Wall painting from the tomb of queen Nefertari (1295-1255 B.C.), Great Royal Wife of Ramesses II, pharaoh of the XIX dynasty. The scene represents the queen held by the hand by the goddess Isis, who accompanies her in the Afterworld. Nefertari’s headdress is made up of a crown surmounting a vulture, attribute of the goddess Mut, Amun’s wife and protectress of the queen. Mut was identified with a name signifying “mother” and was regarded as symbolic mother of the pharaoh.
Isis was the daughter of Geb (the Earth) and Nut (the Heaven), Osiris was her brother and husband and Horus her son. She was one of the most important deities of the Egyptian pantheon. Isis was regarded as a model of feminine behavior and virtues, in particular for the Egyptian queen. The latter indeed was identified with Isis as the wife of the pharaoh (identified with Osiris) and mother of the future king (identified with Horus). Though she was a goddess who conveyed primarily the values of motherhood and fecundity, Isis’s role aside Osiris made her also a queen of the Land of the Dead, expressing the deep link that unites life with death (Remler 2010, Takács 2005).


[Image: http://library.artstor.org/library/]