Meketaten buried in the royal tomb, it may belong to the sarcophagus lid of Nefertiti.⁵ Because of its historical value, the sarcophagus fragment will return to Egypt, where it can be joined with other excavated Nefertiti fragments from the Royal Tomb at Amarna.

MH

1. Wegner 2017, 36, fig. 15. ↩︎

2. RTI image is a computational photographic method that captures a subject’s surface shape and color and enables the interactive relighting of the subject from any direction. ↩︎

3. Gabolde 2015, 74, fig. 10. I would like to thank Marc Gabolde for sharing his research. ↩︎

4. Gabolde 1998, fig 11. ↩︎

5. Gabolde 1998, pls. XV, XVIIb, XX. See also Martin 1974. ↩︎