Mutnedjmet (c. 1360–1326 BCE)
Mutnedjmet (c. 1360–1326 bce)
Great Hereditary Princess and Mistress of Upper and Lower Egypt. Name variations: Eji; Metnedjenet, Mutnedjme, or Mutnodjmet. Born around 1360 bce; possibly died in childbirth in 1326 bce; parents unknown; sister of Nefertiti; married Haremheb (a general).
Mutnedjmet was an Egyptian queen of the New Kingdom and probably the last surviving member of the enigmatic family of Queen Nefertiti , her sister. The parents of these women are not known, but as sister of a regnant queen, Mutnedjmet was perhaps the last surviving female member of the royal family of the 18th Dynasty and could, by marriage, lend legitimacy to the rule of her husband, the general Haremheb, who seized the throne upon the death of King Aye, the successor of Tutankhamun. She is depicted in equal size with her husband in a large statue group now in the Turin Museum. She gave birth to no living heirs, and indeed appears to have died in childbirth and been buried in Haremheb's private tomb at Saqqara near the ancient capital of Memphis, where the remains of a woman and baby were recovered by archae-ologists. Lacking an heir, Haremheb took as his successor another military man, one Ramses (I), who then founded the illustrious line of 19th Dynasty rulers.
Barbara S. Lesko , Department of Egyptology, Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island