Nefertiti of Egypt

Children's Literature - Barbara L. Talcroft

Nefertiti is still one of the most beautiful women in the world. As one of the royals in the "Queens and Princesses" series, this Egyptian ruler fascinates with her exquisite face and her mysterious disappearance. Only with her marriage to Amenhotep IV in 1352 B.C. does Nefertiti appear in sculptures and reliefs with her husband and their daughters, but Englar manages to reconstruct a plausible childhood for her from archaeological clues. Readers may be surprised to learn that she, like other Egyptian women, used makeup, wore wigs, and loved elaborate jewelry. Early in his reign, her husband adopted a new religion of the sun god Aten and initiated a more intimate style of art, so we have images of the Queen holding hands with the King (now called Akhenaten), worshipping Aten, and playing with three of her daughters; Tutankhamen of the golden mask was her nephew. After just 12 years of marriage, Nefertiti disappears from records. What happened? Though her tomb has never been found, historians speculate that she may have died of plague or may have become co-ruler of Egypt under a new name, Smenkhkare. This is a lovely book with pages of aqua, rose, and sand showing off the text and photographs of Egyptian artifacts: a makeup case with cosmetics, a doll with wiry dreadlocks, and the long face of Akhenaten. Most miraculous of all discoveries was the painted limestone bust of Queen Nefertiti (now in a state museum in Berlin), elegant and compelling as ever. Reviewer: Barbara L. Talcroft