Queen Nefertari, the royal spouse of Pharaoh Ramses II: A multidisciplinary investigation of the mummified remains found in her tomb (QV66)

Michael E. Habicht; Raffaella Bianucci; Stephen A. Buckley; Joann Fletcher; Abigail S. Bouwman; Lena M. Öhrström; Roger Seiler; Francesco M. Galassi; Irka Hajdas; Eleni Vassilika; Thomas Böni; Maciej Henneberg; Frank J. Rühli

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0166571

Queen Nefertari, the royal spouse of Pharaoh Ramses II: A multidisciplinary investigation of the mummified remains found in her tomb (QV66)

Michael E. Habicht, Raffaella Bianucci, Stephen A. Buckley, Joann Fletcher, Abigail S. Bouwman, Lena M. Öhrström, Roger Seiler, Francesco M. Galassi, Irka Hajdas, Eleni Vassilika, Thomas Böni, Maciej Henneberg, Frank J. Rühli

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Abstract

Queen Nefertari, the favourite Royal Consort of Pharaoh Ramses II (Ancient Egypt, New Kingdom, 19th Dynasty c. 1250 BC) is famous for her beautifully decorated tomb in the Valley of the Queens. Her burial was plundered in ancient times yet still many objects were found broken in the debris when the tomb was excavated. Amongst the found objects was a pair of mummified legs. They came to the Egyptian Museum in Turin and are henceforth regarded as the remains of this famous Queen, although they were never scientifically investigated. The following multidisciplinary investigation is the first ever performed on those remains. The results (radiocarbon dating, anthropology, paleopathology, genetics, chemistry and Egyptology) all strongly speak in favour of an identification of the remains as Nefertari's, although different explanations-albeit less likely-are considered and discussed. The legs probably belong to a lady, a fully adult individual, of about 40 years of age. The materials used for embalming are consistent with Ramesside mummification traditions and indeed all objects within the tomb robustly support the burial as of Queen Nefertari.

Original language	English
Article number	e0166571
Journal	PLoS One
Volume	11
Issue number	11
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0166571
Publication status	Published - 30 Nov 2016
Externally published	Yes

Bibliographical note

Copyright:©2016Habichtet al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License,which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited

Keywords

Egyptology
Ancient Egypt
New Kingdom
Valley of the Queens
Mummy studies
Nefertari
Ramses II
Turin Museo Egizio
Anthropology
Chemistry
Radiocarbon

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Habicht_Queen_P2016Final published version, 2.38 MBLicence: CC BY

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Habicht, M. E., Bianucci, R., Buckley, S. A., Fletcher, J., Bouwman, A. S., Öhrström, L. M., Seiler, R., Galassi, F. M., Hajdas, I., Vassilika, E., Böni, T., Henneberg, M., & Rühli, F. J. (2016). Queen Nefertari, the royal spouse of Pharaoh Ramses II: A multidisciplinary investigation of the mummified remains found in her tomb (QV66). PLoS One, 11(11), Article e0166571. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0166571

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title = "Queen Nefertari, the royal spouse of Pharaoh Ramses II: A multidisciplinary investigation of the mummified remains found in her tomb (QV66)",

abstract = "Queen Nefertari, the favourite Royal Consort of Pharaoh Ramses II (Ancient Egypt, New Kingdom, 19th Dynasty c. 1250 BC) is famous for her beautifully decorated tomb in the Valley of the Queens. Her burial was plundered in ancient times yet still many objects were found broken in the debris when the tomb was excavated. Amongst the found objects was a pair of mummified legs. They came to the Egyptian Museum in Turin and are henceforth regarded as the remains of this famous Queen, although they were never scientifically investigated. The following multidisciplinary investigation is the first ever performed on those remains. The results (radiocarbon dating, anthropology, paleopathology, genetics, chemistry and Egyptology) all strongly speak in favour of an identification of the remains as Nefertari's, although different explanations-albeit less likely-are considered and discussed. The legs probably belong to a lady, a fully adult individual, of about 40 years of age. The materials used for embalming are consistent with Ramesside mummification traditions and indeed all objects within the tomb robustly support the burial as of Queen Nefertari.",

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Habicht, ME, Bianucci, R, Buckley, SA, Fletcher, J, Bouwman, AS, Öhrström, LM, Seiler, R, Galassi, FM, Hajdas, I, Vassilika, E, Böni, T, Henneberg, M & Rühli, FJ 2016, 'Queen Nefertari, the royal spouse of Pharaoh Ramses II: A multidisciplinary investigation of the mummified remains found in her tomb (QV66)', PLoS One, vol. 11, no. 11, e0166571. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0166571

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AU - Hajdas, Irka

AU - Vassilika, Eleni

AU - Böni, Thomas

AU - Henneberg, Maciej

AU - Rühli, Frank J.

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Queen Nefertari, the royal spouse of Pharaoh Ramses II: A multidisciplinary investigation of the mummified remains found in her tomb (QV66)

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Keywords

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