Queens of the New Kingdom: Power, Politics, and Divine Status

The queens of the New Kingdom (c. 1550–1069 BCE) were, by ancient standards, extraordinarily powerful. They served as regents, military leaders, diplomats, and high priestesses. Some, most famously Hatshepsut, ruled as pharaohs in their own right. Others, Nefertiti, Tiye, Nefertari, exercised enormous influence over their husbands and the state. For a broader view of the era, see our guide to the New Kingdom of Egypt and our long-tail page on why the New Kingdom was a golden age.

The Egyptian title for the principal queen was ḥmt nsw wrt (Great Royal Wife), but the New Kingdom queens held a host of other titles, including the divine God’s Wife and the political King’s Mother. The most comprehensive single book on Egyptian women in English is still Gay Robins, Women in Ancient Egypt (1993), and the New Kingdom chapters are the heart of the book.

The Early Eighteenth Dynasty: Ahhotep and Ahmose-Nefertari

Queen Ahhotep

Ahhotep I was the wife of Seqenenre Tao and the mother of Ahmose I, the pharaoh who expelled the Hyksos and reunified Egypt. After her husband’s death (probably in battle against the Hyksos), she may have served as regent for her young son. A stela, sometimes called the Ahhotep Stela, calls her “the one who cares for Egypt” and credits her with looking after the military affairs of the country. The jewelry found in her tomb at Thebes is among the most spectacular Middle Kingdom to New Kingdom objects in the Egyptian Museum, and includes a magnificent gold pectoral that any visitor to the museum should make a point of seeing.

Queen Ahmose-Nefertari

Queen Ahmose-Nefertari was the daughter of Seqenenre and Ahhotep, the sister-wife of Ahmose I, and the mother of Amenhotep I. She may have served as regent for her young son, and after her son’s death, she was deified as a goddess and a patroness of the Theban necropolis. Her mortuary temple at Deir el-Medina, the village of the workers who built the royal tombs in the Valley of the Kings, became a center of her cult for centuries. Her deification, more than that of any other queen, set the pattern for the religious status of New Kingdom queens.

Hatshepsut: The Woman Who Became Pharaoh

The most famous queen of the New Kingdom is Hatshepsut. She was the daughter of Thutmose I and the wife of Thutmose II, her half-brother. When Thutmose II died around 1479 BCE, Hatshepsut became regent for her stepson and nephew Thutmose III, who was still a child. Within a few years, however, she had assumed the full titles of pharaoh and was ruling as a king in her own right.

Hatshepsut’s reign of about twenty years is one of the most successful in Egyptian history. She sponsored major building projects at Karnak, sent a famous trading expedition to the Land of Punt, and built a magnificent mortuary temple at Deir el-Bahari. To explore her reign in greater detail, see our guide to Hatshepsut and the long-tail page on a woman who became pharaoh.

After her death, Thutmose III attempted to erase her memory from the historical record. He chiseled out her name and image from monuments across Egypt. The erasure was so thorough that Hatshepsut’s reign was almost completely unknown until the late nineteenth century.

Nefertiti: The Great Royal Wife of Akhenaten

Queen Nefertiti is one of the most famous women of the ancient world. She was the chief wife of Akhenaten and is best known for her striking painted stucco-coated limestone bust, now in the Neues Museum in Berlin.

Nefertiti’s status during her husband’s reign was remarkable. She was depicted on temple walls at a scale usually reserved for the king. She accompanied her husband in religious scenes that were traditionally reserved for the pharaoh alone. She may have served as a co-regent during the later years of Akhenaten’s reign, a possibility supported by the discovery, in 2012, of a limestone bust that has been identified as a representation of Nefertiti in the regent’s traditional pharaonic headdress.

Nefertiti’s later life is a mystery. She disappears from the historical record around the twelfth year of Akhenaten’s reign, and her fate is unknown. Some scholars have suggested that she briefly ruled as pharaoh under the name Neferneferuaten; others believe she fell out of favor or died in the plague that struck the royal family.

Tiye: The Political Power Behind the Throne

Queen Tiye was the daughter of Yuya and Tjuyu, a powerful noble family from the Delta, and the chief wife of Amenhotep III. She is one of the most politically active queens in Egyptian history.

Tiye did not hold the formal title of regent, but she was clearly the most powerful figure in the country after her husband. Foreign kings sent letters directly to her, asking for her favor. The vassal princes of the Levant sent her gifts. She was depicted alongside her husband in monuments across Egypt, an unusual honor that emphasized her political role. The Amarna Letters refer to her as “the great royal wife, the lady of the Two Lands.” Tiye survived her husband and served as an adviser to her son Akhenaten during the early years of his reign.

Nefertari: The Favorite Wife of Ramesses II

Queen Nefertari was the chief wife of Ramesses II and one of the most famous queens in Egyptian history. She is best known for her tomb (the most beautiful and elaborate of the queens’ tombs in the Valley of the Queens) and for the small temple at Abu Simbel that Ramesses II built in her honor.

Nefertari was a woman of exceptional education and political influence. She may have served as a diplomat, and her correspondence with the Hittite queen Puduhepa, discovered in the Hittite capital of Hattusa, gives a rare picture of royal women in the ancient world communicating with each other. Her tomb, QV66 in the Valley of the Queens, is decorated with vivid paintings of the queen’s journey through the afterlife, and is considered one of the most beautiful tombs in all of Egypt. The condition of the paintings when they were first opened in 1904 was, by all accounts, jaw-dropping; subsequent visitors have done significant damage just by breathing on the plaster, and the tomb is now closed to general visitors.

The Religious Roles of the New Kingdom Queens

Beyond their political roles, the New Kingdom queens also held important religious offices. The most important of these was the title of God’s Wife of Amun, a priestly title that by the New Kingdom had become one of the most prestigious religious offices in the country. The office was held by a number of New Kingdom queens, including Ahmose-Nefertari, Tiye, and Nefertari. The queen who held this title was the earthly consort of the god Amun, and she performed important ritual duties in the temple of Karnak.

The cult of the deified queen was also important. After her death, Ahmose-Nefertari was worshipped as a goddess for centuries. To explore the broader religious framework, see our guides to Egyptian gods and goddesses and Egyptian mythology and beliefs.

The Queens and the Decline of the New Kingdom

The New Kingdom’s queens became less politically powerful in the late Twentieth Dynasty. The state was weakening, the economy was strained, and the high priests of Amun at Thebes were beginning to assert their independence. The last great queen of the New Kingdom was Twosret, the chief wife of Seti II and possibly the final ruler of the Nineteenth Dynasty. Twosret may have ruled Egypt as regent, or even as pharaoh, after her husband’s death. Her reign came to an end with the establishment of the Twentieth Dynasty by Setnakhte, and the role of the queen as a major political figure effectively ended with the close of the New Kingdom.

The Legacy

The New Kingdom queens left a permanent mark on Egyptian civilization. Their political power, their religious roles, and their visual presence on temple walls set a new standard for royal women that would influence Egyptian culture for centuries. Some of the most famous works of Egyptian art (the bust of Nefertiti, the temple of Nefertari at Abu Simbel, the mortuary temple of Hatshepsut at Deir el-Bahari) come from this period. The title of God’s Wife of Amun continued to be held by important royal women in later dynasties, including Nitocris of the Twenty-Sixth Dynasty. The cult of Isis, which had been a minor cult in the Old Kingdom, grew to become one of the most important religions of the Greco-Roman world.