Tiye

c. 12th century BCE–1156 BCE

Tiye was a queen of the Twentieth Dynasty and mother of the prince Pentawer. She was implicated in the harem conspiracy against Ramesses III, an attempt to replace the designated heir with her own son.

The harem-conspiracy papyri identify a royal woman named Tiye as a central participant in the plot to kill Ramesses III and advance Pentawer; those judicial proceedings show that members of the royal household were tried and punished after the conspiracy.

In Pauline Gedge’s House of Dreams, Thu becomes entangled with Queen Tiye and Prince Pentawer in the conspiracy to remove Ramesses and change the succession. What she first sees as a route to power becomes a system of surveillance, sexual bargaining and betrayal. In Pauline Gedge’s The Twelfth Transforming, Queen Tiye watches the prosperous reign of Amenhotep III give way to the radical programme of their son Akhenaten. Further fictional perspectives on Tiye can be found in Pauline Gedge’s House of Illusions and Mika Waltari’s The Egyptian.

Series

Historical novels and book series featuring Tiye (1 series)

Thu’s Houses in Order

by Pauline Gedge 2 books 4.2(1,330)

Thu’s Houses follows an ambitious healer from the village of Aswat into the court of Ramesses III and then into the consequences of the Harem Conspiracy. House of Dreams charts Thu’s education, her entry into the royal household and her growing involvement with officials who intend to alter…