KMT:  Vol. 14  Number 3  Fall  2003  © KMT Communications
EDITOR'S
Report

     Nefertiti was “busting out all over” this past June 2003 (pun intended), with the almost simultaneously breaking stories of her mummy being “discovered” in a “secret” chamber in the Valley of the Kings, and of the famous painted-limestone portrait bust of her in Berlin being used in an art “happening,” thereby outraging Egyptian antiquities authorities and reviving demands that the sculpture be returned to Egypt.
     From a British journalist colleague, I’ve acquired copies of the two lengthy articles announcing the “discovery,” published on consecutive weekends (6/8 and 15) in London’s The Sunday Times Magazine (“Identified: Egypt’s Holy Grail” and “Revealed: The Secret Desecration of Nefertiti”), as well as Time magazine’s subsequent summary three-page treatment of the story (“Nefertiti Found?,” 6/16). I’ve also checked out what is available on the internet and seen the promo for a Discovery Channel documentary, “Nefertiti Resurrected,” which will have aired (August 17) by the time this issue of KMT is being read.
The Sunday Times Magazine pieces are lavishly illustrated (one of the images misidentified, however: the Cairo Museum relief of Ay and Tiy from their El Amarna tomb labeled as “Tiy and her husband, Amenhotep III”). As might be expected, the documentary promises to “go over the top” in its bald sensationalism.
     I personally am not persuaded that Dr. Joann Fletcher and her team of specialists have made the case for their assertion that the mummy of Younger Lady (“Woman”) in KV35 is “probably” Nefertiti. Especially weak is the argument that mummies were “desecrated” because of their Atenist connections. Dr.
Susan E. James effectively addresses this and several other “evidences” in her article in this issue, “Dueling Nefertitis!.” Until the Egyptian authorities reverse their position of not permitting DNA testing of mummies, one guess as to who Younger Lady and her companions are is as good as another. I stick to my
own assertion made in this journal twelve years ago (KMT 2:2): they are Queen Tiye, Crown-Prince Thutmose and Princess-Queen Sitamen, and all originated in WV22, the Tomb of Amenhotep III in the West Valley of the Kings. Why not?
     The identities of the mummies aside, hopefully all of this media focus on the three will persuade the Supreme Council for Antiquities to finally do what is only right and necessary and remove these individuals from KV35 for conservation and subsequent dignified display — ideally in the place Dr. James
suggests in her article. Whoever they are, the KV35 trio are undoubtedly royal (and now internationally famous) and deserve far better treatment and basic respect than to be left lying moldering on their dusty pallets in a small, pitch-dark side room in the Valley of the Kings.
     As to the uproar resulting from the display, however brief, of the famous Berlin bust of Nefertiti on a modern “nude” statue expressly made for that purpose, I can only wonder why — in the wake of the recent controversial KV55 coffin matter and ultimate outcome in Egypt’s favor — the Egyptian Museum in
Berlin (Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Ägyptisches Museum und Papyrussammlung) would have allowed the (arguably) second-most recognizable “icon” of ancient Egypt (after the Tutankhamen gold mask) to be removed from its display case and elevated onto a life-size modern bronze statue fashioned after the body of the statuette of an aging Nefertiti, also in the Museum’s collection.
     The outcry at all levels in Egypt should have been fully expected in Berlin, especially inasmuch as Egyptian antiquities officials are currently on a campaign to have certain select works of ancient art returned to Cairo. It is generally well known that Egypt has periodically protested for nearly eighty years—since it first went on display at the Berlin Egyptian Museum in 1924— Germany’s possession of the Nefertiti bust, found during Ludwig Borchardt’s excavations of a sculptor’s workshop at El Amarna in 1912.
    Egyptian Culture Minister Hosni Farouk, in a related article in Al Ahram (online, issue No. 642) is quoted as saying that placing the ancient masterpiece on a modern body was a “reckless, irresponsible and unethical action,” and further that “The bronze body poses a real threat to the limestone bust. For one thing, ... [it] might be too heavy a load for the body, and it could fall and break into pieces. Coming into contact with the materials used to make the body will also speed up the bust’s erosion process.”
     The minister stated, however, that, because ties between Egypt and Germany are strong, Egypt would not request the return of the bust to Cairo unless the Berlin Museum failed to remove it from the newly fashioned body. According
to subsequent press reports, the bust was displayed on the contemporary sculpture for only a short time and then safely put back in its showcase.
     Although I know of no other such incidences, this is probably not the first time that an ancient artwork has been conjoined with a modern piece for a special art “event” or display; but perhaps the time has come for this sort of artistic experimentation to cease. In the Berlin case, a copy of the Nefertiti bust—which the Museum surely must have—would have adequately sufficed in this particular endeavor to meld the ancient with the modern. The fragility of antiquities and the emotions (and national pride) that they embody should be internationally respected and safeguarded.

Finally, it distresses me to have to report that publisher Avon Books has decided to discontinue Lauren Haney’s Lt. Bak mysteries following release in October 2003 of A Path of Shadows, the eighth title in the series (including a “prequel”). Haney is presently shopping for a new Bak outlet. I’d urge all fans of the intrepid lieutenant to protest to Avon, but it wouldn’t do any good. Once a publisher drops an author, it’s not likely that they’d bow to reader pressure and take him or her back.
             Do enjoy this issue of KMT.        -Dennis Forbes