Excavated by W.M. Flinders Petrie (1905) at Serabit
Al-Khadim (Sinai), Temple of Hathor.
Egyptian Museum, Cairo
Queen of Egypt
"Given that we are absolutely certain of Tiye's entirely Egyptian parentage, it is surprising that she has been, and continues to be, claimed as either a Syrian or Lebanese princess, or a Nubian beauty. It seems that many early Egyptologists sought to account for Tiye's unusually forceful character and, perhaps, the unusual religious ideas that became apparent towards the end of her husband's reign, by attributing them to the queen's unconventional foreign upbringing.
The suggestion that Tiye may have been a blue-eyed pale-skinned Syrian princess is a complete misinterpretation of the archaeological evidence. The suggestion that she may have been of Nubian extraction is more understandable: a bust of Tiye, recovered from the ruins of the harem palace of Medinet Gurob, Faiyum (ancient Mer-Wer), shows the queen with black skin. There is nothing at all to suggest that the family were regarded as anything other than Egyptian or, indeed, that they had anything other than the brown skin and dark hair of the typical Egyptian family."
Reference:
Chronicle of the Queens of Egypt, by Joyce Tyldesley, p. 116, 2006
