Maathorneferure was an ancient Egyptian queen, the Great Royal Wife of

Ramesses II Ramesses II, ). (; egy, rꜥ-ms-sw, , ; ), commonly known as Ramesses the Great, was an Egyptian pharaoh. He was the third ruler of the Nineteenth Dynasty. Along with Thutmose III of the Eighteenth Dynasty, he is often regarded as the gr ...

Family

Maathorneferure was a daughter of the Hittite king Hattusili III and his wife, Queen Puduhepa. She was the sister of the crown prince Nerikkaili of Hatti and the sister of the later Hittite king Tudhaliya IV. Maathorneferure was married to the

Egyptian Egyptian describes something of, from, or related to Egypt. Egyptian or Egyptians may refer to: Nations and ethnic groups * Egyptians, a national group in North Africa ** Egyptian culture, a complex and stable culture with thousands of years of ...

Pharaoh Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian: ''pr ꜥꜣ''; cop, , Pǝrro; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') is the vernacular term often used by modern authors for the kings of ancient Egypt who ruled as monarchs from the First Dynasty (c. 3150 BC) until the an ...

in the 34th year of his reign, becoming the King's Great Wife. Her original name is unknown, but her Egyptian name translates as "One who sees Horus, the invisible splendor of Ra".

Life

Egypt and the

Hittite empire The Hittites () were an Anatolian people who played an important role in establishing first a kingdom in Kussara (before 1750 BC), then the Kanesh or Nesha kingdom (c. 1750–1650 BC), and next an empire centered on Hattusa in north-centra ...

had been increasingly at odds since the demise of the kingdom of the

Mitanni Mitanni (; Hittite cuneiform ; ''Mittani'' '), c. 1550–1260 BC, earlier called Ḫabigalbat in old Babylonian texts, c. 1600 BC; Hanigalbat or Hani-Rabbat (''Hanikalbat'', ''Khanigalbat'', cuneiform ') in Assyrian records, or ''Naharin'' in ...

, and Maathorneferure's marriage to the Egyptian king was the conclusion of the peace process which had begun with the signing of a

peace treaty A peace treaty is an agreement between two or more hostile parties, usually countries or governments, which formally ends a state of war between the parties. It is different from an armistice An armistice is a formal agreement of warring ...

thirteen years earlier. On the Marriage Stela it is claimed that "The daughter of the great chief of Kheta marched in rontof the army .. The Hittite princess left

Hattusa Hattusa (also Ḫattuša or Hattusas ; Hittite: URU''Ḫa-at-tu-ša'', Turkish: Hattuşaş , Hattic: Hattush) was the capital of the Hittite Empire in the late Bronze Age. Its ruins lie near modern Boğazkale, Turkey, within the great loop of t ...

, the Hittite capital, in late 1246 BCE, accompanied by her mother and a huge contingent laden with gold, silver, bronze, cattle and sheep, and slaves. At the Egyptian frontier, a message was despatched to the Pharaoh: 'They have traversed sheer mountains and treacherous passes to reach Your Majesty's border.' Ramesses sent a welcoming party to escort the princess through Canaan and into Egypt. She arrived in February 1245 BCE at Pi-Ramesse. For Ramesses, the marriage was valuable more for the large dowry he acquired rather than his new bride, who was despatched to his harem palace at Mer-wer (today's Gurob). According to another account, however, Maathorneferure is said to have given Ramesses a baby (a girl called Neferure, according to the Abydos procession) and died shortly thereafter. Maathorneferure is mentioned on a papyrus found at Gurob. The partial text on the papyrus states: '' ..small bag, the king's wife Maathorneferure (may she live) (the daughter of) the great ruler of Khatti, ..Dayt garment of 28 cubits, 4 palms, breadth 4 cubits, ag?of 14 cubits, 2 palms, breath 4 cubits - 2 items ..palms, breath 4 cubits''.
Gurob, papyrus 32795 At Tanis, Egypt, Tanis, there is a broken statue of Ramesses that shows her (mostly destroyed) figure touching his leg, together with her cartouche. During the latter half of the first millennium BCE Maathorneferure's marriage to the pharaoh gave rise to the tale inscribed on the

Bentresh stela The Bentresh Stela or Bakhtan Stela is an ancient Egyptian sandstone stela with a hieroglyphic text telling the story of Bentresh, daughter of the prince of Bakhtan (i.e. Bactria), who fell ill and was healed by the Egyptian god Khonsu. Dating ...

in which the sister of a foreign queen is healed by a divine statue sent from Egypt.

Alternative spellings

* Maat-hor-neferure * Maatnefrure * Maat-hor-nefrure * Naptera

References

*
Marriage Stela
in ''Ancient Records of Egypt'' by J. H. Breasted, Part Three, §415ff * "The Bentresh Stela" in ''Ancient Egyptian Literature'' by M. Lichtheim, Vol.3, pp. 90ff. * ''Ramesside Inscriptions'' by Kenneth Anderson Kitchen * ''Letters of the Great Kings of the Ancient Near East: The Royal Correspondence of the Late Bronze Age'' by Trevor R. Bryce, p. 117ff. * ''The Kingdom Of The Hittites'' by Trevor Robert Bryce, p. 283

Notes

External links

Faience plaque bearing the name of Queen Maathorneferure

{{Queens of Ancient Egypt 13th-century BC Egyptian women Wives of Ramesses II Hittite women Ancient princesses