Nitocris
Egyptian queen of dubious existence
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ToursExplore Lably’s 3D toursHer historicity has been questioned by some with speculation that, if she was a historical ruler, she may have been a regent. Another view, by the Egyptologist Kim Ryholt, argues that Nitocris is legendary and derives from the historical king Neitiqerty Siptah who succeeded Nitocris's brother, Merenre Nemtyemsaf II, at the transition between the Old Kingdom and First Intermediate Period.
Manetho claimed she built the "third pyramid" at Giza. Modern historians and archaeologists attribute that pyramid to a king of the Fourth Dynasty, Menkaure.
Greek tradition
According to Herodotus (Histories ii-100), Nitocris invited the murderers of her brother, the "king of Egypt", to a banquet, then killed them by flooding the sealed room with the waters of the Nile.
- ... [Nitocris] succeeded her brother. He had been the king of Egypt, and he had been put to death by his subjects, who then placed her upon the throne. Determined to avenge his death, she devised a cunning scheme by which she destroyed a vast number of Egyptians. She constructed a spacious underground chamber and, on pretense of inaugurating it, threw a banquet, inviting all those whom she knew to have been responsible for the murder of her brother. Suddenly as they were feasting, she let the river in upon them by means of a large, secret duct. (Herodotus)
Herodotus also indicated that, to avoid the other conspirators, she committed suicide (possibly by running into a burning room).
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Egyptian records
The name, Nitocris, is not mentioned in any known native Egyptian inscriptions in stone and it was long thought that this king appears under her Egyptian name of Nitiqreti (nt-ỉqrtỉ) on a fragment of the Turin King List, dated to the Nineteenth Dynasty. The fragment where this name appears was thought to belong to the Sixth Dynasty portion of a king list, thus appearing to confirm the records of both Manetho and Herodotus. Microscopic analysis of the Turin King List suggests the fragment might have been misplaced in reassembling the fragmentary text, and that the name Nitiqreti is a faulty transcription of the prenomen of king Netjerkare Siptah I, who is named on the Nineteenth Dynasty Abydos King List as the successor of the Sixth Dynasty king Nemtyemsaf II. On the Abydos King List, Netjerkare Siptah is placed in the equivalent spot that Neitiqerty Siptah holds on the Turin King List.
Several kings listed by Manetho, Herodotus, and the Turin list now are proven to have existed, but they were omitted from the Abydos list and their removal is suspected to be suppression of historical details not favored by the rulers when the Abydos list was created.
In modern fiction
- Two letters in the name are transposed in Bolesław Prus' 1895 historical novel Pharaoh, where "Nikotris" appears as the mother of the protagonist, Pharaoh "Ramses XIII" (there were only eleven pharaohs of that name).
- The Queen's Enemies, a play by Lord Dunsany, is based upon the account by Herodotus of the murderous activities of Nitocris.
- Nitocris is mentioned in two stories by H. P. Lovecraft, "The Outsider" and "Imprisoned with the Pharaohs". She is mentioned only in passing and portrayed as evil and reigning over ghouls and other horrors.
- Tennessee Williams' first published work is the 1928 short story "The Vengeance of Nitocris", detailing her careful plan for revenge. She makes the people who slew her brother die in a fitting way.
- Le Basalte Bleu, a book by John Knittel, has a sort of time-travel plot in which the main character falls in love with the ancient ruler. Knittel speculates that the origin of the Cinderella fairy tale lies in the marriage of Nitocris, who lost her golden sandal only to have it later found by the pharaoh.
- Nitocris La Dame de Memphis is a book by Pierre Montlaur.
- "The Mirror of Nitocris", a short story by Brian Lumley, features a mirror that once belonged to Nitocris that unleashes evil forces upon its owners.
- This mirror also appears in Demonbane, as one of the Page Monsters created by the missing pages of Al-Azif; Nya (an avatar of Nyarlathotep) gives it to one of the children in the orphanage, in order to stir up trouble.
- Nitocris is royal wife of Merenra II in the novel Rhodopis of Nubia by Nobel laureate Naguib Mahfouz, which tells the fateful love story of Pharaoh Merenra II (successor to Pepi II, Sixth Dynasty) and the courtesan Rhodopis.
- Karl Sanders has a song called "Slavery Unto Nitokris" on his second solo album, Saurian Exorcisms.
- "By Scarab and Scorpion", a short story featuring the Green Hornet by Mark Ellis, features a plot involving an Egyptian museum exhibition featuring Nitocris.
- The title song from Celtic Frost's 1985 album Morbid Tales is based on the legend of Nitocris.
- Nitocris appears in The Mummy and Miss Nitocris by George Griffith, where she is the namesake of an Egyptologist's daughter in whose person she is reincarnated.
- Nitocris appears in Fate/Grand Order as a Caster-class, an Assassin-class and later an Avenger-class Servant with ties to Horus, Medjed, and Anubis. As Servants are influenced by fictional interpretations of their legends, Nitocris' powers are mostly based on Lovecraft and Lumley's stories about her, and she wields the titular mirror from the latter as her weapon.
- A character named Nitocris appears in the Assassin's Creed Origins tie in novel, Desert Oath. She is the God's Wife of Amun in Karnak temple and mother of Isidora. Her death between the novel and the events of the Curse of the Pharaohs DLC give Isidora motivation to use an Apple of Eden to bring about the wrath of the undead on Thebes.
- Nitocris is the subject of the opera Nitocri by Saverio Mercadante, premiered in Turin in 1824.