Canopic jars, Parrish Collection.1

Seventy vases of coloured glaze, Cairo M., Vestibule
Jewel Room, Case B.

Ushabtis and box, Cairo M., Vestibule Jewel Room,
Case A.

Near the mummy of Queen Nesikhonsu is that of her daughter NESITANEBASHERU, who died about 1,000 years B.C. The name of her husband is not known, nor any details concerning her, except that she succeeded to her mother's office of Priestess of Amen, and had a daughter named for her grandmother, Nesikhonsu.

The mummy and the two coffins of Nesitanebasheru2 were found with those of her mother in the famous Deir el-Bahari tomb. The princess' wrapping were dated in the thirteenth year of the reign of Pasebkhanu II., her halfbrother, and bear the stamp of Astemkheb, a high priestess.

Nesitanebasheru is one of the very few royal women of the ancient Egyptian Empire of whose personal appearance we have a definite idea. The mummy, I m. 75 cent. in length, is that of a woman between thirty-five and forty years of age at the time of death. It still retains a quantity of wavy chestnut-brown hair, eyebrows of a lighter shade, thick eyelashes, and wide lids closing over enamelled eyes of a dark brown, which probably represent their colour in life. The nose is slightly arched, the mouth full, the teeth good, indicating the age of the princess. The face was treated with paint and ochre in the same way as that of the Queen Hent-taui.3

It rests on a coffin originally gilded and painted, but afterwards covered with a coating of bitumen, which gives the case a black and rough appearance, and so damages the inscription that the title of Priestess of Amen, and the name of Nesitanebasheru, can only be made out with difficulty.

1 Rec., IV, 80.

• M.'s M.R., 579-81.

2 Cairo M., Gal. Q, Case D, 1199.

CHAPTER XIV.

XXIIND AND XXIIIRD DYNASTIES.

Bubastis. About 950 B.C.

THE beginning of a new dynasty at the close of the 150 years' rule of the Priest-Kings, finds the government in the hands of a man of foreign extraction, Sheshenq, whose chief claim to the crown probably rested on the strength of his sword.

It is possible that he had the advantage of royal descent through one of the many ramifications of the Pharaonic families.1 At any rate, he seems to have followed the timehonoured Egyptian custom, and to have called an heiress of one of the native royal lines to share his throne.

A tomb discovered middle of the last

KA-RA-MAAT was the princess whose rights were thus assumed by the XXIInd dynasty. She was a daughter of the Tanite king Pasebkhanu II. at Gurnah by Arabs, about the century, but at present unknown, was probably hers. From this tomb came ushabtis and canopic jars, having the heiress titles, "Divine Wife, Lord of both Lands, Lord of Crowns," and royal cartouches enclosing the name of Ka-ra-maat, "Divine Adorer of Amen, loved of Mut."

Ka-ra-maat had inherited property in Upper Egypt which had been stolen from her at some time previous to her marriage with Sheshenq. When that king chose the princess for his wife, he hastened to right the wrong which had been done her, and issued a decree restoring her

1 M.'s S.N., 769.

2 A.B., xiii, B.M.

possessions. The ordinance was inscribed on one of the pylons at Karnak,' and purports to be a divine command." "Thus spake Amen-Ra the king of the gods

With

'regard to any object of any kind, which Ka-ra-maat, the "daughter of the king of Upper Egypt, Pasebkhanu, has "brought with her of the hereditary possessions which had "descended to her in the Southern district of the country, "and with regard to each object of any kind whatever, "which the people of the land have presented to her, "which they have at any time taken from the (royal) lady, we hereby restore it to her. Every king, every "chief priest of Amen, every general, every captain and the people of every condition, whether male or female, who "had great designs, and they who carried out their designs "later, they shall restore the property of all kinds which "Ka-ra-maat . . . brought with her as her inherited "estate in the Southern district of the country, together "with all possessions of all kinds which the habitants of the country have given her, and what they have at any time "taken from the lady, it shall be restored into her hand; we restore it into the hand of her son, and of her grand'son, and to her daughter, and to her grand-daughter,

"Slain shall be all people of every condition of the "whole land, whether male or female, who shall claim any "object of any kind whatsoever, which Ka-ra-maat "brought with her as inherited estate of the South land, and "any object of any kind whatsoever, which the inhabitants " of the land have given her, which they have at any time "taken from the lady as property (they who shall "keep back any object thereof), one morning after the "other morning, to them shall our great spirits be heavy. "We will not be any help to them, we will sink (their) 66 noses into the earth."

1 N. wall, 3rd pylon, S. of Great Temple, Karnak.

* BRUGSCH, Egypt under Pharaohs, 373–375.

From the terms of the inscription, it seems that Ka-ramaat had great riches, which were partly inherited from her father and partly gifts from the people; that for some reason she had probably left her Southern home, and had met with some misfortune which left her unprotected, and her possessions a prey to anyone who chose to take them. People of high and low condition were implicated in the robbery, for the command to restore her goods is laid on every "king, every "high priest of Amen, every general, every captain,"

etc.

After the king's threats contained in the vigorous decree of Amen, the thieves probably returned to Sheshenq's queen the property of which as a friendless princess they had deprived her. The son of Ka-ra-maat was King Uasarkon I., and her grandson was a prince Sheshenq, who dedicated a statue to the memory of his grandmother, stating in the inscription her descent from the Tanite king.1

She had probably also an elder son named Anput, who had the heir's titles of High Priest of Amen, and Commander-in-chief, but who died before his father. Other records of this queen are contained on the stela of Horpasen, which refers to the wife of King Sheshenq I. as Ka-ramaat; while a statue in the British Museum names a Maatra-ka, in connection with Uasarkon I., and as the daughter of Pasebkhanu of Tanis. It is evident that this princess is identical with Ka-ra-maat, the queen of Sheshenq, and that in the Hapi statue she accompanies Uasarkon as his mother.

Queen Ka-ra-maat is also to be found among the royal hosts of Karnak. The canopic jars from that tomb in Gurnah which was probably her burial place, are now in 1 A. B., xiii, B.M.

2 L., D., iii, 253 b, c ; 255 a, b. • Statue of Hapt.

3 M., S., xxxi.