Yuya
Encyclopedia
Yuya was a powerful Egyptian
courtier during the eighteenth dynasty of Ancient Egypt
(circa 1390 BC). He was married to Tjuyu
, an Egyptian noblewoman associated with the royal family, who held high offices in the governmental and religious hierarchies. Their daughter, Tiye
, became the Great Royal Wife
of Amenhotep III
.
They also may have been the parents of Ay
, an Egyptian courtier active during the reign of pharaoh Akhenaten
, who eventually became pharaoh, as Kheperkheprure Ay. There is no conclusive evidence, however, regarding the kinship of Yuya and Ay, although certainly, both men came from the town of Akhmim
. Yuya and Tjuyu also are known to have had a son named Anen
, who carried the titles Chancellor of Lower Egypt, Second Prophet of Amun, sm-priest of Heliopolis, and Divine Father.
The tomb of Yuya and Tjuyu was, until the discovery of Tutankhamun
's, one of the most spectacular ever found in the Valley of the Kings despite Yuya not even being a pharaoh. Although the burial site was robbed in antiquity, many objects not considered worth plundering by the robbers remained. Both the mummies were largely intact and were in an amazing state of preservation. Their faces in particular were relatively undistorted by the process of mummification, and provide an extraordinary insight into the actual appearance of the deceased while alive (see photographs).
ian town of Akhmim
, where he probably owned an estate and was a wealthy member of the town's local nobility. His origins remain unclear. The study of his mummy showed that Yuya had been a man of taller than average stature and the anatomist Grafton Elliot Smith considered that his appearance was not typically Egyptian.
Taking into account his unusual name and features, some Egyptologists
believe that Yuya was of foreign origin, although this is far from certain. The name Yuya may be spelled in a number of different ways as Gaston Maspero noted in Theodore Davis's 1907 book—The Tomb of Iouiya and Touiyou. These include "iAy", ywiA", yw [reed-leaf with walking feet]A, ywiw" and, in orthography—normally a sign of something foreign--"y[man with hand to mouth]iA".
It was not typical for an Egyptian person to have so many different ways to write his name; this may suggest that Yuya's ancestors had a foreign origin. In "The Hebrew Pharaohs of Egypt" (ISBN 1-59143-022-4) one solution is that Yuya had some Mitanni
an ancestry; this argument is based on the fact that the knowledge of horses and chariotry was introduced into Egypt from Asia and Yuya was the king’s "Master of the Horse." It was also suggested that Yuya was the brother of queen Mutemwiya, who was the mother of Pharaoh
Amenhotep III
and may have had Mitannian royal origins. However, this hypothesis can not be substantiated, since nothing is known of Mutemwiya's background. While Yuya lived in Upper Egypt, an area that was predominantly native Egyptian, he could have been an assimilated descendant of Asia
tic immigrants or slaves who rose to become a member of the local nobility at Akhmin. If he was not a foreigner, however, then Yuya would have been the native Egyptian whose daughter was married to Amenhotep III.
, the chief god of the area, and served as this deity's "Superintendent of Cattle".
Yuya and his wife were buried in the Valley of the Kings
at Thebes
, where their private KV46
tomb was discovered in 1905 by James Quibell, who was working on behalf of Theodore M. Davis. Although the tomb had been penetrated by tomb-robbers, perhaps they were disturbed as Quibell found most of the funerary goods and the two mummies virtually intact. As the Egyptologist Cyril Aldred noted:
The goods buried with Yuya and Tjuyu constituted probably the finest ensemble of high-class New Kingdom furniture, etc, recovered before the discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamun
seventeen years later.
has suggested an identification between Joseph
, the ancient Hebrew patriarch who led the tribe of Israel
into Egypt during a famine, and Yuya. Through analysis of anomalous features of the mummy of Yuya as well as linguistic and chronological data, Osman points out how Yuya is the only Egyptian mummy to have his hands placed under his chin rather than across his chest, he has what appears to be Semitic features, and a beard style similar to that of the ancient Hebrews, whereas Egyptian officials were known to shave their facial hair. Additionally, Joseph in the Genesis 45:8 is called "a father of pharaoh" and Osman claims that Yuya is the only Egyptian official to ever have had this title (with the exception of his son, Ay, who held the similar title Itnetjer, or "father of the god").
This theory has not been accepted in mainstream Egyptology and as well contradicts the account regarding Joseph's burial location in Joshua
(24, 32). Donald B. Redford
wrote a scathing review of Stranger in the Valley of the Kings for Biblical Archaeology Review
. Similarly, Deborah Sweeney has expressed great doubt toward the proposed identification. Sweeney states that the title "God's father of the Lord of the Two Lands" is an extension of the title "God's Father," which is not exclusive to Yuya. The Bible states very clearly that Joseph's mummified body was exhumed and transported to Canaan by the Israelites, while Yuya's remained undisturbed in the Valley of the Kings in Egypt, where his mummy was discovered in 1906. However, the biblical statement is proposed by Osman to be a later insertion based upon its placement with regard to the Documentary Hypothesis
.
Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egypt was an ancient civilization of Northeastern Africa, concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in what is now the modern country of Egypt. Egyptian civilization coalesced around 3150 BC with the political unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under the first pharaoh...
courtier during the eighteenth dynasty of Ancient Egypt
Eighteenth dynasty of Egypt
The eighteenth dynasty of ancient Egypt is perhaps the best known of all the dynasties of ancient Egypt...
(circa 1390 BC). He was married to Tjuyu
Tjuyu
Tjuyu was an Egyptian noble goddess, and the mother of queen Tiye, wife of pharaoh Amenhotep III...
, an Egyptian noblewoman associated with the royal family, who held high offices in the governmental and religious hierarchies. Their daughter, Tiye
Tiye
Tiye was the daughter of Yuya and Tjuyu . She became the Great Royal Wife of the Egyptian pharaoh Amenhotep III....
, became the Great Royal Wife
Great Royal Wife
Great Royal Wife or Chief King's Wife is the term used to refer to the chief wife of the pharaoh of Ancient Egypt. While most Ancient Egyptians were monogamous, the pharaoh would have had other, lesser wives and concubines in addition to the Great Royal Wife...
of Amenhotep III
Amenhotep III
Amenhotep III also known as Amenhotep the Magnificent was the ninth pharaoh of the Eighteenth dynasty. According to different authors, he ruled Egypt from June 1386 to 1349 BC or June 1388 BC to December 1351 BC/1350 BC after his father Thutmose IV died...
.
They also may have been the parents of Ay
Ay
Ay was the penultimate Pharaoh of Ancient Egypt's 18th dynasty. He held the throne of Egypt for a brief four-year period , although he was a close advisor to two and perhaps three of the pharaohs who ruled before him and was the power behind the throne during Tutankhamun's reign...
, an Egyptian courtier active during the reign of pharaoh Akhenaten
Akhenaten
Akhenaten also spelled Echnaton,Ikhnaton,and Khuenaten;meaning "living spirit of Aten") known before the fifth year of his reign as Amenhotep IV , was a Pharaoh of the Eighteenth dynasty of Egypt who ruled for 17 years and died perhaps in 1336 BC or 1334 BC...
, who eventually became pharaoh, as Kheperkheprure Ay. There is no conclusive evidence, however, regarding the kinship of Yuya and Ay, although certainly, both men came from the town of Akhmim
Akhmim
Akhmim is a city in the Sohag Governorate of Upper Egypt. Referred to by the ancient Greeks as Khemmis, Chemmis and Panopolis, it is located on the east bank of the Nile, 4 miles to the northeast of Sohag.- History :Akhmim was known in Ancient Egypt as Ipu, Apu or Khent-min...
. Yuya and Tjuyu also are known to have had a son named Anen
Anen
Anen was an Ancient Egyptian official during the late Eighteenth dynasty of Egypt. He was the son of Yuya and Tjuyu and the brother of Queen Tiye, the wife of Pharaoh Amenhotep III...
, who carried the titles Chancellor of Lower Egypt, Second Prophet of Amun, sm-priest of Heliopolis, and Divine Father.
The tomb of Yuya and Tjuyu was, until the discovery of Tutankhamun
Tutankhamun
Tutankhamun , Egyptian , ; approx. 1341 BC – 1323 BC) was an Egyptian pharaoh of the 18th dynasty , during the period of Egyptian history known as the New Kingdom...
's, one of the most spectacular ever found in the Valley of the Kings despite Yuya not even being a pharaoh. Although the burial site was robbed in antiquity, many objects not considered worth plundering by the robbers remained. Both the mummies were largely intact and were in an amazing state of preservation. Their faces in particular were relatively undistorted by the process of mummification, and provide an extraordinary insight into the actual appearance of the deceased while alive (see photographs).
Origins
Yuya came from the Upper EgyptUpper Egypt
Upper Egypt is the strip of land, on both sides of the Nile valley, that extends from the cataract boundaries of modern-day Aswan north to the area between El-Ayait and Zawyet Dahshur . The northern section of Upper Egypt, between El-Ayait and Sohag is sometimes known as Middle Egypt...
ian town of Akhmim
Akhmim
Akhmim is a city in the Sohag Governorate of Upper Egypt. Referred to by the ancient Greeks as Khemmis, Chemmis and Panopolis, it is located on the east bank of the Nile, 4 miles to the northeast of Sohag.- History :Akhmim was known in Ancient Egypt as Ipu, Apu or Khent-min...
, where he probably owned an estate and was a wealthy member of the town's local nobility. His origins remain unclear. The study of his mummy showed that Yuya had been a man of taller than average stature and the anatomist Grafton Elliot Smith considered that his appearance was not typically Egyptian.
Taking into account his unusual name and features, some Egyptologists
Egyptology
Egyptology is the study of ancient Egyptian history, language, literature, religion, and art from the 5th millennium BC until the end of its native religious practices in the AD 4th century. A practitioner of the discipline is an “Egyptologist”...
believe that Yuya was of foreign origin, although this is far from certain. The name Yuya may be spelled in a number of different ways as Gaston Maspero noted in Theodore Davis's 1907 book—The Tomb of Iouiya and Touiyou. These include "iAy", ywiA", yw [reed-leaf with walking feet]A, ywiw" and, in orthography—normally a sign of something foreign--"y[man with hand to mouth]iA".
It was not typical for an Egyptian person to have so many different ways to write his name; this may suggest that Yuya's ancestors had a foreign origin. In "The Hebrew Pharaohs of Egypt" (ISBN 1-59143-022-4) one solution is that Yuya had some Mitanni
Mitanni
Mitanni or Hanigalbat was a loosely organized Hurrian-speaking state in northern Syria and south-east Anatolia from ca. 1500 BC–1300 BC...
an ancestry; this argument is based on the fact that the knowledge of horses and chariotry was introduced into Egypt from Asia and Yuya was the king’s "Master of the Horse." It was also suggested that Yuya was the brother of queen Mutemwiya, who was the mother of Pharaoh
Pharaoh
Pharaoh is a title used in many modern discussions of the ancient Egyptian rulers of all periods. The title originates in the term "pr-aa" which means "great house" and describes the royal palace...
Amenhotep III
Amenhotep III
Amenhotep III also known as Amenhotep the Magnificent was the ninth pharaoh of the Eighteenth dynasty. According to different authors, he ruled Egypt from June 1386 to 1349 BC or June 1388 BC to December 1351 BC/1350 BC after his father Thutmose IV died...
and may have had Mitannian royal origins. However, this hypothesis can not be substantiated, since nothing is known of Mutemwiya's background. While Yuya lived in Upper Egypt, an area that was predominantly native Egyptian, he could have been an assimilated descendant of Asia
Asia
Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...
tic immigrants or slaves who rose to become a member of the local nobility at Akhmin. If he was not a foreigner, however, then Yuya would have been the native Egyptian whose daughter was married to Amenhotep III.
Career
Yuya served as a key adviser for Amenhotep III, and held posts such as "King’s Lieutenant" and "Master of the Horse"; his title "Father-of-the-god" possibly referred specifically to his being Amenhotep's father-in-law. In his native town of Akhmin, Yuya was a prophet of MinMin (god)
Min is an Ancient Egyptian god whose cult originated in predynastic times . He was represented in many different forms, but was often represented in male human form, shown with an erect penis which he holds in his left hand and an upheld right arm holding a flail...
, the chief god of the area, and served as this deity's "Superintendent of Cattle".
Tomb
Valley of the Kings
The Valley of the Kings , less often called the Valley of the Gates of the Kings , is a valley in Egypt where, for a period of nearly 500 years from the 16th to 11th century BC, tombs were constructed for the Pharaohs and powerful nobles of the New Kingdom .The valley stands on the west bank of...
at Thebes
Thebes, Egypt
Thebes is the Greek name for a city in Ancient Egypt located about 800 km south of the Mediterranean, on the east bank of the river Nile within the modern city of Luxor. The Theban Necropolis is situated nearby on the west bank of the Nile.-History:...
, where their private KV46
KV46
Tomb KV46 in the Valley of the Kings is the tomb of Yuya and his wife Tjuyu, the parents of Queen Tiye, the wife of Amenhotep III, and King Ay, and grandparents of Nefertiti. It was discovered in February 1905 by James E. Quibell. Quibell was sponsored by Theodore M...
tomb was discovered in 1905 by James Quibell, who was working on behalf of Theodore M. Davis. Although the tomb had been penetrated by tomb-robbers, perhaps they were disturbed as Quibell found most of the funerary goods and the two mummies virtually intact. As the Egyptologist Cyril Aldred noted:
- "Though the tomb had been rifled in antiquity, the [tomb's] opulent funerary furniture was largely intact, and there was no doubt as to the identity of the pair, who were found resting among their torn linen wrappings, within their nests of coffins."
The goods buried with Yuya and Tjuyu constituted probably the finest ensemble of high-class New Kingdom furniture, etc, recovered before the discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamun
Tutankhamun
Tutankhamun , Egyptian , ; approx. 1341 BC – 1323 BC) was an Egyptian pharaoh of the 18th dynasty , during the period of Egyptian history known as the New Kingdom...
seventeen years later.
Identified as biblical Joseph
Journalist Ahmed OsmanAhmed Osman
Ahmed Osman is an Egyptian-born author. He has put forward a number of theories, some revisionist in nature, about Ancient Egypt and the origins of Judaism and Christianity.-Biography:...
has suggested an identification between Joseph
Joseph (Hebrew Bible)
Joseph is an important character in the Hebrew bible, where he connects the story of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in Canaan to the subsequent story of the liberation of the Israelites from slavery in Egypt....
, the ancient Hebrew patriarch who led the tribe of Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
into Egypt during a famine, and Yuya. Through analysis of anomalous features of the mummy of Yuya as well as linguistic and chronological data, Osman points out how Yuya is the only Egyptian mummy to have his hands placed under his chin rather than across his chest, he has what appears to be Semitic features, and a beard style similar to that of the ancient Hebrews, whereas Egyptian officials were known to shave their facial hair. Additionally, Joseph in the Genesis 45:8 is called "a father of pharaoh" and Osman claims that Yuya is the only Egyptian official to ever have had this title (with the exception of his son, Ay, who held the similar title Itnetjer, or "father of the god").
This theory has not been accepted in mainstream Egyptology and as well contradicts the account regarding Joseph's burial location in Joshua
Book of Joshua
The Book of Joshua is the sixth book in the Hebrew Bible and of the Old Testament. Its 24 chapters tell of the entry of the Israelites into Canaan, their conquest and division of the land under the leadership of Joshua, and of serving God in the land....
(24, 32). Donald B. Redford
Donald B. Redford
Donald B. Redford is a Canadian Egyptologist and archaeologist, currently Professor of Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies at Pennsylvania State University. He is married to Susan Redford, who is also an Egyptologist currently teaching classes at the university...
wrote a scathing review of Stranger in the Valley of the Kings for Biblical Archaeology Review
Biblical Archaeology Review
Biblical Archaeology Review is a publication that seeks to connect the academic study of archaeology to a broad general audience seeking to understand the world of the Bible and the Near and Middle East . Covering both the Old and New Testaments, BAR presents the latest discoveries and...
. Similarly, Deborah Sweeney has expressed great doubt toward the proposed identification. Sweeney states that the title "God's father of the Lord of the Two Lands" is an extension of the title "God's Father," which is not exclusive to Yuya. The Bible states very clearly that Joseph's mummified body was exhumed and transported to Canaan by the Israelites, while Yuya's remained undisturbed in the Valley of the Kings in Egypt, where his mummy was discovered in 1906. However, the biblical statement is proposed by Osman to be a later insertion based upon its placement with regard to the Documentary Hypothesis
Documentary hypothesis
The documentary hypothesis , holds that the Pentateuch was derived from originally independent, parallel and complete narratives, which were subsequently combined into the current form by a series of redactors...
.