Temples, Tombs & Hieroglyphs_ A Popular History of Ancient Egypt - Barbara Mertz [115]
The pieces of cartilage connecting diaphysis and epiphyses are clearly visible in a young bone. They fuse completely at various ages until the last, the medial clavicle, completes its union at approximately the age of twenty-eight. Thus an expert can tell, from the degree of fusion, approximately how old the individual was at the time of his death. Epiphy-seal union is only one of the criteria used in determining age, but it is an important criterion.
Now for the rub. There is a form of pituitary malfunction known as Froelich’s syndrome which can delay the union of the epiphyses. It would be possible for a man suffering from this disease to have, at the age of forty, bones which are in the state normally found in a twenty-three-year-old. What fascinated Egyptologists is the fact that a sufferer from Froelich’s syndrome might also have certain of the physical deformities which are seen in the statues of Akhenaton—heavy thighs and thin calves, over-developed breasts and abdomen. The pituitary lesion affects the secretion of the sexual glands, producing feminine characteristics in a male.
A neat case, surely. There is only one difficulty. The victim of Froelich’s syndrome is necessarily, totally, and unequivocally sterile.
What then do we do with Akhenaton’s six daughters?
Some Egyptologists were quite willing to sweep the girls away rather than revise their theory that the miserably buried skeleton was Akhenaton’s. We can take it for granted that the children were born of Nefertiti, as the inscriptions specifically state; even the Egyptians could hardly have been mistaken about that. We might deliver ourselves from the manufactured dilemma by blackening Nefertiti’s reputation; this would not be chivalrous, but then chivalry cannot stand in the way of scholarship. However, the aspersion is not only unkind, it is ridiculous. Who was Akhenaton trying to fool? Or was Nefertiti trying to fool him? If the king had to hire a substitute to father his daughters, the gentleman overdid it, rather. If I had not been trained to be polite to those who are my elders (admittedly, there aren’t many of those left) and betters in the field of Egyptology, I would say that this is one of the sillier theories to come out of a field which, unfortunately, is not devoid of silly theories.
I hope I may be excused for crowing just a little—since I seldom get that opportunity—because the most reliable medical investigations of the remains substantiate the belief I have always held: that they are indeed those of Smenkhkare. In 1963 a thorough anatomical investigation was carried out by R. G. Harrison, of the University of Liverpool. He concluded that the bones were those of a man who was less than twenty-five years old at the time of his death, with twenty years being the probable age. There was no sign of gross abnormality or of a pathological condition remotely related to Froelich’s syndrome. Harrison stated that the individual might have had an “ectomorphic constitution”—in other words, that he was slightly built—but that he was definitely a normal male. An even more recent examination, by Joyce Filer of the British Museum, supports Harrison’s conclusions.
This should have settled the matter, but the “those bones gotta be Akhenaton’s” crowd hasn’t given up. Every now and then they find a physical anthropologist who asserts that the skeleton is that of an older man. Then another expert comes along and says no, it isn’t. The fact is that the great majority of the best qualified authorities have agreed on the younger age, and their arguments are incontrovertible. I’ve seen the skull (I get these little treats because I am very, very nice to my Egyptological friends),