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Nitocris

From Biocrawler, the free encyclopedia.

Nitocris [Greek Νίτωκρις] is widely claimed to have been the last Pharaoh of the 6th Dynasty of Egypt, and perhaps the first female ruler of Egypt, the first known Queen regnant in the world, and the first of three women to take the title of Pharaoh (the other two being Hapshepsut of the Eighteenth Dynasty and Cleopatra VII of the Ptolemaic dynasty). Her name is found in the writings of both Herodotus and Manetho. According to Herodotus, she invited the murderers of her brother, the king of Egypt, to a banquet, then killed them by flooding the sealed room with the Nile. Then, to avoid the other conspirators, she committed suicide (possibly by running into a burning room). Manetho claims she built the "third pyramid" at Giza, which is normally attributed to Menkaure.

Unfortunately Nitocris is not mentioned in any native Egyptian inscriptions and "she" probably did not exist. It was long claimed that Nitocris appears on a fragment of the Turin King List, dated to the 19th dynasty, under the Egyptian name of Nitiqreti (nt-ỉqrtỉ). The fragment where this name appears was thought to belong to the 6th dynasty portion of the king list, thus confirming both Herodotus and Manetho. However microscopic analysis on the Turin King List suggests the fragment was misplaced and that the name "Nitiqreti" is in fact a faulty transcription of the praenomen of a clearly male king Netjerkare Siptah I, who is named on the Abydos King List as the successor of the 6th dynasty king Nemtyemsaf II. On the Abydos King List, Netjerkare Siptah is placed in the equivilant spot that Neitiqreti Siptah holds on the Turin King List.

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References

Newberry, Percy Edward. 1943. "Queen Nitocris of the Sixth Dynasty." Journal of Egyptian Archæology 29:51–54.
Ryholt, Kim Steven Bardrum. 2000. "The Late Old Kingdom in the Turin King-list and the Identity of Nitocris." Zeitschrift für ägyptische Sprache und Altertumskunde 127:87–100.
Zivie-Coche, Christiane M. 1972. "Nitocris, Rhodopis et la troisième pyramide de Giza." Bulletin de l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale 72:115–138. PDF (http://www.ifao.egnet.net/doc/PubEnLigne/BIFAO/b.php?f=Bifao072_art_05.pdf)

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