If she’s there, she was probably there first.
Her name was Neferneferuaten Nefertiti. We don’t when she died but she disappears from the historical record during year 12 of Akhenaten’s reign. That’s four or five years before Akhenaten’s death. (And around the time of Tutankamun’s birth). There’s no record of her death or her burial. Prior to that, she was one of the most powerful and important figures in Egyptian history and possibly, the most frequently portrayed. Nefertiti and Akhenaten had six daughters. They were a close family and often depicted in relaxed casual settings, much different than formal official art. But there were official portraits, too. There’s a fragementary relief which depicts her striking down her enemies. It’s a bit of pharaohnic iconography that goes all the way back to the oldest piece of Egyptian work we have - Narmer palette.
And then she’s just gone from the official record. Recently, a bit of graffiti came to light in a limestone quarry, saying that the work was being carried out for King Akhenaten and his Great Wife, Nefertiti. That is tentatively dated to around year 16 of Akhenaten’s reign. It suggests that Nefertiti was known to be alive, but it’s a very recent find and no one’s sure yet how it fits in. But that’s the last direct mention we have for her, official or unofficial.
Akhenaten takes his elder daughter, Meritaten, as his new chief wife. She inherits many of Nefertiti’s titles. There’s also another piece, called the coregency stela, which seems to show Akhenaten & Meritaten with Nefertiti - only Nefertiti’s name is scratched out and replaced with another name - Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten. Meritaten’s name is also scratched out and replaced with her sister’s name, Ankhesenpaaten. (Ankhesenpaaten would marry Tutankhaten when he was a young boy, and when he abandoned Aten worship and took up the original Egyptian relions, he changed his name to Tutankhamun, she changed hers to Ankhsenamun). Meritaten died around the same time as Akenaten would, himself.
And then, suddenly, there’s this guy named Smenkhare. Well, maybe he’s a guy. Sometimes he’s addressed with female signifiers. We have no idea who he is, or his parentage, or anything. But all of sudden, there “he” is, and he’s Akhenaten’s coregent for the last few years of his life. We know they didn’t let just anyone become co-regent, so who is this guy and where did he come from?
When Akhenaten dies, Smenkhare marries Meritaten and takes the throne name Ankhkheperure Smenkhkare. Then, suddenly, there’s a whole new co-regent, a woman named Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten. Who the hell are all these people and why are they suddenly sitting on the throne of Egypt? Remember - Nefertiti’s full name was Neferneferuaten Nefertiti. It’s probably her, ruling in her own right.
It’s also possible that the King Ankhephurure Neferneferuaten who succeeds Akhenaten is his and Nefertiti’s fourth daughter, who was called Neferneferuaten Tasherit (tasherit means something like, “junior”. She was named for her mother.) But then we’d have to explain why Daughter #4 succeeded ahead of Daughter #3 - Ankhsenpaaten.
OTOH, there’s an outside chance that NEfertiti was Smenkhare and that when she was elevated to co-ruler, she had to become male (because Pharoah is a religious role, and the King had to have a penis and a fake beard. It was non-negotiable.) Only, now that the Queen is a King, they need another Queen to perform the Queen’s religious duties - so that’s why Akhenaten marries Meritaten. (And probably also because he was hoping for a son. Let’s be real.) So then Akhenaten dies - the Co-ruler Smenkhare is actually Nefertiti and starts calling herself Ankhepherure Smenkhare. The King’s Great Wife is Meritaten - who starts calling herself Ankhepherure Neferneferuaten. And now they have a problem, because even if the beard is false, they need a functioning penis.
There’s no evidence, you understand. Or rather, there’s lots of conflicting evidence. But it all makes more psychological sense than the idea that two people we never heard of - Ankhephurure Neferneferuaten and Ankhephurure Smenkhare - suddenly pop up and become King and then disappear entirely two years later.
Whichever name we choose, Nefertiti likely succeeded Akhenaten, ruling in her own right after his death.
Sadly, it didn’t last. Neferneferuaten & Smenkhare, whoever they were, died shortly afterward before leaving much record. Within a year, Tutankhamun is king. (We don’t really know who he is, either, but this is getting long so skip that for now. Suffice to say the DNA tests are a mess and there’s no record of him before he suddenly is king.)
To sum up:
- Nefertiti, ridiculously powerful and beloved of the living god, disappears in year 12
- Akhenaten marries Meritaten, makes her his chief wife
- Akhenaten names some dude, Smenkhare, as co-regent
- Nefertiti is known to still be alive
- Meritaten marries Smenkhare
- Akhenaten dies
- Some woman named Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten declares herself the king
- Smenkhare takes the throne, renames himself Ankhkheperure Smenkhare
- Meritaten dies. Smenkhare dies. Neferneferuaten drops out of sight -
- Ankhsenpaaten marries Tutankaten
- They change their names to Tutankhamun and Ankhsenamun.
- Tutankhamun dies with no living heir (two small fetuses are found in his tomb, presumably his children who didn’t make it to term.)
- Ankhsenamun begs the king of the Hitittes to send her a prince, because her king has died and she (Daughter of the Living Aten, recall) doesn’t want to marry a commoner
- King of the Hittites thinks it’s probably a gag but sends a random prince to go check it out.
- Vizier Ay marries Ankhsenamun. No word from her on what she thinks about that. Never trust a Vizier!
- That Hititte Prince gets assassinated en route
- Ankhsenamun dies
- Chief General Horhemheb leads a palace coupe and sets about eradicating all traces of the Akhenaten and his family. Horemheb names his vizier as his heir, and they go on to found a new dynasty.
Now at this point, you’re probably saying to yourself, “What the hell? I just asked a simple question. Anyway, you can figure all this out with DNA, can’t you?”
No. The DNA is a mess, partly because we don’t know who Nefertiti’s parents or family are, so we can’t tell by her relations, and partly because getting DNA from a mummy is a nightmare. Dr. Hawass claimed to have DNA tests but that’s a [url=http://www.kv64.info/2011/01/more-criticism-of-tutankhamun-dna-study.html]whole political soap opera
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. Hawass insisted that foreigners shouldn’t be allowed to have access to the mummy DNA because they might try to “rewrite the history of Egypt” (ie - come up with truth that challenge Hawass’ theories.)
At first he insisted that only Muslim scholars would be allowed to participate, but eventually he allowed an Italian geneticist on the team. Hawass laid out a story about how the results prove that Akhenaten was Tutankhamun’s father, but they refuse to release the raw data, because, in the words of the Italian team member, “it would cause a “a lot of arguing” over technicalities”. Yeah.
Suffice it to say, we can’t rely on Hawass’ DNA testing.
The point is, we don’t know when or in what circumstances Nefertiti died. She may have died as early as Year 12 of Akhenaten’s reign or she may taken a different name and ruled later as his co-regent. She have may have outlived him, ruling by herself as Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten and/or Ankhkheperure Smenkhare. (It makes more sense than some rando just showing up an declaring herself queen, after all). We have no record of her burial and we don’t have her mummy. But she was in her life one of the most powerful and important people in Egypt’s long history of powerful and important people.
To answer your question: however it happened, Nefertiti would have predeceased Tutankhamun. If she had lived, he wouldn’t have been crowned himself. She would have had a tomb to match her magnificence. A person of her importance would not have been shoved into a few forgotten rooms. Either the tomb is not Nefertiti’s … or the radar has only barely scratched the surface.
