Ahhotep I

Ahhotep I (Ancient Egyptian: jꜥḥ-ḥtp (.w), alternatively Anglicized Ahhotpe or Aahhotep, "Iah (the Moon) is satisfied") was an ancient Egyptian queen who lived c. 1560–1530 BCE, during the end of the Seventeenth Dynasty and beginning of the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt. Her titles include King's Daughter, King's Sister, Great (Royal) Wife, She who is joined to the White Crown, and King's Mother. She was the daughter of Queen Tetisheri and Pharaoh Senakhtenre Ahmose, and was probably the sister, as well as the queen consort, of Pharaoh Seqenenre Tao. Ahhotep I had a long and influential life, and is believed to have governed as a regent for her young son, Ahmose I, until he was old enough to rule. A stela found at Karnak praises Ahhotep's abilities as a leader, and the cult of Amenhotep I continued to remember Ahhotep after her death, up until at least the Twenty-first Dynasty. While the 19th-century discovery of two separate coffins in Egypt set off debates about Ahhotep's identity and true burial place—which have continued into the 21st century—scholars have gradually become more widely accepting that a coffin found in Deir el-Bahari, at some point reused to bury a high priest, likely first belonged to Ahhotep I.