The Double Crown: Secret Writings of the Female Pharaoh

by Marié Heese

  How presumptuous we were, I thought that terrifying night, to venture upon the fathomless deeps with such frail vessels and with so little knowledge of the vagaries of the gods who reigned over that vast world of water. By and large the gods of Khemet were far more predictable. Hapi could usually be counted upon to deliver the inundation year after year. One knew what to expect. The flood would bring the rich black earth and recede and planting would be done; the crops would germinate and ripen under the winter sun and when the time was right, the harvest would be brought in. It was comfortable and familiar. Out on the boundless ocean all was strange, and savage storms might at any moment descend to punish human audacity.

  And yet, survival in such circumstances brings greater satisfaction than one derives from comfortable routines at home. To go beyond the known, the familiar, the safe and predictable; to venture, to dare, to challenge unknown gods – ah, therein lies a delight that the homebound and the faint-hearted will never experience. I shall be forever grateful to Her Majesty that she afforded me the chance to learn this truth.

  Once we had lived through that first wild storm upon the open ocean I lost my fear. I had seen that our captain was a very capable seafarer and I became confident that we would reach our goal. And so, after a long and often wearying journey lasting many months, at last we did. One hot and humid day, we neared a widely curving bay edged with a broad sweep of white sand where the waves broke in curving lines of glittering foam. Further back a thick tangle of green foliage sheltered a village with curiously conical huts set high above the ground. Thin trickles of smoke ascended into the cloudless sky.

  “Sir, I believe we have reached Ta-Neter,” said the captain. According to the few reports that I had been able to find before we departed, left by the ancients who had made this voyage before us, it seemed that we had indeed. Ta-Neter: the fabled Land of Punt.

  Captain Aqhat suggested that at first only the lead ship, ours, should sail close enough to be sighted and that we should anchor well offshore, sending but a few small boats towards the beach. That way we could establish contact without their assuming that we were attacking them. I thought his plan well judged, and so we carried it out. I went ashore unarmed, carrying my staff of office, but escorted by eight armed soldiers. We were not a sufficiently large group to intimidate their king, who stood ready to greet us, accompanied by one wife, a daughter and two sons. He welcomed us in a friendly manner.

  The king was a slender man with a reddish skin, wearing a loincloth and rows of anklets on his left leg. His long, thin beard straggled to his chest. He did not look so very different from ourselves, but the queen of that wondrous land was truly remarkable to behold. Never had I seen a woman of such ample girth. So heavy was she that she found it difficult to walk about and was carried everywhere upon a small ass, which seemed hardly capable of carrying such a load, yet bore her valiantly. She wore what seemed to be a short, split kilt, a shirt without sleeves and a necklace made of a thong with large, colourful baubles strung on it. She had fine eyes that flashed with laughter, and a wide smile showing strong white teeth.

  The king was clearly very proud of her. We concluded that ample girth was considered beautiful, a strange idea for Egyptians, for our women are admired when they are slim and able to move with grace. However, one must expect that foreign lands will have foreign concepts and foreign customs.

  We had brought some samples of the items we wished to use to barter with and upon landing we spread them out on the sand and stood back, showing that we had come in peace. They chattered among themselves in their strange tongue. It would have been difficult to communicate, but by great good fortune it appeared that there were some among them who had a knowledge of the tongue used in my country of Nubia. Besides myself several of our soldiers are able to speak it, so we managed better than I had anticipated. Soon their king had found an interpreter and had indicated his willingness to trade.

  Thereafter, the other four ships hove into view and anchored offshore in deeper water. The soldiers who now arrived in larger numbers were made welcome also. The village where the Puntites live I judged most attractive. Their houses, with the oddly conical shapes we had noticed from the sea, are constructed from plaited palm fronds and set high off the ground on poles, so that they require a ladder to gain access to their homes. These structures are well suited to their climate, which is hot and sultry. The lush trees surrounding the houses provide cool shade. Chattering monkeys play in their branches, where we also noted many nesting birds. We saw ebony and incense trees as well as palms, and realised at once that we would be able to bring back the trees that Her Majesty desired to create an incense garden for the God at Djeser-Djeseru.

  The Puntites were delighted with the items we had brought: brightly coloured beads and bracelets, and some useful tools. Cordial relations were quickly established, and I gave orders that a tent be prepared in which we could receive the chiefs of this land, so that we might present them with bread, beer, wine, meat and fruits – all the good things of the land of Egypt, as was ordered by the Pharaoh, to whom all life, strength and health are wished. So a tent was raised in the harbour of Punt, on the shore of the sea, and there was a small outpost of the Black Land on a strange and distant coast.

  Captain Aqhat explained to me that it was necessary to await the reversal of the prevailing winds to carry us back to Egypt. So we spent several weeks travelling westwards overland, assisted by Puntite guides, to the interior of that wondrous land, to collect ebony and incense and to gather other treasures such as elephant tusks and panther skins, as well as a number of live animals, some more extraordinary than those told about in any ancient tale. From a number of villages on our route we collected tribute to their distant Pharaoh in the shape of sacks filled with precious metals. Several sturdy donkeys were required to transport the goods back to the shore. We would indeed have a rich haul to present to Her Majesty and to the god Amen.

  At long last, Captain Aqhat deemed the time for our departure to have come. We had been received with much graciousness, but I found that my longing for home was intense: for the warm lips of my wife, for the cooled wine and the dry air of the Black Land. I wondered whether my children would even know me. I had ventured far and I had experienced much, but now I yearned for comfortable familiarity. I was ready to go home.

  While the fleet was away, life in Thebes went on as usual. A year went by. Thutmose for once was living a quiet life. The spies I paid to keep an eye on him reported that he spent a great deal of time at his palace in Memphis. By that time he had expanded his harem. This is the prerogative of the Pharaoh, not common among Egyptian men, and it has always irked me that he assumes it as his right. But then he was crowned, after all, and besides, anything that keeps him busy is a benefit to me. Satioh, the Mitannian princess he wed at sixteen, remained his Chief Wife and favourite, the mother of several little girls, all of them black-haired and plump like their mother.

  Yes, it did indeed seem as if the young whelp had settled down.

  “Commander Thutmose devotes many hours a day to studying plants,” Ibana told me one day.

  “Plants? He likes to garden?”

  “He plans the gardens, but he does not dig or weed. For that he has slaves and workmen,” replied Ibana. “No, he studies plants, it seems, in order to understand their nature. And their properties. Medicinal uses, for example.”

  “Indeed?”

  “Yes. I am told he brews an infusion that takes away the headache very promptly.”

  I should ask for the recipe, I thought.

  “Also, he has redesigned the interior of the palace at Memphis altogether. It is much grander and yet at the same time more comfortable than it has ever been.”

  “A man of many parts,” I commented.

  “And he composes verses, which he reads to the Princess Satioh as they sit in the rose garden. He has imported many exquisite new roses from Syria.”

  “Verses,” I repeated, rather faintly. Could this be th
e chief warrior of Khemet, the scourge of lions, the destroyer of a hundred elephants?

  I was astounded. Furthermore he appeared to have reconsidered his attitude to me. He seemed to have decided that it would be fruitless to oppose me on almost every count as he had been doing until then. Instead, when called to Thebes to join in discussions in the audience chamber he only spoke on issues that he had clearly thought about carefully and made comments and suggestions that were so sensible that I often found myself in agreement with him.

  “He is attempting to impress you,” said Senenmut when I related all of this to him. “He is trying to behave like a Pharaoh instead of like a petulant child.”

  “What do you think he hopes to gain?” I asked.

  “More of a role in governing the country,” suggested Senenmut. “A greater measure of co-regency.”

  “I will not share the Double Throne,” I flared up. “There can be only one true Pharaoh.”

  Indeed, the situation was becoming extremely difficult. While there have been co-regencies before, this happened when an aging Pharaoh called upon his heir to stand by his side and learn the principles of good governance and the daily rituals, to be inducted into the mysteries of Osiris and so forth. Then when the elder died, the younger could take over the reins smoothly. But never to my knowledge had there been two co-equal Pharaohs; the concept did not make sense. I was not nearing my end and I would not, could not surrender the throne.

  “I cannot allow him to edge me out,” I stated angrily.

  “No, but you might allow him to play a more prominent role on some formal occasions, such as in processions and at feasts, without diminishing your authority,” suggested Senenmut reasonably. “It might keep him more content.”

  I sighed. “I suppose I should. Also, the Party of Legitimacy has been pressuring me to allow him to marry Meryetre. You know that he was betrothed to Neferure, may she live, but …” The nobles, no doubt encouraged by Thutmose, wanted to ensure that there would not be two separate contenders for the crown of the Two Lands when I passed into the Afterlife. They do not forget that my stepson is merely the child of a concubine.

  “It is probably inevitable,” said Senenmut, “and although I understand that you are loath to do it, I think you should. She has the pure blood royal and were she to marry any other man, he could lay claim to the throne when Your Majesty passes into the Afterlife. Then there could be civil war, for Thutmose would not accept it.”

  “Their argument exactly,” I said. “Very well. Let them break the jar together. Perhaps then Meryetre will be more content.”

  But she was not. I think it is not in her nature to be happy.

  “I should be the Chief Wife,” said Meryetre angrily, the night before they broke the jar. “I have the full blood royal of the Pharaohs. Satioh is only a foreign princess.”

  And if you did not have royal blood, I doubt you would even have been a minor wife of his, I thought to myself, but I refrained from saying so. Perhaps she may fall pregnant quickly, I thought; rumour has it that Thutmose knows very well how to pleasure a woman. If she has a son, perhaps it will make her feel better. I contemplated the idea of becoming a grandmother and I was not sure that I would care for it. A grandmother is by definition an old lady, went my thinking, and I did not yet feel old in the least. Well, perhaps that would not happen too soon.

  In the end Meryetre settled into life in the harem well enough. There are often tiffs among the women, of course, and sometimes outright battles, about precedence, about servants, about children squabbling – once, by the tears of Isis, about access to a new loom! I was often regaled with complaints when she came to visit – as I still am. But then, as now, I did not have much patience with her. My attention was concentrated on the return of the fleet. But from the time they left, two years were to pass before there was any news of them.

  Here endeth the seventeenth scroll.

  THE EIGHTEENTH SCROLL

  The reign of Hatshepsut year 13

  We were still waiting for the fleet to return when Meryetre informed me of her pregnancy. The child had been conceived on a most favourable night, she informed me smugly, and she was sure that she would bear a son. Beyond my expectation, I felt a leap of happiness within my heart when she told me the news. Perhaps, I thought, she would indeed bear the son that had been denied to me. And so it might yet come to pass that another great Pharaoh would be given to Egypt from my loins. So Meryetre waited for her child and I waited for my ships.

  There were times when I was convinced that the entire fleet had been lost at sea, that they would never return to the Black Land, all those strong, brave men who had dared to undertake that extraordinary journey for my sake and for the greater glory of the god Amen. I found it hard to look the wife of General Nehsi in the eye, for it might be that I had caused her to become a widow. But Senenmut never lost his faith.

  “Majesty, have patience,” he counselled me. “The mysterious country of Punt is far away and they will have had to wait for favourable winds. They will come home. Perhaps in the first months of Akhet, when the flood swells the river.”

  Month after month went by and there was no sign of the five great ships. My eyes grew tired of scanning the horizon to no avail. I gave gold to the priests to ensure regular prayers and incantations, begging the gods to protect the ships and bring them safely back. Yet when at last the first news came, I was caught unawares. I was conducting an interview with diplomats from Canaan in my Grand Audience Chamber when a herald arrived post-haste from the North, covered in dust, and demanded immediate audience as he brought momentous news.

  I was afraid that he would announce an insurrection on our borders, but I would not show the visitors any hesitancy. “Let him in,” I ordered, remaining outwardly calm.

  A slight youth strode up to the throne and prostrated himself.

  “Arise,” I said. “What news have you?”

  “Majesty, the ships have been sighted,” he told me. “The fleet has traversed the canal and sails upon the river!”

  “By the breath of Horus, that is wonderful news!” I exclaimed. “Our ships have returned from Punt,” I informed the assembled men. A murmur of amazement and admiration from the swarthy Canaanites greeted this announcement. “But tell me – are they all there? All safe? We did not lose any ships?”

  “Not a single one, Majesty,” he assured me. “All five are there. Low in the water, as if they bring much cargo. And the people who have seen them pass tell of many monkeys that scamper about and clamber on the rigging.”

  “We must arrange a suitable welcome,” I said. “You will be rewarded for your pains.”

  His tired face broke into a smile and he kissed the ground again.

  Of course they did not arrive that very day, as I would have wished; it still took several weeks for them to ride the rising flood towards Thebes. There was time enough for Senenmut to arrange a welcoming party of appropriate size and grandeur. As the days wore on I became ever more impatient and awaited the progress reports from the cities lining the river with great anticipation. At last the morning came when they would sail into harbour.

  I had decreed a public holiday and the crowds were out in full force, eating, drinking and making merry. Bands played on the quay. Brightly coloured flags flew in the brisk breeze and looped chains of flowers swayed along the way that the procession would take to the palace. I had a special throne erected for myself upon a platform on the wharf, so that I might see over the crowds. I was dressed as if for a festival, in a gilded kilt and a pleated robe with a gold sash, with jewels at my throat and on my wrists, and the double crown of Egypt proudly on my head. A temporary awning protected me from the brilliant sun, and I was flanked by my guards, a pair of tall Nubians.

  The water was running fast and green, but the wind blew from the north, and when the first ship rounded the bend in the river it was making good time with a full-bellied sail and the aid of the rowers. A ringing cheer went up and trumpets sounded a clarion
call of welcome. The beat of the rowers’ gong echoed the thump of my excited heart.

  The plan was that I would wait until all five ships had been safely moored and then I would welcome a deputation of the five captains and their first mates, led by General Nehsi. Thereafter we would proceed to the palace for a banquet while the unloading went on and the cargo was brought ashore and transported to the palace.

  When Nehsi strode onto the quay I almost did not recognise him. He had grown lean and his hair and beard were bushy. But I knew him by his brilliant smile. Directly behind him walked a person who had to be from Punt: a sinewy fellow who had a magnificent beast on a leash and a whip in his other hand. Behind them came the captains and their mates with the rolling gait so typical of sailors. Then followed some soldiers, each bearing a gift: items made of gold, silver, lapis lazuli and malachite, amphorae containing incense and myrrh, ebony, a vast pair of ivory tusks, a small chattering monkey on a chain and two trees planted in baskets slung from a rod. They all knelt and presented the gifts. The beast snarled. His handler dragged him back onto his haunches.

  “Majesty,” said Nehsi, “I have the honour to present the fruits of our expedition to the Land of Punt. These are, of course, but samples. We have brought a rich cargo, and many strange animals.”

  “Welcome home, Nehsi,” I said. “You have done well. Pharaoh is pleased – nay, Pharaoh is delighted. The god Amen will be delighted also.”