Nefertiti and Cleopatra : Queen-Monarchs of Ancient Egypt

David Brown Book Co. Very Good. 1990. Revised. Paperback. 8vo 0948695188 Crease to front cover.150 pages clean and tight. This book gives .us a new and vivid account of the lives of two eminent Queen-Monarchs of Ancient Egypt - the beautiful Nefertiti (1367-1350 B.C.) and the highly talented Cleopatra (51-30 B.C.). Both politically adept, they also distinguished themselves in their love for the greatest men of their day: Nefertiti for the sun-worshipping Pharaoh Akhenaten, and Cleopatra for Julius Caesar and Mark Antony. Though far apart in time and culture, a likeness in their situation existed - in their elegance, their position of power, their remarkable and unusual aims, and their grief and ultimate tragedy. Julia Samson has graphically described their sophisticated environment in the Nile Valley, and by using evidence from excavations and objects from the world's great museums, has recreated life in Nefertiti's and Akhenaten's capital city at Amarna, and from the Classical writers, the dramatic history of Cleopatra. Nefertiti and Cleopatra has been written for the general reader but should be of interest to the student for it contains much original research. Julia Samson took the Academic Diploma in Archaeology under Professor S.R.K. Glanville, Sir Flinders Petrie's successor in the Edwards Chair of Egyptology at University College London in the 1930s. While studying, she began cataloguing and arranging the museum exhibition, objects Petrie had found at Amarna. During this work, John Pendlebury invited her to join his excavation at Amarna and to write a chapter for City of Akhenaten III. After a war-time and post-war career in the Civil Service, she returned to the Petrie Museum in the 1960s, where she completed her task of cataloguing the Amarna' collection. She is an Honorary Research Fellow there and has published Amarna, City of Akhenaten and Nefertiti : Key pieces in the Petrie Museum in 1972. Subsequently she has written numerous articles in international journals on Amarna history, and revised and expanded her original work to incorporate new discoveries, and the second edition has a section on Nefertiti as Pharaoh .