Amarna, Before and After

[Aldebaran]

Another thing, this schist statuette always seems to be photographed from the same angle.  What does it say on the other side of the bier?  The same text or what?  I couldn't even find the piece at the Berlin museum website.  But a couple of photos show that there was text down the front of the recumbent figure and there was something on the foot of the bier, as well.

[Wepwawet]

Bier left side with identical text to the right side

 

Bier foot showing Isis, at the head is Nephthys

The Neues Museum in Berlin has photos in it's catalogue of the model sarcophagus the bier was found in, I know they do as I linked to them in the Box 001K thread in 2018, but searching the catalogue now draws a blank, and I cannot find the post in the thread.

I had linked to the page in the catalogue for the bier, but they have some odd time-out thing and the link reverts to their main page. Follow this link and paste this into the search box Kronprinz Thutmosis

Edited February 21, 2022 by Wepwawet

[Aldebaran]

21 hours ago, Aldebaran said:

It's true.  When the word "HD[i]" is written with the X determinative it means something bad.  "Destroyed", "put into shade"--something on that order.  Unfortunately, ancient Egyptian expressions are not always easy to translate into English.  Even though it seems colloquial, "wasted" would not go amiss.   But there must be a better term :

I think I have one now.  As "HD" is a club, "HD[i]" arguably could mean "struck down".  But, generally, all the attestations I have checked into are about something being reduced in some bad sense or even cut down to size in one case in the Precepts of Ptah-hotep where Budge translated "HDt" [inf.] as "trimming".  [His old "An Egyptian Hieroglyphic Reading Book" was of much help to me in learning how to read Egyptian, as one needs texts to translate.]  "m xb [also has the X det.] tri n Ss ib btw kA pw HDt At=f" or "Do not shorten the time of following the heart [like] a miserly person trimming his moment,"  

Edited February 21, 2022 by Aldebaran

[Wepwawet]

For a bit more clarity:

The text on both sides is read from his head to his toes. So, in English, we have, Gone too soon - King's son - Sem - Thutmose - True of Voice

The True of Voice, Maa-cheru in Egyptian, sometimes rendered as Justified, used to only mean that the person was dead and had made it into the afterlife, but by the New Kingdom could also be used for the living, for example mortuary priests could use Maa-cheru as an epithet, and it had military uses. That it appears here on a bier obviously means that the person is dead, though it is not in itself a determinative for death, as by the NK it means that the person has been allowed to continue their existance due to their good conduct in Sechet-iaru, aka The Field of Reeds, so it indicates not the death of their mortal body, but their state of being in the afterlife. To us this sounds like semantics and splitting hairs, but they paid attention to the nuances of meanings. Which leads to what the first phrase of text means, and just how nuanced it is. I boiled it down to "Gone too soon", but just how bad whatever happened was I cannot say, but I suggest that as this phrase appears at all means it was not minor, otherwise I think it would not be so rare. Whoever had the bier made must I think have seen it as an event that needed recognition. Does this phrase appear with Tutankhamun, who most certainly had an untimely death, not that I can see. His death was probably due to accident, and so, no matter that he was the king, was mundane, so was this phrase used with Thutmose because his death was not mundane, I would say it may well not have been.

Edited February 21, 2022 by Wepwawet

[Wepwawet]

Or, the death may have been mundane, but treated as "murder". To the AE death was an enemy, and it is to all of us anyway, but they would see it in the terms of the death, murder, of Osiris by Set. Therefore just the fact of Thutmose's death may have been seen the same as a murder. A problem here is that if death per se was seen in these terms, then this phrase would be universal and not rare. I'll offer the explanation that the phrase may be used when the deceased has been murdered, but if in the case of a mundane death, if the deceased was so loved that their death was too much to take as a normal death and treated as if they had had their life ripped away from them by violent means, even if they had died peacefully in their sleep. This explanation would need Thutmose to have been particularly well loved of course, and we have not a single piece of evidence to show anything like this, all we know is that he was a King's eldest son, a priest of Ptah, and had a cat. Therefore, "Gone too soon" could fit either a violent or mundane death, but if a mundane death, a very traumatic one for whoever comissioned this bier, a death perhaps almost too much to bare, but we can never know, unless his tomb is discovered reasonably intact.

[Wepwawet]

Or, The Martyr, King's son and Sem-priest, Thutmose, True of Voice

[Wistman]

So the blood line of Thutmose is a dead letter.  He isn't KV55 and Tut isn't his progeny. 

Looking for the identity of Smenkhkare still, then.  So, not trying to sandwich him into KV55 and parenting Tut, the problem remains how to explain such extraordinary royal favor.  Whose son is he?  It must be Akhenaten, but by which wife?  Kiye?  And did Akhenaten have any diplomatic wives?  What was his birth name?  He's entirely unattested prior to kingship, as far as can be seen, but so apparently is Nefertiti, if she is indeed YL and the daughter of AIII/Tiye.  And, he might also have been another unattested sibling of Akhenaten, but nobody likes that possibility because there are no known prior instances of such a transfer of kingship from Pharaoh to his brother.  But this was a time of upheaval of religion and government, at the height of Egypt's power. 

This is awfully messy.  Can we figure his age at all?

Edited February 22, 2022 by Wistman

[Wepwawet]

3 hours ago, Wistman said:

So the blood line of Thutmose is a dead letter.  He isn't KV55 and Tut isn't his progeny. 

Looking for the identity of Smenkhkare still, then.  So, not trying to sandwich him into KV55 and parenting Tut, the problem remains how to explain such extraordinary royal favor.  Whose son is he?  It must be Akhenaten, but by which wife?  Kiye?  And did Akhenaten have any diplomatic wives?  What was his birth name?  He's entirely unattested prior to kingship, as far as can be seen, but so apparently is Nefertiti, if she is indeed YL and the daughter of AIII/Tiye.  And, he might also have been another unattested sibling of Akhenaten, but nobody likes that possibility because there are no known prior instances of such a transfer of kingship from Pharaoh to his brother.  But this was a time of upheaval of religion and government, at the height of Egypt's power. 

This is awfully messy.  Can we figure his age at all?

I think that in his 38 year reign Amunhotep III had more than two sons, though it can only be proven that Akhenaten was a son of Tiye, assuming he is KV55. Thutmose may have been a son of Tiye, but doesn't need to have been to become crown prince, and Amunhotep III was himself the son of a secondary wife.

On the evidence we have, no parentage can be shown for Smenkhkare, so I think it best to go by what would be the normal course of these things, even in unusual times. So who is more likely to be made co-regent, the eldest son of the reigning king, or a brother of the king. I think it will be the eldest son. Another very strong point against Smenkhkare being brother to Akhenaten is that by the time he enters the record in Year 14/15, Tutankhaten would have been born, and I don't see how he could ever have lost out on his right to the throne to an uncle, so I think there is no doubt, at least not to me, that Smenkhkare was the older brother of Tutankhaten. I went thorugh how old he might have been earlier, but to re-iterate. Akhenaten is not even married at the start of his reign, so no child would appear until the end of Year 1 at the earliest, and more likely in Year 2, and we have Meritaten appearing on the Hwt-bnbn with Nefertiti in Year 2/3. Unless there were twins, not impossible, it does look to be that Meritaten was the first born, with Smenkhkare born in the gap between Meritaten and Mekaten, born in Year 5. So Smenkhkare could have been born in Year 3 or 4. This would make him 11 or 10 in Year 14. I suspect he was made co-regent in Year 15 and died in Year 16 aged 12 or 13. The tomb of Meryre II is not finished, the depiction of Smenkhkare and Meritaten is only roughed out, yet Meryre II seems to have lived past the end of the reign of Akhenaten, so as the tomb does not seem to have been used by him, the unfinished scene is likely to be unfinished not because Meryre II died, but because Smenkhkare died. As Nefertiti, still as Nefertiti, is named in a graffito in Year 16, but then appears as co-regent Neferneferuaten with Meritaten now as GRW to a joint monarchy, and this is why I think Smenkhkare died during Year 16, and then Akhenaten had to change plans, just as Amunhotep III would have done.

Who Smenkhkare's mother was will probably remain a mystery, unless the DNA results of the prince show him to be a son of the YL and KV55, but without that it's speculation and he could just as well be a younger brother of Akhenaten who died young. He could even be a younger brother of Tutankhamun who has predeceased him due whatever caused his severe internal injuries. What would be interesting is if his DNA showed KV55 to be his father, but he was not the son of the YL, but of either somebody further away in relationship, or even not related to any of the Amarna royals at all. But if not a son of the YL then Kiya is going to come into the frame. It is though an unescapable fact that he was found placed between Tiye and the YL, and fits the presumed age, on my reckoning, of Smenkhkare just about spot on. There are possible issues with him still having a sidelock as a king though, a question asked before, but never getting an answer, just guesses.

[Aldebaran]

22 hours ago, Wepwawet said:

There are possible issues with him still having a sidelock as a king though, a question asked before, but never getting an answer, just guesses.

No king is going to have a sidelock.  And a prince who has one has not yet reached puberty.  The prince from KV35 has been judged to have been 11 years old, which makes sense with regard to that.  That boy is not Smenkhkare.  The latter was made a coregent, married to Princess Meritaten, because he was near to her own age and this daughter of Akhenaten, at about 16, was a grown woman in oriental terms and even in western terms before teenagers were created and young women were expected to go to school instead of getting married.   You can look around for Smenkhkare all you like but this is he--by default if nothing else.  He is depicted on a trial piece as a pharaoh [first image] with Akhenaten and this is he, as well.  If not Smenkhkare, then who?  

 

[Wepwawet]

And I also don't think that a juvenile king would have a sidelock, which is why I pointed to the KV35 prince's sidelock as an issue, and why I only refer to him as a prince as there is zero evidence that he is Smenkhkare. I do of course raise him as a possibility due to him being found between Tiye and the YL, and being the right age to have been eldest son, or at least quite some years older than Tutankhamun, of Akhenaten. However, I do not close the door to the possibility of him being Smenkhkare on the basis of his sidelock, for we simply do not have any evidence to say a juvenile king straight away had his sidelock cut off. Do depictions of kings always show reality, or do they present a required image. How many depictions are there of kings wearing a dalmatic, none that I can think of right now, and certainly none showing Tutankhamun wearing a dalmatic, yet one was found in his tomb. So, for religious and propaganda purposes, what you see in an imgae may not represent reality. Now I've not said all that to try to 'prove' that the KV35 prince could be Smenkhkare, only that we ought to think about the differences between reality and the images presented to the public, or what is shown in tombs.

As to the prince's age, G.E. Smith said that he was no younger than eleven, and the current estimates put him between twelve and fourteen, though as fourteen is the age at which they became men, he'll be twelve or thirteen, just about the right age to die in about Year 16 if he were born in Year 3. Not proof of course, but a valid factor that cannot be dismissed out of hand, and when his DNA results are eventually released we will get a better understanding of who he may be, but never a full understanding of course.

You say that Smenkhkare was married to Meritaten as she was near to him in age, and I fully agree with that, but let's look then at what age Meritaten may have been when made his GRW. We cannot be exact, but it is very probable that she was born some time in Year 2. There is no precise date for the appearance of Smenkhkare, but there is agreement that it was in Year 14/15, though Dodson puts Year 13 into the frame. Let's say it was Year 14 for the sake of argument. Meritaten would be about twelve, and had Smenkhkare been born in Year 3, he would be about eleven, though depending in which month of the regnal year they were born in, they could be up to 24 months apart in age. Putting the KV35 prince to one side, if, as you say, Smenkhkare was near to Meritaten in age, when do you propose he may have been born, and, do you think it feasible that he was a younger brother of Akhenaten. My opinion is yes, as we have Beketaten.

The trial piece and the bust don't say it is Smenkhkare, it's an assumption, not a fact. That's not to say that we cannot make assumptions, and with the state of hard evidence from Amarna it's difficult to avoid at times, and have I not made a number of assumptions about Thutmose when all the hard evidence can be dealt with in one sentence, as I did a few posts up.

Edited February 23, 2022 by Wepwawet

[Wistman]

Don't anybody get irritated but there's the (remote) possibility that Thutmose's wife was pregnant when he died and gave birth after his demise.  We don't know exactly when he died, but most surmise at @ the yr30 of AIII.  If a boy was born then,  @ yr I of Akhenaten (AIV), then he might be a candidate for Smenkhkare, who would then be @ 15-16 in Akhenaten's yr16.  Correct?

 

Edited February 23, 2022 by Wistman

[Wepwawet]

11 minutes ago, Wistman said:

Don't anybody get irritated but there's the (remote) possibility that Thutmose's wife was pregnant when he died and gave birth after his demise.  We don't know exactly when he died, but most surmise at @ the yr30 of AIII.  If a boy was born then,  @ yr I of Akhenaten (AIV), then he might be a candidate for Smenkhkare, who would then be @ 15-16 in Akhenaten's yr16.  Correct?

 

Yes, I write trying to contain my raging fury!

There's issues of course, but if born at the start of the reign, those few more years of age over being a son of Akhenaten born in Year 3 would make a lot of difference to his features by the time he was co-regent. A thirteen year old still looks like a little kid, a sixteen year old is looking more like a young adult, usually, and that would better fit some of the purported images of him.

[Aldebaran]

3 hours ago, Wepwawet said:

The trial piece and the bust don't say it is Smenkhkare, it's an assumption, not a fact. That's not to say that we cannot make assumptions, and with the state of hard evidence from Amarna it's difficult to avoid at times, and have I not made a number of assumptions about Thutmose when all the hard evidence can be dealt with in one sentence, as I did a few posts up.

Oh, really?  Since Akhenaten had no other known male coregent, who is it supposed to be other than Smenkhkare?  And I suggest not trying to nominate a female as only princes had earlobes with such large piercings at that time.   Hard evidence?  Isn't that something you demand from others [except your buddies] but never bother to supply yourself?  That's been your MO for all the years I've encountered you on various fora.  I don't make assumptions.  I assemble the clues and write up the result in papers.  Also, I'm aided by my store of knowledge.  Didn't I advise you and Wistman to drop that "Prince Thutmose as Smenkhkare" idea? What did I get except attitude?  Did it ever occur to either of you that, when I looked at that bier, I saw something there that you couldn't see?  Of course not!  That would have involved a smidgen of humility. Don't confuse assumptions with educated conclusions, theories.  

Another thing I don't do that you and Wistman indulge in is "assuming" people existed of which there is no evidence whatsoever.  Prince Thutmose was a kid.  He had no wife. Didn't you, yourself, suggest "gone too soon" was written on his bier?  What "estimates" are you talking about besides those of Prof. Smith?   And how do you know that a sample of DNA was extracted from the boy in KV35?  Maybe yes--and maybe no.  Just because some Egyptologists are standing by his mummy wearing protective clothing?   The image lying on the bier is that of a child.  I think there was enough schist available in ancient Egypt to make a longer bier and a longer figure if one wanted to portray an adult.

Edited February 23, 2022 by Aldebaran

[Wepwawet]

1 hour ago, Aldebaran said:

Oh, really?  Since Akhenaten had no other known male coregent, who is it supposed to be other than Smenkhkare?  And I suggest not trying to nominate a female as only princes had earlobes with such large piercings at that time.   Hard evidence?  Isn't that something you demand from others [except your buddies] but never bother to supply yourself?  That's been your MO for all the years I've encountered you on various fora.  I don't make assumptions.  I assemble the clues and write up the result in papers.  Also, I'm aided by my store of knowledge.  Didn't I advise you and Wistman to drop that "Prince Thutmose as Smenkhkare" idea? What did I get except attitude?  Did it ever occur to either of you that, when I looked at that bier, I saw something there that you couldn't see?  Of course not!  That would have involved a smidgen of humility. Don't confuse assumptions with educated conclusions, theories.  

Another thing I don't do that you and Wistman indulge in is "assuming" people existed of which there is no evidence whatsoever.  Prince Thutmose was a kid.  He had no wife. Didn't you, yourself, suggest "gone too soon" was written on his bier?  What "estimates" are you talking about besides those of Prof. Smith?   And how do you know that a sample of DNA was extracted from the boy in KV35?  Maybe yes--and maybe no.  Just because some Egyptologists are standing by his mummy wearing protective clothing?   The image lying on the bier is that of a child.  I think there was enough schist available in ancient Egypt to make a longer bier and a longer figure if one wanted to portray an adult.

I don't see a name tag with Smenkhkare written on it, do you?

What proof do you have that Thutmose "was a kid", and while there is of course zero evidence that he had a wife, there is nothing to say that he did not, and looking at possibilities, speculating, is acceptable, until speculation turns into dogma, which is not something I have done with any part of the Amarna story.

Stop deliberately misrepresenting my posts. The phrase "Gone to soon" did not mean that I thought he was a child, and if he was in his mid to late 20s, which is what I suspect, then a death at that age is most certainly too soon.

As to the scene in KV35 of the prince having a DNA sample taken, I think you are being ridiculous. Why would they put him on the table in the first place if not to take a sample. It could not have been for show as this scene was not in the documentary. Hawass is the only Egyptologist there, the others are a female technician and professor Ashraf Selim, who was in charge of all the examinations of the mummies.

The age range of 12-14 was arrived at by the examination of the prince by the University of York team in 2002/03, and this is something that you must know as their report on all chamber Jc mummies has been widely diseminated, so why are you feigning ignorance.

And as for this:

Quote

Didn't I advise you and Wistman to drop that "Prince Thutmose as Smenkhkare" idea? What did I get except attitude? 

I suggest that you discuss the topic and not the posters, and most certainly drop trying to constrict discussion by an attempt at enforcing your dogmatic views of the YL and Amarna in general.

Edited February 24, 2022 by Wepwawet

[Wistman]

3 hours ago, Aldebaran said:

Oh, really?  Since Akhenaten had no other known male coregent, who is it supposed to be other than Smenkhkare?  And I suggest not trying to nominate a female as only princes had earlobes with such large piercings at that time.   Hard evidence?  Isn't that something you demand from others [except your buddies] but never bother to supply yourself?  That's been your MO for all the years I've encountered you on various fora.  I don't make assumptions.  I assemble the clues and write up the result in papers.  Also, I'm aided by my store of knowledge.  Didn't I advise you and Wistman to drop that "Prince Thutmose as Smenkhkare" idea? What did I get except attitude?  Did it ever occur to either of you that, when I looked at that bier, I saw something there that you couldn't see?  Of course not!  That would have involved a smidgen of humility. Don't confuse assumptions with educated conclusions, theories.  

Another thing I don't do that you and Wistman indulge in is "assuming" people existed of which there is no evidence whatsoever.  Prince Thutmose was a kid.  He had no wife. Didn't you, yourself, suggest "gone too soon" was written on his bier?  What "estimates" are you talking about besides those of Prof. Smith?   And how do you know that a sample of DNA was extracted from the boy in KV35?  Maybe yes--and maybe no.  Just because some Egyptologists are standing by his mummy wearing protective clothing?   The image lying on the bier is that of a child.  I think there was enough schist available in ancient Egypt to make a longer bier and a longer figure if one wanted to portray an adult.

Cut it with the ad hominems.  Make your points, and forget about dominating the other posters here.  You don't set the rules.  If that is unpleasant for you, too bad.

[Aldebaran]

17 hours ago, Wepwawet said:

I don't see a name tag with Smenkhkare written on it, do you?

What proof do you have that Thutmose "was a kid", and while there is of course zero evidence that he had a wife, there is nothing to say that he did not, and looking at possibilities, speculating, is acceptable, until speculation turns into dogma, which is not something I have done with any part of the Amarna story.

Stop deliberately misrepresenting my posts. The phrase "Gone to soon" did not mean that I thought he was a child, and if he was in his mid to late 20s, which is what I suspect, then a death at that age is most certainly too soon.

As to the scene in KV35 of the prince having a DNA sample taken, I think you are being ridiculous. Why would they put him on the table in the first place if not to take a sample. It could not have been for show as this scene was not in the documentary. Hawass is the only Egyptologist there, the others are a female technician and professor Ashraf Selim, who was in charge of all the examinations of the mummies.

The age range of 12-14 was arrived at by the examination of the prince by the University of York team in 2002/03, and this is something that you must know as their report on all chamber Jc mummies has been widely diseminated, so why are you feigning ignorance.

For the third time--Akhenaten and another pharaoh together--who ELSE could it have been?  Funny you haven't been able to answer so far but then you never do--just start accusing somebody of something by way of distraction.  Prince Thutmose was a kid because he always looks like one.  It's simple and you have no actual proof to the contrary.  I have news.  Your *guess* as to when the prince was born doesn't amount to "proof" of anything in the scholarly world.  Isn't that the word you always fling at me?  But you do supply some comedy with your ridiculous assumptions.  Ashraf Selim is a *radiologist* and not a microbiologist.  If he is present, some mummies are going to go into the CT machine, not have their DNA harvested.  When Dr. Gad is there with his harvesting bore, then you can assume someone is scheduled for DNA analysis.

The "University of York Team"!  Ha. ha, ha HA!  That was the radiologist who opined the Younger Lady was "nulliparous", meaning never having given birth.  And here she is a mum today!    As for Fletcher, she is  the famous mummy expert with her own show on mummies who tried to guess at the age of a mummy and was proved wrong by her own husband!  If it's really true that someone in that team judged the boy to be 14, then they couldn't be more wrong.  No Egyptian prince that age would be wearing a side-lock anymore.  You should know that by now--but then it isn't necessary for you to feign ignorance, is it?  That's it--I'm done here.  There's nobody normal here who can discuss any of this.

Edited February 24, 2022 by Aldebaran

[atalante]

On 2/22/2022 at 11:52 AM, Wepwawet said:

I think that in his 38 year reign Amunhotep III had more than two sons, though it can only be proven that Akhenaten was a son of Tiye, assuming he is KV55. Thutmose may have been a son of Tiye, but doesn't need to have been to become crown prince, and Amunhotep III was himself the son of a secondary wife.

Wepwawet,

Has any Egyptologist researched the age, and circumstances, at which a person would be announced as "crown prince" in Egypt?   And for an important corollary - how much time would elapse before replacing a previous crown prince with a new crown prince?

I suspect that one of the requirements for naming a "crown prince" would be that "more than one son of the king" was old enough to be considered an adult.  If so, then can't we agree that that both AIV (=Akhenaten) and Thutmose were considered adults at the time when Thutmose became crown prince.  

For another line of inquiry - would it be logical for AIV to become co-regent with AIII immediately after crown prince Thutmose died?  e.g. It seems that no other son of AIII existed, no matter how young, when crown prince Thutmose died.  (Otherwise, would it be logical for AIV to be named as crown prince, instead of co-regent?) 

 

 

Edited February 24, 2022 by atalante

[Wepwawet]

19 minutes ago, atalante said:

Wepwawet,

Has any Egyptologist researched the age, and circumstances, at which a person would be announced as "crown prince" in Egypt?   And for an important corollary - how much time would elapse before replacing a previous crown prince with a new crown prince?

I suspect that one of the requirements for naming a "crown prince" would be that "more than one son of the king" was old enough to be considered an adult.  If so, then can't we agree that that both AIV (=Akhenaten) and Thutmose were considered adults at the time when Thutmose became crown prince.  

For another line of inquiry - would it be logical for AIV to become co-regent with AIII immediately after crown prince Thutmose died?  e.g. It seems that no other son of AIII existed, no matter how young, when crown prince Thutmose died.  (Otherwise, would it be logical for AIV to be named as crown prince, instead of co-regent?) 

 

 

Not that I'm aware of, though it's quite possible that there's a paper out there somewhere.

In a straightforward world if the current "crown prince" dies, then the next eldest would automatically become the new crown prince, and I could see that if the next one to step up was a son of the principal GRW, but maybe they had a discussion about this if there were a selection of sons born to lesser wives, and some of the sons were of similar age. I honestly don't know though.

I don't think that age would be an issue as the future Amunhotep III is shown as "crown prince" in the tomb of his tutor, and as Thutmose IV was still alive when the scene in the tomb was made, and prince Amunhotep has a sidelock, then he was still a juvenile, as does the future Ramesses II depicted with Seti I on the Abydos king list.

There's a question here of if a king just had the one son, would he be named as his first son, or just as King's son. Going back to the Hermopolis talatat that names Tutankhaten, it does only name him as King's son, not first son. So I need to rethink my suggestion that he may have been a younger son, for if he was the only son, would he then just be named as King's son, and only named as first son if a younger brother subsequently appeared. Easy to go around and around and around here.

There is only one mention of Akhenaten before he appears as king, and that is on a wine docket. Everytime I see mention of this it just says that he was King's son, not first son. Unfortunately all authors that I've read on this quote from a 1959 publication by W. Hayes, which I've never been able to track down. So as in the paragraph above, the docket could date froma time when Thutmose was still alive, or if he were dead and Akhenaten was the only surviving son, and we get on the roundabout again.

 

[Wistman]

Switching dynasties (I know, there's many differences, but bear with me for a moment), we have - during Rameses II's kingship - the prince Khaemwaset, who though he was sem priest and HPP like Thutmose was, only became crown prince later in his life.  He was fourth son of the king, second by Queen Isisnofret.  Did his titulary change in a way that may signify?  That is, was he King's Son, and later, King's First son?

Edited February 26, 2022 by Wistman

[Wepwawet]

1 hour ago, Wistman said:

Switching dynasties (I know, there's many differences, but bear with me for a moment), we have - during Rameses II's kingship - the prince Khaemwaset, who though he was sem priest and HPP like Thutmose was, only became crown prince later in his life.  He was fourth son of the king, second by Queen Isisnofret.  Did his titulary change in a way that may signify?  That is, was he King's Son, and later, King's First son?

For most of his life he was King's son and Sem. I cannot find an example of an inscription showing him as King's first son, or as HPP, but they will of course be out there somewhere. He became heir in about Year 51 of Ramesses II and died in Year 55, I cannot find when he became HPP. There are various inscriptions out there that show all four sons down to Khaemwaset showing their titles, and other inscriptions from after the original first son, Amunhirkopshef, had died and the next in line is then titled as King's first son. I've seen an inscription where it has come down to Ramesses B as King's first son and Khaemwaset just behind him still as King's son and Sem, but nothing beyond that.

Edited February 26, 2022 by Wepwawet

[Wistman]

10 minutes ago, Wepwawet said:

For most of his life he was King's son and Sem. I cannot find an example of an inscription showing him as King's first son, or as HPP, but they will of course be out there somewhere. He became heir in about Year 51 of Ramesses II and died in Year 55, I cannot find when he became HPP. There are various inscriptions out there that show all four sons down to Khaemwaset showing their titles, and other inscriptions from after the original first son, Amunhirkopshef, had died and the next in line is then titled as King's first son. I've seen an inscription where it has come down to Ramesses B as King's first son and Khaemwaset just behind him still as King's son and Sem, but nothing beyond that.

Thanks very much for that.  Still, it shows (if we don't concentrate exclusively on Khaemwaset) that the title King's First Son is transferred to the next crown prince once the original died.  And also HPP was not a title necessarily included in princely titulary, though it was held and in effect (as with the bier statuette). 

 

Edited February 26, 2022 by Wistman

[Wistman]

By these examples, that talatat is informative (by inference) of Tut having had an older brother who was crown prince in effect.  Is it possible that Akhenaten was a little older than thought in yr30 of AIII?  Might he not already have had a son upon his co-regency, though not by Nefertiti.  This then could be Smenkhkare, aged 16 or so in Akhenaten's year 16 of kingship.

Edited February 26, 2022 by Wistman

[Wepwawet]

It seems that what happens is that when a crown prince dies before becoming king, then the title passes straight to the next in line by age, not seniority of mother, and the lists of the sons of Ramesses II are drawn up in seniority of birth. I'm also seeing that where the term King's eldest son is used, it looks to be only describing a prince still living. For example, the funeral bier for Thutmose only names him as King's son, likewise shabti for Khaemwaset only name him as King's son, not eldest, yet when he died he was the eldest. Also, the shabti of Khaemwaset only name him as Sem, again just as Thutmose is only Sem on the bier. But this is a sample of just two princes among hundreds. To do a survey that would give a far better idea would be a task best left to professionals I think, not least because access to all the actual inscriptions, or at least photos of them, would be needed. I would not be surprised if this information has already been collated, but in what form and where it could be, and in how many versions, I have no idea, but, I'm looking.

There is also an added complication in that even if you are a king's eldest son, you might not be titled as such. For instance, in TT64, tomb of royal tutor Heqaerneheh, Thutmose IV, though an adult king, is shown sitting on the lap of his tutor as if he were a child, behind him and standing on the plinth is the future Amunhotep III, but he is only named as King's son, not eldest, his position in the scene, with multiple younger brothers shown behind him, infers that he is crown prince, and of course we know he was, but it is not written down that he is. Another example where a presumption is made not just that a person depicted is crown prince, but also of what their name is, is found on a stela showing a prince who is also Sem. His actual name and titles have been removed,  and as the stela was found near the Great Sphinx, then he is assumed to have been the original heir to Amunhotep II, prince Amunhotep C.

The Complete Royal Families of Ancient Egypt by Dodson and Hilton is helpful, and provided the two examples above, but does not answer all the questions. For reference, these examples are found on pages 134 and 138.

Edited February 27, 2022 by Wepwawet

[Wepwawet]

Accepting that I said myself that I don't think a juvenile king would keep his sidelock, I wonder though if this really is the case. Adult kings are sometimes depicted as a child with a sidelock, as can be seen in the picture of Ramesses II below. So I'm thinking that if it is fine to depict an adult king as a juvenile, would there actually be an issue in a real juvenile king keeping their sidelock. In the depiction of Ramesses II, and all other such depictions, in dress, you can only tell this is a king by the uraeus. There is also what I think to be an issue of perception and expectation on our part as to how a king would appear in their day to day existance. We see kings wearing their best clothes and a crown, and so we perhaps unconsciously get into our minds the idea that this is how they looked all the time, though to be fair we really don't know how they dressed day to day. So we are doing the equivalent of looking at a monarch such as Elizabeth II dressed in her coronation robes and wearing a crown and holding an orb and scepter, and thinking that this is how she dressed all the time, ridiculous of course. So maybe we should re-appraise how we think an Egyptian king should look "off duty", and I don't think for one moment that they wore a crown, a uraeus is quite possible though. Unfortunately what we find in KV62 does not answer this. Tutankhamun is depicted as a juvenile with sidelock on a perfume box, and he is in exactly the same seated pose as Ramesses II, though this is not the same for all depictions of adult kings depicted as minors, a case in point being the Persian king Darius depicted as wholly Egyptian juvenile king with sidelock and uraeus, and standing while he suckles Mut. The problem with Tutankhamun is that for the first six years of his reign he was a juvenile, and as the depiction of him as a juvenile on the perfume box is formulaic, it tells us nothing. The bust of him as Nefertum, where he is very young and has no sidelock, also tells us nothing as it is him as a god, and so formulaic, not him as he was day to day. The "manequin" with him wearing a flat topped crown is ambiguous as we have no idea what it actually is, or how old he was when it was made. His features though look more to be 14 or slightly above than younger. In some depictions he wears a wig with uraeus, notably on the gold throne, but even though it has to be that he was well under the age of 14 and still Tutankhaten when the throne was made, is the image formulaic, and despite the informality of the scene, it's still a throne, and images have meaning. There are other depictions of him wearing a wig and uraeus, but how old is he in these depictions? over 14 or under, nobody knows, so they cannot tell us anything without knowing how old he was at the time.

So I don't really know, but I'm not certain I can see a specific reason for a juvenile king to have their sidelock cut off if it is perfectly acceptable for an adult king to be depicted as a juvenile with a sidelock.

Edited February 27, 2022 by Wepwawet

[Wistman]

Some stuff first on Prince Thuthmose.

From the Amarna Research Foundation biennial publication Akhetaten Sun, Spring 2015, an article by Dietrich Wildung titled A Premature Death   :

• cat sarcophagus inscription:  "In the hieroglyphic inscriptions Thutmosis is called “The king’s eldest son, the overseer of all priests of Upper and Lower Egypt, the greatest of the chiefs of craftsmen”. This last title, designating the High Priest of Ptah, makes him the highest authority at the main sanctuary at Memphis, this most prestigious centre of pharaonic traditions. Thutmosis’ name, written on the lid of the cat’s sarcophagus, is followed by m3’ ḫrw, “true of voice” – which means that he had already passed away when the burial of the cat (previously ordered by him?) took place."
• "On a limestone relief fragment (fig. 2) from this Apis burial, prince Thutmosis is represented with globular wig and the side-lock of the High Priest of Ptah, standing behind his father and holding an ointment vessel [3]. His facial features show the typical “sweet” style of Amenhotep III. The remains of the hieroglyphic inscription above his head identify him as 'sem priest Thutmosis'."
• On the bier statuette:  "The key piece concerning this prince is a miniature anthropoid limestone coffin (fig. 3) containing a tiny statuette of a mummy-shaped figure with globular wig and side-lock on a funerary bier [...] A short hieroglyphic text on the two sides of the bier and on the mummiform figure reads: “The enlightened one, the sem Thutmosis, the deceased”. The same text is inscribed in four vertical columns on the outside of the trough of the miniature coffin. [...] The typology of these statuettes and the epithet m3` ḫrw “true of voice” designate prince Thutmosis as deceased. Most probably they belonged to the funerary equipment of the tomb of Thutmosis – situated somewhere in the necropolis of Saqqâra, perhaps not too far from the Apis tomb."
• His age:  "For the date of Thutmosis’ death, there are no explicit documents available. Since he is not mentioned or represented in the reliefs of his father’s first heb-sed, it can be assumed that he passed away in his late twenties before year 30 of Amenhotep III. His premature death may be the reason of the outstanding role of princess Sat-Amun, [...] "

@Wepwawet   So, according to Wildung, the presentation of a globular wig and sidelock signified the office of HPP, even if the inscriptions only mention sem priest.  The prince was likely an adult when he died (as you suspect as well), which he assuredly did (we already knew this, thank you by the way) somewhere around the time of the yr30 heb-sed festival.  Also, the 'sweet' style of the period may account for over-youthful appearances on artifacts.

file:///C:/Users/amunr/AppData/Local/Temp/Sun2015%20Spring%20Vol%2021%20No%201.pdf              (pdf of Spring 2015 journal...I cannot direct link. Copy/paste this address into your browser window or google "The President's Papyrus, Amarna Research Foundation, Spring 2015")  The Wildung article is the second one of the publication, scroll down.

https://www.theamarnaresearchfoundation.org/            In case you don't have this site bookmarked already.

 

I'm currently still exploring Sitamun.  Right now focusing on her chair from Yuya/Thuya's tomb.  The image of her on the back of the chair shows her as wearing a gazelle diadem with a lotus headdress.  References to this which I've found refer to it as rare, but give no specifics.  I no longer have a good reference library to help me.  I know that gazelle diadems may signify fecundity, but the composite form shown on the object is not explained or named.  So I haven't been able to verify that it signified a 'royal concubine', previous to her being raised to GRW, as was stated earlier in this thread.  I'm trying to nail down a timeline and age range for Sitamun.

She was eldest daughter of the king, but not necessarily older than Thutmose.  One article suggested she didn't stay in the abandoned Malkata/City of the Dazzling Aten after the court removed to Akhetaten, but may have accompanied Tiye when she moved.  There is the notion that she may have conceived a child by her brother Akhenaten while there.  All speculation of course, but trying to get some idea of her age and if she was really too old to be YL. 

Edited March 2, 2022 by Wistman