It is a scorching summer in 1326 BCE. At the royal palace of Hattuša, on the highlands of modern-day Turkey, the Hittite King Suppiluliuma I reads the second letter from a princess who signs herself as Dahamunzu (an Egyptian term roughly translating to "the daughter of the king"). The letter has reached us only in fragments, but we can reconstruct its contents from other annalistic texts known as the “Deeds of Suppiluliuma." After greeting the Hittite king and addressing him as "brother," in line with the etiquette of the time, she tells a heartbreaking story. 

Many days have passed since the death of her husband, the pharaoh, and an evil vizier is trying to force her into marriage to claim the double crown of the Nile for himself, a treacherous serpent in disguise. Her situation is so desperate that the young queen commits an act of humiliation for an Egyptian queen: she asks for the hand of a Hittite prince to make him the pharaoh of Egypt. Dahamunzu is likely the young Ankhesenamun, first sister, then wife, and finally widow of the famous Tutankhamun. These two young siblings, who married each other, ruled Egypt during a time of political and religious upheaval: the reforms of Akhenaten.

With two sons on the thrones of Aleppo and Carchemish and one ready for the throne of Hattuša, Suppiluliuma I, father of four sons, has one son left free, worthy enough to assume this role (or perhaps expendable enough to send him across the Sinai desert). His name is known to us as Zannanza, and he is ready to depart for Thebes, the splendid capital of the pharaohs.

However, Zannanza does not live long enough to fulfill his mission. The sources are silent on the details, but the brave prince meets his death en route, somewhere in Egypt's eastern territories. Other factors will eventually contribute to the end of this political friendship, leading to the famous clash at the Battle of Kadesh in Syria seventy-five years later.

Who knows if, while Hittites and Egyptians were trying to kill each other on the plains of Kadesh, they regretted not being able to truly call each other "brothers."