Neferneferuaten

For other uses, see Neferneferuaten (disambiguation).

Neferneferuaten
This gold pectoral of the goddess Nut (Cairo JE61944) originally belonged to the female pharaoh Neferneferuaten since it was inscribed with her cartouches. Later, her cartouches were replaced with those of Tutankhamun.
Pharaoh
Reign	1335–1333 BC or 1334–1332 BC
Predecessor	Uncertain: Akhenaten (most likely) or Smenkhkare
Successor	Uncertain: Smenkhkare or (most likely) Tutankhamun
Royal titulary Praenomen Ankhkheperure (plus ephithet) Nomen Neferneferuaten (plus ephithet)
Consort	if Nefertiti: Akhenaten if Meritaten: Smenkhkare
Died	1333 BC or 1332 BC
Dynasty	Eighteenth dynasty of Egypt

Ankhkheperure-Merit-Neferkheperure/Waenre/Aten Neferneferuaten (Ancient Egyptian: nfr-nfrw-jtn), or "Neferneferuaten", is the name of a queen regnant ('female king') of ancient Egypt who reigned in her own right near the end of the Amarna Period during the Eighteenth Dynasty. Her name features feminine gender traces, and one of her epithets was Akhet-en-hyes ("Beneficial for her husband"). This epithet also features in one version of her nomen (birth name) cartouche. (See Ancient Egyptian royal titulary.) The name Neferneferuaten translates as either "(“Perfect/Beautiful is the perfection/beauty of Aten”)

She is to be distinguished from the male king Smenkhkare, with whom she shared the prenomen (throne name) Ankhkheperure. However, Smenkhkare was a male king who was married to Akhenaten and Nefertiti's daughter Meritaten but his prenomen bore no additional epithets and he disappears from the historical records shortly after Year 12 of Akhenaten.

Gold Nut pectoral (Carter no. 261p1)

A miniature canopic coffin of Tutankhamun. Traces of Neferneferuaten's cartouches were identified underneath the cartouches of Tutankhamun in the interior of his four miniature golden canopic coffins.

The external trappings of Tutankhamun's mummy (the gold hands, the crook and flail, a gold chain which hung from the Ba-bird and a series of eight golden mummy bands) also held a spelling of Neferneferuaten's prenomen: “Ankhkheperure-Meryt-Neferkheperure”

The round-fronted chest (Cairo JE 61495) from the antechamber of Tutankhamun's tomb. The knob on the chest that contains Tutankhamun’s cartouche had been written over the name of Neferneferuaten.

The golden Nut pectoral (Carter no. 261p1) or (Cairo JE61944) was reused for the funeral of Tutankhamun. Howard Carter noted that Tutankhamun’s cartouche replaced earlier ones containing the name of Akhenaten. Marc Gabolde successfully demonstrated that the original cartouches reinscribed with Tutankhamun’s nomen and prenomen were those of Neferneferuaten with the variation of Ankhkheperure-Mery-Waenre and Neferneferuaten-Akhetenhies “One Who is Beneficial for Her Husband,” proving Neferneferuaten was a female king who was at the same time the wife of Akhenaten.

The "female king" identity is also supported by the feminine form of “the justified” under the prenomen Ankhkheperure-Mery-Waenre. The main inscription consists of an adaptation of the formula 777b from the Pyramid Texts, indicating the return to religious orthodoxy that the country was undergoing when the pectoral was made. Evidence from the pectoral suggests that Neferneferuaten was a female king during the restoration of orthodoxy following Akhenaten’s death.

Other attestations of Neferneferuaten in Tutankhamun's tomb

According to the latest published 2023 research by Nozomu Kawai, Neferneferuaten is identified by name or by her royal name or royal epithet on numerous items in Tutankhamun's tomb—apart from from the Golden Nut Pectoral. These include an "Inscribed Strip from the Lid of a Box (GEM 354, JE 61500, Carter no. 1k)" which was not altered by Egyptian officials. The unaltered text on the box reads:

"King of Upper and Lower Egypt, one who lives in truth, Lord of the Two Lands, Neferkheperure Waenre, Son of Re, one who lives in truth, Lord of Crowns, Akhenaten, great in his lifetime, King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Lord of the Two Lands, Ankhkheperure beloved of Neferkheperure, Son of Re, Lord of crowns, Neferneferuaten Beloved of Waenre, Great Royal Wife, Meritaten, may she live forever.

Another attestation of the female pharaoh Neferneferuaten include "Box (Carter no. 79+574)" which consist of a strip of a box from Tutankhamun’s tomb that originally bore an inscription of the prenomen and nomen of Neferneferuaten as well as the name of Meritaten (Carter no. 79+574),31 which was later altered for Tutankhamun and Ankhesenamun. This Box originally held the inscription below:

"King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Lord of the Two Lands, Ankhkheperure beloved of Neferkheperure [ie. Akhenaten], Son of Re of his body, his beloved, Lord of every land, Neferneferuaten beloved of Waenre, great royal wife, his beloved, Mistress of Upper and Lower Egypt, Mistress of the Two Lands, Meritaten, may she live forever."

Thirdly, "traces of the cartouches of Neferneferuaten are also identified underneath the cartouches of Tutankhamun on the four miniature golden canopic coffins [of the Boy King]." Marc Gabolde and James P. Allen discovered the epithet Axt-n-H(j)=s, “One Who is Beneficial for Her Husband” known in Neferneferuaten's nomen on these canopic coffins." Three other known objects naming the female king in Tutankhamun's burial consists of 1. a pair of blue bracelets of Akhenaten and Neferneferuaten (Carter no. 620 [41, 42]) which still bear these king's royal names discovered in the Annex of Tutankhamun's tomb. 2. three gold sequins of Neferneferuaten assumed to be found from the Tomb of Tutankhamun (now in the National Museums of Scotland, Edinburgh A.1959.451) "though none is recorded by Carter" and, finally, The External Trapping of Tutankhamun’s Mummy (Carter no. 256b) where in 2012, Martin von Falk identified a further spelling of Neferneferuaten's prenomen or royal name Ankhkheperure-Meryt-Neferkheperure on the external trappings of the mummy of Tutankhamun.

The round fronted box chest (Carter No. 79, Cairo JE 61495) bears a box knob which was discovered in the Antechamber of Tomb KV 62. Howard Carter noted that Tutankhamun’s cartouche had been superimposed over the name of a royal predecessor, Neferneferuaten. Moreover, Tutankhamun’s stunning, innermost coffin of solid gold (Carter 255, JE 60671) features "distinctly feminine lines of the stomach and hips—an evident carry-over from its original [female] owner, Neferneferuaten." In addition, the purported gilded statuette of the male king Tutankhamun riding a leopard shows this figure with women's breasts--which clearly identifies this object as belonging to the original burial equipment of this king's predecessor--the female pharaoh Neferneferuaten.

General chronology

Further information: Amarna succession

Original succession

There was previously no broad consensus on the succession order of Smenkhkare and Neferneferuaten. Akhenaten's great royal wife Nefertiti had been last attested as alive in Year 12 of Akhenaten at a public reception of foreign tribute or durbar scene with the other members of the Egyptian royal family both in Amarna Tomb 1 and in the Tomb of Meryre II. The period from the 13th regnal year of Akhenaten to the ascension of Tutankhaten was unclear to modern historians. The reigns of Smenkhkare and Neferneferuaten were very brief and left little monumental or inscriptional evidence to draw a clear picture of political events. Adding to this, Neferneferuaten shares her Ankhkheperure prenomen (throne name) with Smenkhkare, and her nomen (birth name) with Nefertiti, making identification very difficult at times. With little dated evidence to fix their reigns with any certainty, the evidence was subject to interpretation.

Many encyclopedic sources and atlases show Smenkhkare succeeding Akhenaten on the basis of a research tradition dating back to 1845, and some still conflate Smenkhkare with Neferneferuaten. The lack of unique names continued to cause problems in books and papers written before the early 1980s: an object might be said to bear the name "Smenkhkare", when it could also be translated to "Ankhkheperure". Advocates for Smenkhkare as the direct successor of Akhenaten make the case that she is attested as "Great Royal Wife" just before the start of Akhenaten's final regnal year.

Prior to 2014, Neferneferuaten was sometimes thought to have ruled between Akhenaten and Smenkhkare. A generally accepted chronology of the late Eighteenth Dynasty before 2012 is presented below:

King	Approx years
Akhenaten	17 years
Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten	2 years
Ankhkheperure Smenkhkare	2 years
Tutankhaten/Tutankhamun	9 years
Ay	4 years
Horemheb	14 years

Revised succession

This gilded statuette nominally portrays the male king Tutankhamun on the back of a black leopard (out of frame) shows the figure’s feminine breasts, which clearly identifies it as belonging to the burial equipment of this king's predecessor, the female pharaoh Neferneferuaten.

This replica of Tutankhamun's stunning solid gold inner coffin (JE 60671) features distinctly feminine lines of the stomach and hips which identifies it as belonging to the burial equipment of this king's original female predecessor, Neferneferuaten.

Marc Gabolde cites the Smenkhkare wine docketto Smenkhkare succeeding Akhenaten. Aidan Dodson proposes that: Smenkhkare did not have an independent reign; that Neferneferuaten must have come after him; that Smenkhkare's reign was entirely that of a coregent; and that Smenkhkare's reign ended in Year 14 or 15 of Akhenaten's reign. Finally, James Peter Allen previously used the wine docket and the strong association of Neferneferuaten with Akhenaten in epithets and on stelae to speculate that both Neferneferuaten and Smenkhkare succeeded Akhenaten, each as a rival claimant.

However, the 2014 publication of a red ochre ink inscription—first discovered in 2012—for Nefertiti at a limestone quarry in Deir Abu Hinnis as "Great Royal Wife" in Regnal Year 16 of Akhenaten makes clear that Nefertiti was still alive and still serving as this King's Great Royal Wife in what was Akhenaten's second to last year as king. The Year 16 ink inscription was translated as:

"Regnal year 16, first month of the inundation season, day 15. May the King of Upper and Lower Egypt live, he who lives of Maat, the Lord of the Two Lands Neferkheperure Waenre, l.p.h. the Son of Re, who lives of Maat, the Lord of the Crowns Akhenaten, l.p.h., whose life span is long, living forever and ever, the King’s Great Wife, his beloved, the lady of the two lands Neferneferuaten-Nefertiti, living forever and ever. Beloved of Re, the ruler of the two horizons, who rejoices in the horizon in his name of Re ///, who comes as the Aten. the /// the work of the Mansion of the Aten, under the authority of the king’s scribe Penthu, under the authority of overseer of work///."

The discovery that Nefertiti was still alive in the second last Year of Akhenaten—his 16th Year—strongly indicates that she was most likely the female king Neferneferuaten and the direct successor to Akhenaten. This would require Akhenaten having chosen Smenkhkare as his successor in his Year 12. Smenkhkare died before Akhenaten, however, forcing Akhenaten to elevate Nefertiti to the throne as Neferneferuaten to secure his legacy. Nozomu Kawai writes:

...it can be suggested that Akhenaten appointed Nefertiti as his coregent after the demise of his male coregent, Smenkhkare. Smenkhkare's widowed queen, Meritaten, seems to have kept her title as his great royal wife. Simultaneously, Neferneferuaten obtained another epithet, Axt-n-H(j)=s, "One Who is Beneficial for Her Husband", which Gabolde used to prove this king's female identity beyond doubt... However, it is worth noting that this coregency does not seem to have lasted a long time. After Akhenaten's death, Neferneferuaten continued in power as sole ruler for approximately three years. During her sole reign, Neferneferuaten also obtained new epithets. She replaced the name of Akhenaten with references to the Aten in her prenomen and nomen. The epithet of her prenomen was then mry-Itn, "Beloved of Aten", while the epithet of her nomen became HoA-mAat, "Ruler of Truth".

That most of Tutankhamun's funerary equipment was originally made for or inscribed with the name of the female king Neferneferuaten strongly suggests that Tutankhamun, in fact, directly succeeded Neferneferuaten on the throne after the female king died. With the discovery of so many objects from the female king Neferneferuaten's own funerary equipment—carved in her name or bearing distinct feminine faces—in Tutankhamun's own burial, many Egyptologists today such as Chris Naunton, Aidan Dodson, Athena van der Perre, James Peter Allen since 2016 and Nozomu Kawai accept that Neferneferuaten was Tutankhamun's predecessor—or coregent in the case of Dodson—and that this female ruler was Nefertiti.

Athena van der Perre notes:

After the death of Semenkhkare, the royal family had to face the problem of succession again....At some point after Semenkhkare's disappearance, Akhenaten must have decided that there was only one person capable of reigning and tutoring Tutankhaten after his death. The new regent would use the name Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten. The reign of “king” Neferneferuaten is actually better documented than that of Semenkhkare....The name is attested in Amarna, Thebes and Tell el-Borg. Mud jar sealings referring to the “(wine of the) estate of Neferneferuaten, beloved of Waenra,” were also discovered in Saqqara. Nefertiti, who already played an important role in Amarna, and already bore the name Neferneferuaten, is in my view the most likely candidate for this function. Her name was extended with epithets inside the cartouches; Ankhkheperure mr.y X Neferneferuaten mr.y Y, where X and Y could differ. After her husband’s death, Nefertiti would reign the country herself. During a short period, probably near the beginning of her reign, she used the female variant “Ankhetkheperure.” The epithets were used to show the affection between Akhenaten and his wife and to confirm the legitimacy of her position. The epithet Ꜣḫ.t n hy=s “who is effective for her husband,” clearly confirms the femininity of “King” Neferneferuaten....Titles such as ḥm.t nsw.t (wr.t) and mw.t-nsw.t continue to be used by queens after the accession of another king, so Meritaten kept the title she gained while being married to Semenkhkare. This implies that the only female person to whom the epithet may apply is in fact Nefertiti, who was the actual wife of Akhenaten. During her sole reign, Nefertiti also used other epithets. She replaced the name of her former husband with references to Aten and Akhetaten in her prenomen and she added the title “ḥḳꜢ ” in her nomen.

Nozomu Kawai observes:

The numerous objects of Neferneferuaten in Tutankhamun's tomb are difficult to understand. Since Neferneferuaten was the direct predecessor of Tutankhamun, the latter should have been responsible for the former's burial. Reeves and van der Perre suggested that Neferneferuaten was originally buried at Amarna and later moved to Thebes by Tutankhamun and the new tomb might have been too small for all her funerary equipment and thus, the remaining objects were modified for Tutankhamun. However, I would rather propose that Tutankhamun did not give Neferneferuaten credit as his predecessor and did not bury her properly as king....Instead, the remaining unused funerary equipment prepared for her burial was eventually appropriated for Tutankhamun’s [own] burial.

This archaeological evidence rather suggests this revised Eighteenth Dynasty chronology table below is closer to the truth since it agrees with the historical facts.

King	Approx years
Akhenaten	17 years
Ankhkheperure Smenkhkare (coregent)	2 years
Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten	2 years
Tutankhaten/Tutankhamun	9 years
Ay	4 years
Horemheb	14 years

Regardless of the order, Neferneferuaten's successor seems to have denied her a king's burial based on items originally inscribed with her name, but used for the burial of Tutankhamun. In the reign of Horemheb, the reigns of the Amarna Period kings from Akhenaten to Ay were expunged from history as these kings' total regnal years were assigned to Horemheb. The result is that 3,300 years later, scholars would have to piece together events and even resurrect the players bit by bit with the evidence sometimes limited to palimpsest.

Manetho's Aegyptiaca

Manetho was an Egyptian priest of the third century BC, in the early years of the Hellenistic period, a thousand years after the Amarna Period. His lost literary work Aegyptiaca (History of Egypt), written in Greek and now known only in fragmentary form from later writers claiming to quote his work, is the sole ancient record available. Because of the deliberate suppression of histories of the Amarna succession by rulers that followed, Manetho's Amarna Period sources were incomplete at best.

Manetho's Epitome, a later epitome (summary) of his work,describes the late Eighteenth Dynasty succession as Orus or "Amenophis for 30 years 10 months." After Orus, who is most likely Amenhotep III, comes "his daughter Acencheres for 12 years 1 month then her brother Rathotis for 9 years". According to Marc Gabolde, Acencheres is Ankhkheperure with a transcription error converting 2 years, 1 month into the 12 years, 1 month reported (Africanus and Eusebius cite 32 and 16 years for this person). Akhenaten is not even mentioned in the most accurate 18th dynasty regnal list of the epitome of Aegyptiaca compiled by Josephus in Contra Apionem. Most agree that Rathotis refers to Tutankhamun; therefore, the succession order also supports Acencheres as Ankhkheperure. Manetho states that Rathotis is followed by "his son Acencheres for 12 years 5 months, his son Acencheres II for 12 years 3 months", which demonstrates the limits to which Manetho may be relied upon for accuracy about the Amarna Period.

Key evidence

Inscription from the Carter 001k artifact, a box from Tutankhamun's tomb naming Neferneferuaten's cartouche in the middle column.

Unlike Smenkhkare, there are no known named depictions of Neferneferuaten; she is only securely attested in inscriptions. Of particular interest is the lid of a box (Carter 001k) inscribed with the following:

King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Living in Truth, Lord of the Two Lands, Neferkheperure-Waenre

Son of Re, Living in Truth, Lord of Crowns, Akhenaten, Great in his duration
King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Lord of the Two Lands, Ankhkheperure Mery-Neferkheperre
Son of Re, Lord of Crowns, Neferneferuaten Mery-Waenre

Great Royal Spouse, Meritaten, May she Live Forever

The most definitive inscription attesting to Neferneferuaten is a long hieratic inscription or graffito in the tomb of Pairi (TT139) written by a scribe named Pawah:

Regnal year 3, third month of Inundation, day 10. The King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Lord of the Two Lands Ankhkheperure Beloved of Aten, the Son of Re Neferneferuaten Beloved of Waenre. Giving worship to Amun, kissing the ground to Wenennefer by the lay priest, scribe of the divine offerings of Amun in the Mansion [temple] of Ankhkheperure in Thebes, Pawah, born to Yotefseneb. He says:
"My wish is to see you, O lord of persea trees! May your throat take the north wind, that you may give satiety without eating and drunkenness without drinking. My wish is to look at you, that my heart might rejoice, O Amun, protector of the poor man: you are the father of the one who has no mother and the husband of the widow. Pleasant is the utterance of your name: it is like the taste of life... [etc.]
"Come back to us, O lord of continuity. You were here before anything had come into being, and you will be here when they are gone. As you caused me to see the darkness that is yours to give, make light for me so that I can see you...
"O Amun, O great lord who can be found by seeking him, may you drive off fear! Set rejoicing in people's heart(s). Joyful is the one who sees you, O Amun: he is in festival every day!"
For the Ka of the lay priest and scribe of the temple of Amun in the Mansion of Ankhkheperure, Pawah, born to Yotefseneb: "For your Ka! Spend a nice day amongst your townsmen." His brother, the outline draftsman Batchay of the Mansion of Ankhkheperure.

Nicholas Reeves sees this graffito as a sign of a "new phase" of the Amarna revolution, with Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten "taking a decidedly softer line" toward the Amun priesthood. Therefore, Neferneferuaten might have been the Amarna-era ruler who first reached an accommodation with the Amun priests and reinstated the cult of Amun—rather than Tutankhamun as previously thought—since her own mortuary temple was located in Thebes, the religious capital of the Amun priesthood and Amun priests were now working within it. However, Egypt's political administration was still situated at Amarna rather than Thebes under Neferneferuaten's reign.

Two crowned kings are depicted on Berlin Stele 17813, a female king (left) is caressing Akhenaten, Ägyptisches Museum und Papyrussammlung, Neues Museum, Berlin

There are several stele depicting two kings—with each wearing a different traditional king's crown—in various familiar, almost intimate scenes. All of them are unfinished or uninscribed and some are defaced. These include:

• An unfinished stele (#17813, Berlin) depicts two royal figures in a familiar, if not intimate, pose. One figure wears the double crown, while the other wears a headpiece which is similar to that from the familiar Nefertiti bust, but is the Khepresh or "blue crown" worn by a king. Aidan Dodson cites this stele to support the idea that Nefertiti may have acted as coregent, as indicated by the crown, but not entitled to full pharaonic honors such as the double cartouche.

A female king (right), usually identified as Nefertiti, wearing the blue crown, while affectionately pouring water for Akhenaten, Ägyptisches Museum und Papyrussammlung, Altes Museum, Berlin

• Berlin 25574 depicts what clearly seems to be Akhenaten and Nefertiti wearing her flat top headpiece. They are accompanied by four empty cartouches—enough for two kings, one of which seems to have been squeezed in. Reeves sees this as an important item in the case for Nefertiti. When the stele was started, she was great royal wife and thus portrayed with the flat top headpiece. She was elevated to coregent shortly afterward and a fourth cartouche was squeezed in to accommodate two kings.
• Flinders Petrie discovered seven limestone fragments of a private stele in 1891, now in the Petrie Museum, U.C.410 sometimes called the Coregency Stela. One side bears the double cartouche of Akhenaten alongside that of Ankhkheperure mery-Waenre Neferneferuaten Akhet-en-hyes ("effective for her husband"), which had been carved over the single cartouche of Nefertiti.

The clues may point to a female coregent, but the unique situation of succeeding kings using identical throne names may have resulted in a great deal of confusion.

A number of items in Tutankhamun's tomb (KV62) were originally inscribed for Neferneferuaten. Among them Carter 261p(1), a stunning gold pectoral depicting the goddess Nut. Other items include the stone sarcophagus, mummy wrappings, royal figurines; canopic items (chest, coffinettes, and jar stoppers), various bracelets and even shabti figures. Some items are believed to have been at least originally intended for a woman based on the style even when a name cannot be restored. Egyptologist Nicholas Reeves has suggested that even the famous gold mask may have originally been intended for Neferneferuaten since her royal name in a cartouche, Ankhkheperure, was found partly erased, on Tutankhamun's funerary mask.

Female king

The prenomen (left column) and nomen (right column) forms for Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten

For some time the accepted interpretation of the evidence was that Smenkhkare served as coregent with Akhenaten beginning about year 15 using the throne name Ankhkheperure. At some point, perhaps to start his sole reign, he changed his name to Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten. An alternative view held that Nefertiti was King Neferneferuaten; in some versions she is also masquerading as a male using the name Smenkhkare.

Things remained in this state of interpretation until the early 1970s when English Egyptologist John Harris noted in a series of papers the existence of versions of the first cartouche that seemed to include feminine indicators. These were linked with a few items including a statuette found in Tutankhamun's tomb depicting a king whose appearance was particularly feminine, even for Amarna art that seems to favor androgyny.

In 1988, James P. Allen proposed that it was possible to separate Smenkhkare from Neferneferuaten. He pointed out the name 'Ankhkheperure' was rendered differently depending on whether it was associated with Smenkhkare or Neferneferuaten. When coupled with Neferneferuaten, the prenomen included an epithet referring to Akhenaten (such as 'desired of Wa en Re'). There were no occasions where the 'long' version of the prenomen (Ankhkheperure plus epithet) occurred alongside the nomen 'Smenkhkare', nor was the 'short' prenomen (without epithet) ever found associated with the nomen 'Neferneferuaten'. Additionally, a feminine 't' glyph is often present in the prenomen, nomen, or epithets. Later, the French Egyptologist Marc Gabolde noted that several items from the tomb of Tutankhamun, originally inscribed for Neferneferuaten and initially thought to read "...desired of Akhenaten", when translated correctly, were inscribed as Akhet-en-hyes or "effective for her husband". His reading was later confirmed by James Allen.

The use of epithets (or lack of them) to identify the king referenced in an inscription eventually became widely accepted among scholars and regularly cited in their work although a case for exempting a particular inscription or instance will occasionally be argued to support a larger hypothesis.

Possible sole reign

Allen later showed that Neferneferuaten's epithets were of three types or sets. They were usually in the form of "desired of ...", but were occasionally replaced by "effective for her husband". In a few cases, the names can be followed by 'justified' using feminine attributes. The term 'justified' (maet kheru) is a common indicator that the person referenced is dead; a similar reference associated with Hatshepsut in the tomb of Penyati is taken to indicate she had recently died. Finally, a few of Neferneferuaten's cartouches bear unique epithets not associated with Akhenaten at all. These include "desired of the Aten" and "The Ruler". Allen concluded that the strong affiliation with Akhenaten in the epithets and the number of them made it likely that Neferneferuaten had been his coregent and therefore, preceded Smenkhkare. The "effective..." epithets, then represent a period during which Akhenaten was incapacitated, but may also date from a time after Akhenaten's death. Finally, the less common 'Akhenaten-less' versions represented a period of sole reign for Neferneferuaten.

Allen offers a possible explanation for the use of the same throne name by two successive kings. He suggested that the almost constant references to Akhenaten may be proclamations of legitimacy on the part of Neferneferuaten, with the epithets functioning to assert her as Akhenaten's chosen successor or coregent. This implies there may have been resistance to the choice of Neferneferuaten, resistance was anticipated. This appears to be supported by her funerary items being usurped to deny her a king's burial. He suggests that adoption of the throne name Ankhkheperure by Smenkhkare was "to emphasize the legitimacy of Smenkh-ka-re's claim against that of Akhenaton's "chosen" (/mr/) coregent". That is, a division in the royal house put Smenkhkare on the throne as a rival king to Neferneferuaten. This was offered as a simple and logical reading of the evidence to explain the nature of the epithets, the use of identical prenomens by successive kings and that she was denied a royal burial. However, with no dated evidence of rival or contemporaneous kings it remains conjecture.

However, since Smenkhkare disappears from the political scene late in Akhenaten's reign and Neferneferuaten instead appears, the most likely explanation is that Smenkhkare—who is attested in an unfinished durbar scene from the Tomb of Meryre II (TA2) at Amarna dated to Year 12 of Akhenaten—must have died perhaps 1 or 2 years after since this relief scene was never finished by the craftsman. Athena Van der Perre observes that:

After the death of Semenkhkare, the royal family had to face the problem of succession again. Akhenaten was left with two royal wives (Nefertiti and Meritaten) and one possible future successor, who was still too young to reign (Tutankhaten [ie. Tutankhamun]). At some point after Semenkhkare's disappearance, Akhenaten must have decided that there was only one person capable of reigning and tutoring Tutankhaten after his death. The new regent would use the name Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten. The reign of "king" Neferneferuaten is actually better documented than that of Semenkhkare. Several attestations were found, revealing some interesting facts about this king's reign. The name is attested in Amarna, Thebes and Tell el-Borg. Mud jar sealings referring to the "(wine of the) estate of Neferneferuaten, beloved of Waenra," were also discovered in Saqqara. Nefertiti, who already played an important role in Amarna, and already bore the name Neferneferuaten, is in my view the most likely candidate for this function....After her husband's death, Nefertiti would reign the country herself.

The Egyptologists, Rolf Krauss, Athena Van Der Perre and Nozomu Kawai both assign the female king Neferneferuaten an independent reign of between 2 and 3 years between Akhenaten and Tutankhamun.

Athena Van Der Perre writes:

The attestations of the name confirm the reign of Neferneferuaten, which, if this was Nefertiti, could not have started until after the 1st month of the 16th year of Akhenaten, as has been shown in the quarry inscription at Deir Abū Ḥinnis. So far, no evidence has been found about the queen's demise. The most likely possibility is that she died after reigning at least 3 years. After her death, Tutankhaten―now a boy approximately 8 years old―would start his own reign. With no queen-mother left to guide him, the actual power came into the hands of a small group of high officials at the court.

Identity of Neferneferuaten

By the late twentieth century, there was "'a fair degree of consensus'" that Neferneferuaten was a female king and Smenkhkare a separate male king, particularly among specialists of the period. Many Egyptologists believe she also served as coregent on the basis of the stela and epithets, although a sole reign seems very likely, given that the Pairi inscription is dated using her regnal years. Opinion is more divided on the placement and nature of the reign of Smenkhkare in relation to her.

Most Egyptologists see the two names to indicate two separate individuals and consider this as the simplest and more likely view. Most name changes in the Amarna period involved people incorporating -Aten into their name or removing an increasingly offensive -Amun element.

The focus now shifts to the identity of Neferneferuaten, with each candidate having its own advocate(s), a debate that may never be settled to the satisfaction of all. Akhenaten is known to have died in his 17th year from wine docket evidence found at Amarna.

Nefertiti

Nefertiti depicted in familiar scene of a king smiting Egypt's enemy

Even among Egyptologists who advocate for the identification of Nefertiti as Neferneferuaten, the exact nature of her reign can vary. Nefertiti was an early candidate for King Neferneferuaten, first proposed in 1973 by J. R. Harris. The apparent use of a portion of her name made her an obvious candidate even before Neferneferuaten's gender was firmly established. Remains of painted plaster bearing the kingly names of Neferneferuaten found in the Northern Palace, long believed to be the residence of Nefertiti, supports the association of Nefertiti as the king. Nefertiti was in the forefront during her husband's reign and even depicted engaging in kingly activities such as smiting the enemies of Egypt. The core premise is that her prominence and power in the Amarna Period was almost unprecedented for a great royal wife, which makes her the most likely and most able female to succeed Akhenaten.

More importantly, Nefertiti is known to have held the title of "Neferneferuaten" meaning either (Beautiful is the beauty of Aten) nfr-nfrw-jtn during Akhenaten's reign when she was his Great Queen or "The Beautiful One has Come." Until 2012, Nefertiti's last dated depiction was from Year 12 of Akhenaten's reign, which suggested that she had died shortly after. However, she is now known to have still been alive in the second to last year of Akhenaten's reign and still bearing the title of Great Royal Wife, based on an ink inscription dated explicitly to 'Year 16 III Akhet day 15' [of Akhenaten] in a limestone quarry at Dayr Abū Ḥinnis. This inscription would argue against a coregency of more than about a year, if at all, as the inscription attests to Nefertiti's position still as Akhenaten's great royal wife—and not a pharaoh with a royal title—just before the start of Akhenaten's final year.

This affects theories proposed by some Egyptologists, such as Aidan Dodson, who see Neferneferuaten as both a coregent of Akhenaten, a sole ruler, and regent or coregent of Tutankhamun. Despite her highest attested year being Year 3, he suggests she counted her regnal years only after Akhenaten's death, a view put forth by Murnane to account for the lack of double dates in the New Kingdom, even when a coregency is known to exist. Dodson then speculates that she may later have shared Tutankhamun's regnal dating, in effect deferring senior status at least nominally to him. He proposes that Neferneferuaten helped guide the reformation in the early years of Tutankhaten and conjectures that the return to the dominence of the Amun priesthood is the result of her 'rapid adjustment to political reality'. To support the Nefertiti-Tutankhamun coregency, he cites jar handles bearing her cartouche and others bearing those of Tutankhaten from Northern Sinai. This is not a view shared by the excavators, who note that sealings and small objects such as bezel rings from many Eighteenth Dynasty royals including Akhenaten, Ay, Queen Tiye, and Horemheb were found, and that "linking Tutankhamun and Neferneferuaten politically, based on the discovery of their names on amphorae at Tell el-Borg, is unwarranted." Gabolde likewise considered a coregency or regency unlikely.

Van der Perre considers it likely Nefertiti assumed the royal office using the name Neferneferuaten, adopting the throne name briefly used by Smenkhkare in combination with her own name, but that the chance of a co-regency period is slim. References to Akhenaten that were added to her names as epithets, confirm her legitimacy. The epithets changed over time: initially conferring legitimacy, then linking to the deified deceased king, before finally changing to 'Beloved of Aten' and 'the ruler' late in her reign. Furthermore, it has been suggested that Smenkhkare may also be Neferneferuaten, a view still held by a few such as Nicholas Reeves and until 2004 by Dodson. Aidan Dodson, since 2014, now agrees that the female pharaoh Nefereruaten was Nefertiti himself and has written so as such in his 2020 book titled "Nefertiti: Queen and Pharaoh of Egypt."

The Coregency Stela (UC 410), mentioned earlier, might resolve the question if it were not so badly damaged. The name Neferneferuaten replaced Nefertiti's name on it. How the image of Nefertiti was changed to match the new inscription could settle matters if her image was not missing. If her entire image was replaced it would mean Nefertiti was replaced by someone else called King Neferneferuaten and perhaps that she died. If just a new crown was added to her image, it would argue quite strongly that Nefertiti adopted a new name and title. As it is, the scene seems to be another of the royal family including at least Meritaten. Replacing the name Nefertiti with the name King Neferneferuaten in a depiction of the royal family, still seems to favor Nefertiti as the new king.

The primary argument against Nefertiti had been that she likely died sometime after Year 12, which was the last known dated depiction of her until 2012. However, an inscription discovered in 2012 showed that she was still alive in Year 16 of her husband's reign. Evidence put forward to suggest she predeceased Akhenaten includes pieces of an ushabti indicating her title at death was Great Royal Wife; wine dockets from her estate declining and ceasing after Year 13; Meritaten's title as Great Royal Wife alongside Akhenaten's name on items from Tutankhamun's tomb indicating she likely replaced Nefertiti in that role; the floor of the tomb intended for her shows signs of cuts being started for the final placement of her sarcophagus. A single ushabti for Nefertiti seems scant evidence for her death, given there are about 200 shabti for Akhenaten. It is possible the two pieces belonged instead to two separate shabtis, one of Nefertiti and the other of Meritaten. Alternately, it may have been a votive placed in the burial of a family member such as Meketaten, at a time before she was elevated.

Meritaten

Meritaten as a candidate for the identity of Neferneferuaten seems to be the most fluid, taking many forms depending on the views of the Egyptologist. She had been put forth by Rolf Krauss in 1973 to explain the feminine traces in the prenomen and epithets of Ankhkheperure and to conform to Manetho's description of a Akenkheres as a daughter of Oros. He speculated Meritaten might have ruled with the feminine prenomen 'Ankh-et-kheperure' after Akhenaten's death and before Smenkhkare's accession. In his argument, Smenkhkare then takes the masculine form of her prenomen upon gaining the throne through marriage. Although few Egyptologists endorsed the whole hypothesis, many did accept Meritaten at times as the probable or possible candidate for a female Ankhkheperure ruling for a time after Smenkhkare's death and perhaps, as regent to Tutankhaten.

The primary argument against Meritaten, either as Krauss's pro tempore Ankh-et-kheperure before marriage to Smenkhkare or as Akhenaten's coregent King Neferneferuaten, is that she is well attested as wife and great royal wife to Smenkhkare. For her to have later ruled as king means necessarily, and perhaps incredibly for her subjects, that she stepped down from King to the role of King's Wife. This view places Smenkhkare after Neferneferuaten, which requires the Meryre depiction to be drawn 5–6 years after the 'Durbar' depiction it is alongside, and several years after work on tombs had stopped.

The counter to this argument comes from Marc Gabolde, who offers political necessity as the reason for Meritaten's demotion. He sees the inscribed box (Carter 001k tomb naming her alongside Akhenaten and Neferneferuaten) as depicting Meritaten in simultaneous roles using the name Neferneferuaten as coregent and using her birth name in the role of royal wife to Akhenaten. He has also proposed that the Meryre drawing was executed in advance of an anticipated coronation that ended up not taking place due to his death. Most recently, Gabolde has proposed that Meritaten was raised to coregent of Akhenaten during the final years of his reign and that she succeeds him as interregnum regent using the name Ankhkheperure. He also identifies her as the subject of the Dakhamunzu affair, with the Hittite prince Zannanza ascending the throne as Smenkhkare. As there is no evidence as to when or where he died nor that he was murdered, Gabolde believes that he completed the trip and died only after becoming king. The proposal continues that, after his death, she adopts full pharoanic prerogatives to continue to rule as King Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten. Since Tutankamun was alive and of royal lineage, Gabolde argues that Meritaten's actions almost certainly must be taken as intending to prevent his ascension to king. The Smenkhkare-Zannanza version garners little support among Egyptologists. With the presence of Tutankhamun, Miller points out Meritaten "would presumably have needed the backing of some powerful supporter(s) to carry out such a scheme as the tahamunzu episode, one is left with the question of why this supporter would have chosen to throw his weight behind such a daring scheme".

Since Nefertiti has been confirmed to be living as late as Year 16 of Akhenaten's reign however, the Meritaten theory becomes less likely because she would no longer be the most senior living person to be at court using either the name Neferneferuaten nor be identified as "Effective for her husband" as the epithet of a ruling female pharaoh. Secondly, both Aidan Dodson and the late Bill Murnane have stressed their opinions that the female ruler Neferneferuaten and Meritaten cannot be the same person. As Dodson writes:

...the next issue is clearly her [i.e., Neferneferuaten's] origins. Cases have been made for her being the former Nefertiti (Harris, Samson and others), Meryetaten (Krauss 1978; Gabolde 1998) and most recently Neferneferuaten-tasherit, [the] fourth daughter of Akheneten (Allen 2006). Of these, Meryetaten's candidature seems fatally undermined by the existence of the KV62 box fragment JE61500, which gives the names and titles of Akhenaten, Neferneferuaten and Meryetaten as clearly separate individuals.

Neferneferuaten-tasherit

In 2009, James P. Allen proposed a new reading of events, suggesting that Neferneferuaten was Akhenaten and Nefertiti's fourth daughter, Neferneferuaten-tasherit. Tasherit meaning the lesser. The evidence presented in favour of this identification was solely based on her name.

The primary element in the nomen of a pharaoh always corresponds to the name he (or she) bore before coming to the throne; from the Eighteenth Dynasty onward, epithets were usually added to this name in the pharaoh's cartouche, but Akhenaten provides the only example of a complete and consistent change of the nomen's primary element, and even he used his birth name, Amenhotep, at his accession. The evidence of this tradition argues that the coregent bore the name Neferneferuaten before her coronation, and since it now seems clear that the coregent was not Nefertiti, she must have been the only other woman known by that name: Akhenaten's fourth daughter, Neferneferuaten Jr.

Allen explains the 'tasherit' portion of her name may have been dropped, either because it would be unseemly to have a King using 'the lesser' in their name, or it may have already been dropped when Nefertiti died. This theory is the only one that does not rely on someone changing their name in some awkward fashion to assume the role of Neferneferuaten. Akhenaten's choice of her as coregent remains a mystery. She is a less attractive candidate now that the Year 16 graffito for Nefertiti has been verified.

Neferneferuaten-tasherit's age is the first objection often raised to this argument. She is thought to have been about ten at the time of Akhenaten's death, but Allen suggests that some daughters may have been older than generally calculated based on their first depicted appearance. Their first appearance may have been on the occasion of being weaned, at age three; Neferneferuaten-tasherit may have been as old as 13 by the end of Akhenaten's reign. The later use of the "effective..." epithets may indicate that she too, was eventually old enough to act as wife to her father, supporting the older age. However, a younger age need not disqualify her, since Tutankhaten ascended the throne at a similar age, but yet a ten-year-old female seems unlikely to many researchers.

• However, in a newer 2016 article in Göttinger Miszellen, James P. Allen has now rejected his previous opinion that Neferneferuaten-tasherit was the female pharaoh Neferneferuaten that he had suggested in a 2009 article in memory of the late William J. Murnane; Allen now agrees that this female king was indeed Nefertiti herself with the publication of the Year 16 date showing that Nefertiti was still alive in Akhenaten's second last year of rule. James P. Allen wrote below in his 2016 paper:

The evidence indicates Smenkhkare ruled only about a year at most....Smenkhkare's premature death probably no later than Akhenaten's Regnal Year 14 left only the one-to-four year old heir Tutankhuaten as putative heir....Tutankhamun must have been considered too young to be named coregent in his father's stead....To safeguard Tutankhamun's accession, Akhenaten also appointed a female coregent Ankheperure Neferneferuaten, to oversee the transition and probably to instruct him in the new religion. In 2009, I argued that this coregent was Akhenaten's fourth daughter, Neferneferuaten, both because it seemed a logical progression in his attempts to produce a son within each of his daughters as they reached puberty, and because evidence was lacking that the other Neferneferuaten, Nefertiti, was still alive in Akhenaten's final years. The Year 16 inscription noted [for the existence of Akhenaten's wife] at the beginning of this article solves the latter problem, and I (and my students) now think it likeliest that the coregent was in fact, Nefertiti. The arguments for this are more compelling than they are for the daughter...Since Nefertiti was still chief queen in Regnal Year 16 [of Akhenaten], her Year 3 as pharaoh must have occured [sic?] two years after Akhenaten's death, and it was within those two years that the first steps towards reconciliation with Amun occurred. While little is known about the daughter other than her existence, Nefertiti had assumed pharaonic roles and prerogatives throughout Akhenaten’s reign, and the occasional epithet in her nomen Akhet-en-hyes “Beneficial for her husband,” both reflects a relationship that had already existed and mirrors Akhenaten's own nomen [Akh-en-Iten or 'The one who is beneficial to the Aten'], which described his relationship not only with his god but also with his predecessor, the Tjehen-Aten “dazzling Aten,” Amenhotep III. Moreover, if as now seems probable, the appointment of a female coregent was intended not to ensure her own succession but that of the young Tutankhuaten, then it is far more likely that Akhenaten would have turned to the older more experienced woman who had served as his virtual co-ruler than to a young daughter who had just reached puberty barely three to six years older than the heir she was intended to safeguard.

Reuse of Neferneferuaten's funerary equipment for Tutankhamun's burial

The faces of the canopic jars of Tutankhamun have distinctively female features; the holes in the ears are fully pierced--a feature which identifes the original owner as an adult female since post-pubescent male pharaohs did not wear earrings.

According to Nicholas Reeves, almost 80% of Tutankhamun's burial equipment from KV62 was derived from Neferneferuaten's original funerary goods, including the famous gold mask, middle coffin, canopic coffinettes, several of the gilded shrine panels, the shabti-figures, the boxes and chests, the royal jewelry, etc., and adapted for use after his unexpected early death. In 2015, Reeves published evidence showing that an earlier cartouche on Tutankhamun's famous gold mask reads, "Ankheperure mery-Neferkheperure" or (Ankheperure beloved of Akhenaten); therefore, the mask originally was made for Nefertiti, Akhenaten's great royal wife, who used the royal name Ankheperure when she assumed the throne after her husband's death.

This development implies that either Neferneferuaten was deposed in a struggle for power, possibly deprived of a royal burial as a king by Tutankhamun's officials, or that she died a natural death but was not buried with her own funerary equipment—by Tutankhamun's officials when Tutankhamun succeeded her as king since Tutankhamun was the officially recognised heir to the throne but Neferneferuaten (ie. Nefertiti) refused to step aside due to the Boy King's relative youth. As Nozomu Kawai concludes:

The fact that a number of objects found in Tutankhamun's tomb had been made for the burial of Neferneferuaten, adapted and reinscribed for Tutankhamun's use, implies that Tutankhaten and his entourage did not want to recognize the preceding reign. Neferneferuaten had assumed sole reign despite the fact that Tutankhaten, the crown prince, was the legitimate successor. Instead of giving up her kingship to a young boy, Neferneferuaten may have wished to continue her sole rule not only because she was already reigning, but also because Tutankhaten was just a boy between five and 10 years old. Although Neferneferuaten began restoring the cults of Amun and other deities she also simultaneously maintained the cult of Aten at Amarna, resulting in a dissatisfied faction of [royal] officials [such as Ay and Horemheb] and priests who advocated a quick return to orthodoxy. When Neferneferuaten’s reign ended, probably after about three years, Tutankhaten and Akhenaten’s third daughter Ankhesenpaaten were the only surviving members of the Amarna royal family.

Upon his accession as pharaoh, Tutankhamun likely immediately abandoned Amarna as Egypt's political capital—unlike Neferneferuaten—for Memphis since "he did not leave any royal monument there. Tutankhaten worshipped Amun and other traditional deities since the movement back towards orthodoxy had already been initiated under Neferneferuaten, while continuing to worship Aten – at the beginning of his reign at least – as indicated by a depiction of the Aten god on Tutankhamun’s golden throne."

Summary

There is little that can be said with certainty about the life and reign of Ankhkheperure Neferneferuaten. Whether she reigned before or after Smenkhkare depends on the underlying theory as to her identity. Most Egyptologists accept that she was a woman, and likely an individual separate from the male king Smenkhkare. Many specialists in the period believe the epigraphic evidence strongly indicates that she acted for a time as Akhenaten's coregent. Since Nefertiti already held the title of "Neferneferuaten" during Akhenaten's reign, it is quite reasonable to identify her as the female pharaoh named Neferneferuaten who succeeded Akhenaten on the throne after the latter died and was later succeeded, in turn, by Akhenaten's son, Tutankhamun.

Based on the Pairi or Pawah inscription dated to her third regnal year, it appears she enjoyed a sole reign. How much of her reign was as coregent and how much as sole ruler, is a matter of debate and speculation. The same tomb inscription mentions an Amun temple in Thebes, perhaps a mortuary complex, which would seem to indicate that the Amun proscription had abated and the traditional religion was being restored toward the end of her reign. Since much of her funeral equipment was used in Tutankhamen's burial, it seems fairly certain she was denied a pharaonic burial by her successor. The reasons for this remain speculation, as does a regency with Tutankhaten.

With so much evidence expunged, first by Neferneferuaten's successor, then the entire Amarna Period by Horemheb, and later in earnest by the kings of the Nineteenth Dynasty, the exact details of events may never be known. The highly equivocal nature of the evidence often renders it suggestive of some interpretation, while falling short of proving it.

Cultural depictions

Neferneferuaten's identity and legacy is a key part of the archaeological topics in Jacqueline Benson's 2024 historical fantasy novel, Tomb of the Sun King.

Online presentation regarding Neferneferuaten

• KS2 Understanding the Reigns of Tutankhamun and his predecessors from the objects in the Tomb of Tutankhamun Youtube presentation by Nozomu Kawai (Kanazawa University) at the Centro de História da Universidade de Lisboa in 2023 (see 09:00 to 44:00)

Further reading

Each of the leading candidates have their own proponents among Egyptologists, whose work can be consulted for more information and many more details for a given candidate. Several of the works of Nicholas Reeves and Aidan Dodson advocate for Nefertiti as Neferneferuaten. Marc Gabolde has written several papers and at least one book (in French) supporting Meritaten. James Allen's previous work in this area primarily dealt with establishing the female gender of Neferneferuaten and then as an individual apart from Smenkhkare. His paper on "The Amarna Succession" is his first theory as to identity of King Neferneferuaten, having previously cited Nefertiti or Meritaten as the probable or possible identity depending on the state of the evidence. However, in a final 2016 paper, James Allen concluded with the discovery that Nefertiti was alive in Akhenaten's Year 16, the female ruler Neferneferuaten must likely be queen Nefertiti herself.

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• Allen, James P. (2006). "The Amarna Succession" (PDF). Archived from the original on 1 July 2013. Retrieved 23 June 2008.
• Allen, James P. “The Amarna Succession Revised,” GM 249 (2016), pp. 9–13
• Dodson, Aidan and Hilton, Dyan. The Complete Royal Families of Ancient Egypt. Thames & Hudson. 2004. ISBN 0-500-05128-3
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• Gabolde, Marc, Under a Deep Blue Starry Sky in "Causing His Name to Live: Studies in Egyptian Epigraphy and History in Memory of William J. Murnane"; Gabolde - Starry Sky
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• Kawai, Nozomu, "Neferneferuaten from the Tomb of Tutankhamun Revisited" in Wonderful Things Essays in Honor of Nicholas Reeves, Lockwood Press, (2023), pp. 109–121
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• Reeves, C. Nicholas., The Complete Tutankhamun: The King, the Tomb, the Royal Treasure. London: Thames & Hudson, 1 November 1990, ISBN 0-500-05058-9 (hardcover)/ISBN 0-500-27810-5 (paperback)
• Reeves, Nicholas (2014). "Tutankhamun's Mask Reconsidered". In A. Oppenheim; O. Goelet (eds.). The Art and Culture of Ancient Egypt. Studies in Honor of Dorothea Arnold.
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• Tyldesley, Joyce. Nefertiti: Egypt's Sun Queen. Penguin. 1998. ISBN 0-670-86998-8
• Van der Perre, Athena (2014). "The Year 16 Graffito of Akhenaten in Dayr Abu Hinnis. A Contribution to the Study of the Later Years of Nefertiti". Journal of Egyptian History. 7 (1): 94–102. Retrieved 22 November 2023.
• Female Pharaohs Part II by the American Research Center in Egypt September 2021,, pp. 1–3 (on Neferneferuaten)