Naunakhte of Deir el-Medina cut the children who did not support her out of her will

Naunakhte lived in Deir el-Medina, the village of the workmen who cut the royal tombs at Thebes. Her first husband was the scribe Kenhikhopshef. Her second was the workman Khaemnun, and the eight children named in her will were his. She owned property she had inherited from her own father. In year 3 of Ramesses V, about 1145 BC, she spoke before a panel of fourteen villagers. She was about 80. She called herself "a free woman of the land of Pharaoh" and said of some of her children: "they do not care for me." Those who had "put their hands in my hand" would share her property. Those who "gave me nothing" would get none of it. She stated that the excluded children could still inherit from their father. One son, Kenhikhopshef, received an extra bronze washing bowl. Two scribes wrote down her words. About a year later Khaemnun returned to court and asked that everything be done as she had wished, which indicates she had died. The papyrus is in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, as P. Ashmolean 1945.97.