“Archaeologists argue that the love of turquoise preceded the ancient Persians. Egypt remains the site of some of the oldest pieces of jewelry ever excavated — four turquoise-and-gold bracelets encircling the wrist of the mummified Egyptian Queen Zar (5,500 B.C.). Laboring under the blistering sun, Egyptians mined turquoise on the Sinai Peninsula. Although the mine is now depleted and nearly forgotten, the area is still known as the ‘Land of Fayrouz,’ or ‘Land of Turquoise.’ This variety of turquoise stone was more green than blue, rendering it less valuable than its Persian counterpart.”
https://www.gaia.com/article/turquoise-a-healing-master-stone-of-the-anciens-2?fbclid=IwAR3esvictU8AIanFk8rqCpCFshyoUi3uz8__pmcIJqUBt7RZvNG8QxL0MNI
My friend was intrigued and asked if I knew more about Queen Zar. I was as intrigued as she about the mysterious Queen! And my mystical friend always inspires me on my Quests. So I decided to aim for the source of the mystery....
The first thing I found was that there were different versions of this same paragraph about turquoise all over the Internet! Sometimes different facts were inter-changed, the dates were mixed up, some details were added or subtracted; but always there was Queen Zar and (at least one) turquoise bracelet on her mummified arm.
I found, for example, these variations of the story:
* The tomb of Queen Zar was opened in 1990, OR in 1900!
* The bracelet had a cabochon of turquoise, OR there were four bracelets, OR the bracelet was made of gold and turquoise (BTW, the word “zar” means “gold” in Arabic.), OR the bracelet was of silver and turquoise. Also, some articles say the arm was the only part of Queen Zar’s mummy that was found.
*Queen Zar lived in the time of “the second ruler of the Egypts First Dynasty (5,500 B.C.)” However, I found that most historians agree that Egypt’s First Dynasty started between 3,250--3,111 B.C., although I did find one site that called it “Egypt’s Early Dynastic Period, spanning the era from c. 6000-3150 B.C.”! One site said Queen Zar lived 6500 years ago.
It’s amazing how wide-ranging these facts are; all you have to do is SEARCH for “Queen Zar” and “turquoise” and you will find hundreds of the same sentences. Supposedly, they all come from an article by Lee Anderson.
So...try as I might, I couldn’t find anything about a Queen Zar (besides this turquoise bracelet story). So I decided to message one of the sites, www.barlowsgems.net
Bruce Barlow was kind enough to answer me promptly. He told me that sometimes she was called Queen Zar and sometimes she was called Queen Zer! He sent me another small article:
“The oldest pieces of Egyptian gold jewellery, four bracelets, were found in the tomb of King Zer at Abydos. They date back to 3200 BCE, during the first Egyptian dynasty. When discovered in 1900, these bracelets were still in place on Queen Zer’s linen-wrapped arm; her arm was all that remained of her body. The bracelets were made of gold, lapis lazuli, and turquoise.”
http://www.virtualmuseum.ca/edu/ViewLoitDa.do?method=preview&lang=EN&id=26094
Ah, here was my clue! There was a KING ZER and a QUEEN ZER. This turned out to be the key to the solving of this puzzle.
Here is a site that tells of Egypt’s First Dynasty, which was the beginning of an inherited rulership of a united Egypt:
http://www.sci-news.com/archaeology/science-timeline-ancient-egypt-first-dynasty-01357.html
As you can see on that page, the SECOND RULER of the FIRST DYNASTY was named DJER. When translating these words to English, the “DJ” is often changed to a “Z” because the sound is similar. So DJER would be changed to ZER. And from that would be derived ZAR. (It is interesting that ZAR is also an Arabic word meaning “Gold” as well as a Hebrew word meaning “Red.” Both “Gold” and “Red” are associated with Royalty in the ancient world.)
King Zar/Djer According to Manetho, Djer ruled for 57 years from Memphis, the city that his father (Aha, also called Menes) founded. There are inscriptions of his name as far south as the first Cataract of the Nile, which shows that he ruled most of the known lands at the time. Egypt was prosperous and the arts flourished. Djer himself was renowned as a physician and many of his writings about disease were still in use three millennia later. Militarily, he ran successful campaigns in the Sinai and expanded Egyptian influence.
This site says that his “daughter/wife” was Merneith.
http://phouka.com/pharaoh/pharaoh/dynasties/dyn01/02djer.html
The first five rulers of the FIRST DYNASTY are usually said to be: Aha, Djer, Djet, Queen Merneith, and Den. During the FIRST DYNASTY, women has more power in rulership. Djer (Zer, Zar) was found to be the father of Merneith. Djet (Zet) was her husband/brother and Den was their son.
MERNEITH! The name means “beloved of Neith.” Neith was a strong warrior Goddess.
King Zar (Djer) was accustomed to strong women ruling, as his reign was preceded by a regency controlled by Neithhotep, possibly his mother or grandmother. His main wife was Herneith (Face of Neith), but she died early on and is buried in a separate tomb. Here’s a page that has a little information about Neithhotep, who must have had much influence on her granddaughter(?) Merneith:
https://www.ancient-origins.net/history-famous-people/revealing-identify-first-female-ruler-egypt-hint-it-was-not-hatshepsut-007390
King Zar (Djer), himself, ruled for over 40 years, but when he died, Djet/Zet (who became the new King) did not live long. So Djet/Zet’s son with Merneith, Den, became King. However, since Den was very young, Merneith was the true ruler...at least until Den became of age. And when she died, she was honored as a true ruler! Here are some pages that speak of her:
https://www.ancientegypt101.com/queen-merneith.html
http://www.ancientpages.com/2018/03/20/merneith-mysterious-queen-in-the-land-of-the-pharaohs-could-be-earliest-attested-female-ruler/
https://www.parcast.com/blog/2016/10/26/5-powerful-women-rulers-of-ancient-egypt
http://www.mummies2pyramids.info/egyptian-queens/queen-merneith.htm
https://women-s.net/egyptian-queens-names-list/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merneith
Merneith also has been called Meritnit, Meryet-Nit, Meritnit, Meryt-Neith, and many more variations. But the most common one, and the one I will use, is MERNEITH. (BTW, the Goddess Neith is one of the most complex and oldest deities of ancient Egypt. She inspired her daughters to rule the world. The first female rulers of Ancient Egypt dedicated their power and lives to this deity.)
“A carved funeral monument discovered in 1900 CE has on it the name Meryt-Neith. The monument was among those of kings of the First Dynasty. Egyptologists believed this to be a ruler of the first dynasty -- and some time after finding the monument, and adding this name to the rulers of Egypt, they realized that the name likely refers to a female ruler. Then those earlier Egyptologists automatically moved her to the status of royal consort, assuming that there were no women rulers. Other excavations support the idea that she ruled with the power of a king and was buried with the honors of a powerful ruler.”
https://www.thoughtco.com/meryt-neith-biography-3528380
I still wasn’t sure this was the “Queen Zar” who was described as wearing the turquoise bracelet. I had to find the story of the discovery and opening of the tomb!
“In 1900 William Petrie discovered Merneith’s tomb and believed it belonged to an unknown king. However subsequent findings proved that Merneith was a queen. A clay seal found in the tomb of Den was engraved with ‘King’s Mother Merneith’ proving that Merneith was a woman.”
https://mysterieszone.wordpress.com/ancient-mysteries/ancient-egypt/merneith/
So, there I had 2 more clues:
1. The Tomb of Merneith was opened in 1900!
2. It was William Petrie who discovered the tomb.
On the Wikipedia page for King Zar/Djer, a further clue was found:
“A mummified forearm of Djer or his wife was discovered by Flinders Petrie,[3] but was discarded by Emile Brugsch.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Djer
The discussion about Emile Brugsch was the only mention of an “arm” that I was able to find! But I did find it! (And I am not going to discard it!) ;-)
So that did confirm to me that Queen Zar was Merneith!
The footnote about the arm was said to come from the book by W. M. Flinders Petrie: “The Royal Tombs of the Earliest Dynasties,” 1901, Part II, London 1901, p.16-17.
I did some research on Mr. Petrie and he was, indeed, the archaeologist who opened the tombs of this First Dynasty! In fact, there is a whole museum built on his findings:
https://www.ucl.ac.uk/culture/petrie-museum/about
The Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology is part of the University College London, England.
Here’s their page for Queen Zar, who they called “Queen Merytneit”---
https://www.ucl.ac.uk/museums-static/digitalegypt//chronology/queenmeritneit.html
Here’s some pictures that illustrate how jewelry was worn, according to the findings:
https://www.ucl.ac.uk/museums-static/digitalegypt//jewellery/jewelryexamples.html
Here’s a page about Abydos, the place in Egypt where the Tombs of Merneith and her family were found:
https://www.ucl.ac.uk/museums-static/digitalegypt//abydos/index.html
Considered one of the most important archaeological sites of ancient Egypt (near the town of al-Balyana), the sacred city of Abydos was the site of many ancient temples, including Umm el-Qa'ab, the royal necropolis, where early pharaohs were entombed. These tombs began to be seen as extremely significant burials and in later times it became desirable to be buried in the area, leading to the growth of the town's importance as a cult site.
As for evidence of the turquoise;
“Among the rare examples of turquoise dating to these periods are beads on several bracelets (Egyptian Museum, Cairo), found on the arm of an unidentified woman buried in the tomb of the Dynasty 1 king Djer at Abydos “
https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/turqe/hd_turqe.htm
Unfortunately, though, the Archaeologists who discovered these early tombs were a bit strange.
“Burial Place of Djer:
“Large tomb in Abydos (Tomb O), Umm el Ga'ab. The tomb was originally believed to hold the remains of Osiris and was the focus of pilgrimages. The tomb was excavated by Emile Amelineau in 1895 -- he was a very poor archeologist and cleared out the tomb between January 1 and January 12, keeping only the complete objects and discarding entire hoards of artifacts that he felt had "no value". He found a small statue and a skull in one chamber of the tomb and quite arbitrarily decided that he had found the tomb of Osiris himself -- even though the skull was later identified as a woman, his view never changed.
“The tombs were completely re-excavated by Petrie in 1900 and found many things that Amelineau had overlooked or discarded. The volumes he produced to document the excavation became the model for future archeological work. There are some 300 subsidiary burials nearby. These burials of human servants and retainers would later be replaced by shabti burials.”
http://phouka.com/pharaoh/pharaoh/dynasties/dyn01/02djer.html
Flinders Petrie (who excavated in 1900) had no school training, yet he was a prodigy and he practically invented modern Archaology. However, he often had a hard time of it! For instance, this story from a page about Flinders Petrie:
“Mummified arm from Djer's Tomb
“ A mummified arm was discovered in Djer's tomb, which he believed to be a woman which is likely as the skull of a female was also discovered.
When the arm was discovered inside the tomb Petrie wrote:
“ ...the arm of the Queen of Djer was found, hidden in a hole in the wall, with the gold bracelets in place. The lads who found it saw the gold, but left it untouched and brought the arm to me. I cut the wrappings apart so bared he bracelets all intact. Thus the exact order could be copied when my wife re-threaded them next morning.
When Quibell came over on behalf of the Museum, I sent up the bracelets by him. The arm - the oldest mummified piece known - and its marvelously fine tissue of linen were also delivered to the museum. Emile Brugsch only cared for display; so from one bracelet he cut away the half that was of plaited gold wire, and he also threw away the arm and linen. A museum is a dangerous place…”
https://ancientegypt.fandom.com/wiki/Flinders_Petrie
It’s interesting that Emile Brugsch also assisted author and occultist Aleister Crowley in 1904 by having the “Stele of Revealing” translated by his assistant. “The Stele”, and the translation, became integral parts of Crowley's subsequent writing of “The Book of the Law” and his founding of the philosophical practice and religion of Thelema. Weird.
Nevertheless, we know that in King Zar/Djer’s tomb, many copper and turquoise artefacts were found, and Sinai is the area where ancient Egyptians traditionally obtained these materials.
So there you go. But at least we know WHO WAS QUEEN ZAR! ‘Twas Merneith.
And perhaps NOW is the time she can begin to get the respect that she certainly deserves.
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