[Illustration:  344.jpg PORTRAIT OF THE QUEEN AHMASI]

     Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph by Naville.

The inscriptions with which Hatshopsitu decorated her chapel relate how, on that fateful night, Amon descended upon Ahmasi in a flood of perfume and light.  The queen received him favourably, and the divine spouse on leaving her announced to her the approaching birth of a daughter, in whom his valour and strength should be manifested once more here below.  The sequel of the story is displayed in a series of pictures before our eyes.

[Illustration:  345.jpg QUEEN MUTNOFRIT IN THE GIZEH MUSEUM]

     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Emil Brugsch-Bey.

The protecting divinities who preside over the birth of children conduct the queen to her couch, and the sorrowful resignation depicted on her face, together with the languid grace of her whole figure, display in this portrait of her a finished work of art.  The child enters the world amid shouts of joy, and the propitious genii who nourish both her and her double constitute themselves her nurses.  At the appointed time, her earthly father summons the great nobles to a solemn festival, and presents to them his daughter, who is to reign with him over Egypt and the world.*

     * The association of Hatshopsitu with her father on the
     throne, has now been placed beyond doubt by the inscriptions
     discovered and commented on by Naville in 1895.

[Illustration:  346.jpg QUEEN HATSHOPSITU IN MALE COSTUME]

     Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Naville.

From henceforth Hatshopsitu adopts every possible device to conceal her real sex.  She changes the termination of her name, and calls herself Hatshopsiu, the chief of the nobles, in lieu of Hatshopsitu, the chief of the favourites.  She becomes the King Makeri, and on the occasion of all public ceremonies she appears in male costume.  We see her represented on the Theban monuments with uncovered shoulders, devoid of breasts, wearing the short loin-cloth and the keffieh, while the diadem rests on her closely cut hair, and the false beard depends from her chin.

[Illustration:  347.jpg BUST OF QUEEN HATSHOPSITU]

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by M. de Mertens.  This was the head of one of the sphinxes which formed an avenue at Deir el-Bahari; it was brought over by Lepsius and is now in the Berlin Museum.  The fragment has undergone extensive restoration, but this has been done with the help of fragments of other statues, in which the details here lost were in a good state of preservation.

She retained, however, the feminine pronoun in speaking of herself, and also an epithet, inserted in her cartouche, which declared her to be the betrothed of Amon—­khnumit Amaunu.*