![\"Isis](\"https:\/\/blogs.swarthmore.edu\/pschmid1\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/isis_nofretari.jpeg\")
<\/a>Isis and Nefertari<\/p><\/div>\n
Goedicke claims that the style of dress worn by Hathor and Isis was \u201cfashionable a millennium earlier\u201d than when Nefertari lived (51)—in other words, four thousand years ago. (How does he know? Did he uncover an Egyptian Vogue<\/strong>?) If he is right, then the goddesses are portrayed as if they are descended from an earlier stage of Egyptian civilization—as if time-bound humans can best imagine the age of their deities only by imagining them wearing long-ago fashions. But the fact that such dresses could be so accurately \u201cplaced\u201d in time—that is, recognized not as from an earlier decade or even century, but from an earlier millennium—shows the powerful sense of continuity and duration in the Egyptians\u2019 sense of time.<\/p>\n Do Hathor\u2019s and Isis\u2019s and Neith\u2019s dresses really look four thousand years old? What\u2019s odd to a contemporary (Web) viewer without detailed knowledge of Egyptian dynasties or fashions is that such an \u201cold\u201d dress seems radically fresh, timeless as sex itself—and elegance itself. Can you imagine what it would be like to wear one of these topless items on a dance floor?<\/p>\n To be eternal, these ancient painters knew, you also had to be unforgettably stylish.<\/p>\n In the picture above, Nefertari is not topless; she wears a light shoulder-wrap. (The proper modesty of the newly dead? The right dress to wear when traveling? Or is she wearing it and the wrap to keep warm, because it takes her body longer to adjust to the cool air of eternity?) Look at the suave knot- and fold-lines of Nefertari’s white shoulder-wrap above: it is as if these lines are streaming from her sternum or heart.<\/p>\n As Nefertari is about to step across into the world of the dead, she and Isis hold hands, intertwining thumbs. At Nefertari’s mouth and nostrils Isis places an ankh, the hieroglyph of breath, life, spirit. It does not seem to mark the last breath leaving the body when a person dies. Rather, it marks the gift of immortality. Nefertari does not expire or exhale, but inhales.<\/p>\n Yet Nefertari could not receive this gift without another handy accessory: the artist\u2019s (invisible) brush. It too is the ankh of life, in its own modest way.<\/p>\n In the end, turn your gaze upwards, toward the ceiling of Nefertari\u2019s underground chamber. To see a blue field full of stars…. They are not arrayed to imitate the constellations, but in rows multiplying horizontal and vertical patterns from wall to wall of the tomb. As if what is depicted is not the literal sky but endless permutation itself, infinity.<\/p>\n Stars<\/p><\/div>\n Close-up, we can see the precise (and precisely different) brush-strokes that make up individual stars. Think about it: the variations in the painter\u2019s gestures—the pressure of hand and brush on the ceiling-surface during a single moment many millennia ago—are just about as infinite as the stars themselves. All made by a long-dead painter or painters as they went about their mortal, immortal labor.<\/p>\n Close up view of stars<\/p><\/div>\n These stars sent out their invisible light in the darkness for thousands of years. Only in 1904 did their light reach us. They are in the dark again now, for their own protection. Yet as they recede from us they also shine here, glowing with the time-shift of virtual light.<\/p>\n For more information and images of Nefertari’s\/Nofretari’s tomb online, see this link<\/a>.<\/p>\n Wrapping Paper<\/p><\/div>\n Images from Nefertari’s tomb and other burial sites now circulate not just on the Web or in expensive library books in the Egyptology section, but also on commercial gift-wrapping paper. There are also many Nefertari tomb images reproduced on fake plaster wall-chunks for sale on the Internet.<\/p>\n To the right is an image from a piece of wrapping paper I received on a recent birthday, reproduced somewhat larger than “life size” here.<\/p>\n It obviously is inspired by one of the tomb\u2019s most famous images, Isis leading Nefertari to the afterlife. The commercial image even copies the women\u2019s hand-holding pose and their slight skin-color difference, though many other details are changed.<\/p>\n Note how in this version the women\u2019s full lips are carefully emphasized.<\/p>\n From a queen bearing gifts to the goddesses and gods of life and death, to our own version of gift-giving many centuries later….<\/p>\n Actual tomb and actual wrapping paper: both sets of images (not to mention meanings) are hard to keep in focus.<\/p>\n The tomb images were not meant to circle the world. After the workers were done and the Queen laid to rest, the torches were taken away. The images of Nefertari\u2019s tomb were to reside underground, in absolute darkness, to be seen only by the eyes of the immortal.<\/p>\n The other set of images, on commercial wrapping paper, is in a way equally invisible, but for a different reason. It is glanced at only briefly until torn open and cast aside, to get at what we think is the real gift.<\/p>\n Surprise, surprise. <\/p>\n Goedicke, Hans. \u00a0Nofretari: A Documentation of Her Tomb and Its Decoration<\/em>. Graz, Austria: Akademische Druck, Univ. Verlagsanstalt, 1971. Introduction by Gertrud Thausing. Photography by Ekkehart Ritter, March 1963. \u00a0[Out of print. This is the text cited “Goedicke” in the Tour, and the source of many of the images.]<\/p>\n \u2022 McDonald, John K. \u00a0House of Eternity: The Tomb of Nefertari<\/em>. Los Angeles: Getty Trust, 1996.<\/p>\n \u2022 Angeletti, Roberta. A Journey Throught Time: \u00a0Nefertari, Princess of Egypt<\/em>. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999. \u00a0A children\u2019s book: Anna follows a cat into the tomb of Nefertari, who tells the girl all about Egyptian gods and goddesses.<\/p>\n \u2022 OsirisNet. \u00a0“Tombs of Ancient Egypt: \u00a0Queen Nefertari.”\u00a0https:\/\/www.osirisnet.net\/tombes\/pharaons\/nefertari\/e_nefertari_05.htm<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Return to Tour Guide<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Nefertari’s Tomb: The Final Chamber Boogie Down To accompany Nefertari, Isis wears a topless dress too, similar to Hathor\u2019s and Neith\u2019s shown on earlier parts of this Tour. Isis’ dress and headdress and headband seem at first glance almost identical … Continue reading Isis and the Breath of Life<\/h2>\n
Underground Stars<\/h2>\n
<\/a><\/a>From Virtual Tomb to Wrapping Paper<\/h2>\n
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\nInhale this Tour\u2019s final ankh: how much changes, how much remains the same.<\/p>\nFURTHER TRAVEL:<\/h1>\n
Primary Source<\/h2>\n
Other Sources<\/h2>\n