Bathsheba

Bathsheba is a biblical figure whose story is told principally in the books of Samuel and Kings. She is introduced as the wife of Uriah the Hittite, whom King David sees bathing and summons to him; after she becomes pregnant, David arranges Uriah’s death in battle and later marries her. The narrative presents the episode as a grave abuse of royal power. Bathsheba subsequently becomes the mother of Solomon, although no independent contemporary evidence confirms the details of her life.

In the succession narrative at the end of David’s reign, Bathsheba and the prophet Nathan intervene when Adonijah appears poised to take the throne. David orders Solomon’s public anointing, and Bathsheba later occupies the influential position of queen mother in Solomon’s court. Her request on Adonijah’s behalf concerning Abishag becomes part of the struggle in which Solomon secures his rule. Because the sources are literary and theological, exact birth and death dates sometimes assigned to Bathsheba should not be treated as historically established.

Angela Hunt’s Bathsheba makes Bathsheba the centre of the story rather than a brief episode in David’s life. Her marriage to Uriah, David’s summons, Uriah’s engineered death and the loss of her first child are followed by the much longer task of surviving inside the royal household and protecting Solomon’s future. Geraldine Brooks’s The Secret Chord approaches the same events through Nathan’s account of David, placing Bathsheba within a history of charisma, sexual violence and dynastic rivalry. In both novels her importance lies in what happens after the famous scandal: she becomes a political actor in a court where motherhood and succession are inseparable.