The case of Mose, a bitter legal wrangle involving a complex tangle of forged documents and lying witnesses, clearly demonstrates the woman’s right to inherit property, to act as a trustee and to bring a complaint before the law courts. Mose, a bureaucrat employed in the treasury of Ptah at Memphis, proudly recorded the entire dispute on the wall of his Sakkara tomb.18 He tells us how his ancestor, a certain captain Neshi, received a small estate as a reward for his loyal services to the king. This estate remained intact within the Neshi family for over two hundred years, passing down from generation to generation and always administered by a trustee appointed to act on behalf of the legal heirs. During the reign of King Horemheb a man named Khay was appointed trustee of the estate, but his appointment was challenged by the Lady Wernero, Mose’s grandmother, and the court eventually confirmed Wernero’s position as trustee for her five brothers and sisters. Unfortunately Takharu, one of Wernero’s sisters, made an official objection to this new trusteeship, and so it was decided that the land should be divided into six equal portions and shared out between all the legal heirs. Mose’s father, Huy, and his grandmother, Wernero, both appealed against this judgement, but before the issue could be resolved Huy died and Mose’s mother Nubnofret was evicted by Khay from her one-sixth share of the land. Although Nubnofret immediately lodged a formal complaint before the court she was unable to prove her right to the land as Khay had submitted forged documents in evidence, and therefore Khay retained possession of Mose’s inheritance. It was only when Mose grew old enough to plead his own case, presenting several sworn testimonies to the Grand Court of the vizier, that the dispute was finally settled in Mose’s favour.
I am a free woman of Egypt. I have raised eight children, and have provided them with everything suitable to their station in life. But now I have grown old and behold, my children don’t look after me any more. I will therefore give my goods to the ones who have taken care of me. I will not give anything to the ones who have neglected me.
Last will and testament of the Lady Naunakhte
The right to own property was a very important legal concession, providing a degree of security for all unmarried, widowed and abandoned women and their dependent children. The 20th Dynasty last will and testament of the Lady Naunakhte illustrates the extent to which women were able to dispose of their own goods as they wished. Naunakhte, the mother of eight children, had acquired considerable wealth from her family and from her first husband but had grown old and increasingly dependent upon her offspring. She swore her will before a court tribunal, specifying that she wished her property to be split only between the five children who were continuing to care for her in her old age, and specifically disinheriting those children who had ignored her plight. However, recognizing that she could not prevent her husband’s share of the joint property plus his personal possessions from being divided according to his wishes, she conceded that ‘as regards these eight children of mine, they shall come into the division of the possessions of their father to a proportionate part’. Clearly, the families of 3,000 years ago could be as unreliable as those of today.
The deed of transfer made by the Priest Wah:
I make this deed of transfer for my wife, Sopdu’s daughter Sheftu, known as Teti, of everything that my brother left to me. She herself shall pass it on to any of the children that she shall bear me, as she wishes. I am giving her the three Asiatics which my brother gave to me, and she may give them to any of her children, as she wishes. As for my tomb, I shall be buried in it and my wife also, without any interference from anyone. Furthermore, my wife shall live in our home which my brother built for me, without being evicted by any person…
Middle Kingdom last will and testament
Property acquired by a couple during a marriage was legally regarded as a communal asset, and so in addition to her own possessions a wife was entitled a share of any such joint property.19 This share passed to her children at her death, or to the woman herself if she was divorced, while the remaining two-thirds were divided firstly between the husband’s children and then between his brothers and sisters. In addition, a widow automatically inherited a percentage of her husband’s private property and, indeed, some husbands used their knowledge of the legal system to ensure that their partner would receive the bulk of the joint estate by legally transferring property to their wife before death, somewhat as present-day inheritance tax is avoided by those who resign themselves to giving away their goods during their lifetime.
A more devious means of preventing brothers or sisters from laying claim to matrimonial property involved the husband adopting his wife as his child; a fascinating Middle Kingdom legal document gives details of the adoption of the woman Nenufer by her husband Nebnufer: ‘My husband made a writing for me and made me his child, having no son or daughter apart from myself.’20 This declaration, made in front of witnesses, was legally binding and Nenufer was able to inherit all Nebnufer’s property as she was both his wife and his daughter. Seventeen years later Nenufer, now a widow, made an important addition to the legal deed, telling how she and her husband had purchased a slave girl to act as a surrogate mother, presumably to Nebnufer’s children. This slave had borne two girls and one boy who had been freed and in turn adopted by Nenufer, and then as Nenufer’s brother had expressed a wish to marry one of the girls, he had also been adopted by his sister so that he might receive his share of the family property. Nenufer’s legal right to inherit property, make a legally binding will, adopt a child and free a slave are all made explicit in this text.