*** This is the pretext advanced by Burnaburiash in the letter just cited.
**** This seems to have been the motive in a somewhat embarrassing letter which Dushratta, King of Mitanni, wrote to the Pharaoh Amenôthes III. on the occasion of his fixing the dowry of his daughter.
The princesses thus sent from Babylon or Mitanni to the court of Thebes enjoyed on their arrival a more honourable welcome, and were assigned a more exalted rank than those who came from Kharû and Phoenicia. As a matter of fact, they were not hostages given over to the conqueror to be disposed of at will, but queens who were united in legal marriage to an ally.* Once admitted to the Pharaohs court, they retained their full rights as his wife, as well as their own fortune and mode of life. Some would bring to their betrothed chests of jewels, utensils, and stuffs, the enumeration of which would cover both sides of a large tablet; others would arrive escorted by several hundred slaves or matrons as personal attendants.** A few of them preserved their original name,*** many assumed an Egyptian designation,**** and so far adapted themselves to the costumes, manners, and language of their adopted country, that they dropped all intercourse with their native land, and became regular Egyptians.
* The daughter of the King of the Khâti, wife of Ramses IL, was treated, as we see from the monuments, with as much honour as would have been accorded to Egyptian princesses of pure blood.
** Gilukhipa, who was sent to Egypt to become the wife of Amenôthes III., took with her a company of three hundred and seventy women for her service. She was a daughter of Sutarna, King of Mitanni, and is mentioned several times in the Tel el-Amarna correspondence.
*** For example, Gilukhipa, whose name is transcribed Kilagîpa in Egyptian, and another princess of Mitanni, niece of Gilukhipa, called Tadu-khîpa, daughter of Dushratta and wife of Amenôthes IV.
**** The prince of the Khâtis daughter who married Ramses II. is an example; we know her only by her Egyptian name Mâîtnofîrûrî. The wife of Ramses III. added to the Egyptian name of Isis her original name, Humazarati.
When, after several years, an ambassador arrived with greetings from their father or brother, he would be puzzled by the changed appearance of these ladies, and would almost doubt their identity: indeed, those only who had been about them in childhood were in such cases able to recognise them.* These princesses all adopted the gods of their husbands,** though without necessarily renouncing their own. From time to time their parents would send them, with much pomp, a statue of one of their national divinities--Ishtar, for example--which, accompanied by native priests, would remain for some months at the court.
***