What is Isetnofret?

Information about Isetnofret

Isetnofret

in hieroglyphs
<hiero>st-t:H8 nfr r:t</hiero>
Isetnofret (or Isis-nofret or Isitnofret) (Ancient Egyptian: "the beautiful Isis") was one of the Great Royal Wives of Pharaoh Ramesses II and was the mother of his heir, Merneptah. She was one of the most prominent of the royal wives, second only to the pharaoh's favourite, Nefertari, and was the chief queen after Nefertari's death (around the 24th year of the pharaoh's reign). She had at least three sons and one daughter.

Her children include:
  • Prince Ramesses B, Crown Prince from Year 25-50 of Ramesses II[1]
  • Princess-Queen Bintanath, firstborn daughter and later wife of Ramesses[2]
  • Prince Khaemwaset, High Priest of Ptah. Crown Prince from Year 50-55 of Ramesses II[3]
  • Pharaoh Merneptah, Ramesses' 13th son and ultimate successor (he outlived the first 12 princes)
  • Princess Isetnofret II (?), possible wife of Merenptah[4]
  • Prince Sethi (?)
  • Princess Nebettawy (?) (more likely to be the daughter of Nefertari[5])
Queen Isetnofret's titles include: Hereditary Princess (iryt-p`t),Great of Praises (wrt-hzwt), King’s Mother (mwt-niswt), Mistress of the entire Two Lands (hnwt-t3wy-tm), King’s Wife (hmt-nisw), Great King’s Wife (hmt-niswt-wrt)

She is known from several inscriptions and small statues.[6] She is shown on a family stela from Aswan. The upper register shows Ramesses II, Isetnofret and Khaemwaset before Khnum. While the lower register shows Princes Ramesses, Merneptah and Princess Queen Bint-Anath. Another family stela (Speos at West Silsila) shows Ramesses II, Isetnofret and Bint-Anath with a much smaller Khaemwaset before Ptah and Nefertem. The lower register shows Prince Ramesses and Prince Merenptah. [7]

A daughter of her son Khaemwaset (sometimes called Isetnofret III) was named after her. It is possible that this Isetnofret was Merenptah's wife, not her aunt Isetnofret II[8]. A possible daughter of Merneptah also bears this name[9].

Notes

1. ^ Aidan Dodson & Dyan Hilton, The Complete Royal Families of Ancient Egypt, Thames & Hudson (2004), p.173
2. ^ Dodson & Hilton, op. cit., p.170
3. ^ Dodson & Hilton, op. cit., p.170
4. ^ Dodson & Hilton, op. cit., p.171
5. ^ Dodson & Hilton, op. cit., p.167
6. ^ [1]
7. ^ Kitchen, K.A., Rammeside Inscriptions, Translated & Annotated, Translations, Volume II, Blackwell Publishers, 1996.
8. ^ Dodson & Hilton, op. cit., p.171
9. ^ Dodson & Hilton, op. cit., p.182

Sources

Egyptian hieroglyphs
Child systems Hieratic

ISO 15924 Egyp

Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode.
Egyptian hieroglyphs (sometimes called hieroglyphics
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 Egyptian 
Writing system: hieroglyphs, cursive hieroglyphs, hieratic, demotic and Coptic (later, occasionally Arabic script in government translations)
Language codes
ISO 639-1: none
ISO 639-2: egy
ISO 639-3: egy
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Great Royal Wife or Chief King's Wife (Ancient egyptian: ḥmt nswt wrt) is the term used to refer to the chief wife of an Egyptian pharaoh on the day of his coronation. The first holder of its title was perhaps Nubkhaes of the Second Intermediate Period.
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Dynasties of Pharaohs
in Ancient Egypt
Predynastic Egypt
Protodynastic Period
Early Dynastic Period
1st 2nd
Old Kingdom
3rd 4th 5th 6th
First Intermediate Period
7th 8th 9th 10th
11th (Thebes only)

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Golden
Horus

<hiero>G8</hiero>
<hiero>wsr-s-M4-M4-M4-O29:D44:Z2</hiero>[1] Userrenput-aanehktu[2]

Consort(s) Henutmire, Isetnofret, Nefertari
Maathorneferure

Issue
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Merneptah (or Merenptah) was the fourth ruler of the 19th Dynasty of Ancient Egypt. He ruled Egypt for almost 10 years between late July/early August 1213 to May 2 1203 BC according to contemporary historical records.
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Nefertari (Nefertari Merytmut or Mut-Nefertari) (c. 1300–1250 BC) was the Great Royal Wife (or principal wife) of Ramesses the Great. Nefertari means Beautiful Companion. She is one of the best known Egyptian queens, next to Cleopatra, Nefertiti and Hatshepsut.
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Ramesses was an Ancient Egyptian prince, the eldest son of Pharaoh Ramesses II and Queen Isetnofret. He had a sister Bint-Anath who was elevated to the position of great royal wife later in the reign of Ramesses II.
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Bintanath (or Bentanath) was the firstborn daughter and later Great Royal Wife of the Egyptian Pharaoh Ramesses II.[1]

She was born possibly when her father was still a co-regent with his father, Seti I.
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Prince Khaemweset (also translated as Khamwese, Khaemwese or Khaemwaset[1] ) was the fourth son of Ramesses II, and the second son by his queen Isetnofret and, by far, the best known son of this king whose memory was remembered for centuries
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Merneptah (or Merenptah) was the fourth ruler of the 19th Dynasty of Ancient Egypt. He ruled Egypt for almost 10 years between late July/early August 1213 to May 2 1203 BC according to contemporary historical records.
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stele (from Greek: στήλη, stēlē, IPA: /ˈstiːli/; plural: stelae,
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Aswan (Egyptian: Swenet (=trade); Coptic: Swān; Greek: Συήνη Syene; Arabic: أسوان Aswān
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Register (sculpture) is a term in sculpture, or in ancient artwork, (or in languages), that refers to pictographic representation of a scene, and its separation from an adjoining scene, by putting the scene in regestered sections, by lines.
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Christian Settipani (born January 31 1961) is the Technical Director of an IT company in the Paris area and a self-taught genealogist.

Passionate about genealogy, he has specialised in the ancestry of early Middle Ages people and earlier.
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