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TadukhipaAfter her father Tushratta came to the throne of the Mitanni, Tadukhipa was sent to Egypt to marry Amenhotep III and reassert the diplomatic alliance between the two nations. Tadukhipa had arrived in or before the 36th regnal Year of Amenhotep III, some 26 years after her aunt Gilukhipa made the same journey. A letter from Tushratta, dated to that year, greets her in the Egyptian court as the wife of the king. Most of the surviving letters Tushratta sent to Amenhotep III dealt with the lengthy negotiations for her marriage, dowry, and bride-price. After the death of the Egyptian king, the Mitanni letters to Akhenaten usually complained about unfulfilled promises of presents, perhaps relating to her bride-price. Little is known about the life of Tadukhipa at the Egyptian court. Her husband did not live long after her marriage, and some have suggested that Kiya is a nickname for Tadukhipa, and that she married Akhenaten after the old king's death. This is could explain why the funerary equipment prepared for Kiya (almost certainly the alabaster canopic jars from KV55 and perhaps the lid of the coffin as well) were not used for her burial: if she were a foreign princess, her Mitanni relatives might have requested that her body be returned for burial in her own land, freeing up her funerary goods for others' use. |