Egypt Museum

Fragment of a Queen

This white limestone relief fragment shows an unidentified queen clutching a thick usekh collar in her raised left hand. Dressed in a translucent pleated garment with a headdress ornamented with a double uraei, cow horns, double plume and sun disc in the centre, the queen has divine status. The plumes are streaked with blue, brown, and red, as well as gold. The fragment measures at 4 5/16 x 7/16 in. (11 x 1.1 cm).

Fragment of a Queen
Brooklyn Museum. 73.67.2

Based upon educated guesswork and the characteristics of the queen’s face, we here at Egypt-Museum feel safe in our chances to identify this fragment with Queen Tiye, the mother of Akhenaten and Great Royal Wife of Amenhotep III.

During her son’s reign, Queen Tiye became deified, and would be depicted with the sun-disc crown, horns and double plumes, as seen in this nameless queen fragment (73.67.2). By adding the double feathered (plume) sun disc crown to imagery of Queen Tiye, Akhenaten raised his mother, already in her lifetime, into the realm of a goddess.

Granite head of Queen Tiye
Granite head of Queen Tiye. Egyptian Museum, Cairo. JE 38257

Of course, without a title identifying the queen, we cannot give 100% certainty, this queen could after-all be a relative with similar family features. Alas, all things considered, we do sense this was most likely depicted Queen Tiye and was created during her son Akhenaten’s reign. Here below are some other depictions of Queen Tiye made during Akhenaten’s reign to provide further evidence for our reasoning.

Detail of the face shows a striking resemblance both 3-dimensial and 2-dimensial imagery of Queen Tiye.
Detail of the face shows a striking resemblance both 3-dimensial and 2-dimensial imagery of Queen Tiye.
Brooklyn Museum. 73.67.2
Fragment of a sandstone relief from the Aten temple at Karnak with the figure of a Queen holding a fly-flapper
“Fragment of a sandstone relief from the Aten temple at Karnak with the figure of a Queen holding a fly-flapper. The drawing is in the revolutionary style of the great mass of this dismantled temple and the carving is summary, as befits the granular nature of the rather coarse stone and the haste in which it was evidently worked. The Queen represented, however, has none of the exaggerated angular features of Nefertiti found on the other fragments from this same temple, and has been most plausibly identified as Tiye, her slight double chin and down-turned mouth being unmistakable.” – Akhenaten, Pharaoh of Egypt, a new study. By Cyril Aldred, 1968. New Aspects of Antiquity Edited by Sir Mortimer Wheeler
Akhenaten leading his mother queen Tiye by the hand into her sunshade.
Akhenaten leading his mother queen Tiye by the hand into her sunshade.
– Akhenaten – King Of Egypt, Cyril Aldred, 1988.
Notice the double plume headdress the queen is wearing.

Summary:

Limestone fragment of an unidentified queen, most likely Queen Tiye
New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, reign of Akhenaten, c. 1352-1336 B.C.
From Tel el-Amarna.
Brooklyn Museum. 73.67.2

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