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Maatkare Hatshepsut (c. 1504 BC-1458 BC; sometimes spelled Hapshepsut) was the 5th Pharaoh of the 18th dynasty of Egypt. She ruled from 1473 BC to 1458 BC and is regarded as the first female monarch in recorded history.
She was the daughter of Thutmose I and Queen Ahmose. Hatshepsut was favored by the Temple of Karnack over her two brothers who did not live into adulthood. She apparently also had a loving relationship with her parents and assumed the prestigious title of god’s wife of Amun before either parent died. After the death of her father in 1492 BC she married her half-brother Thutmose II and assumed the title of Great Royal Wife. Thutmose II ruled for only three years over which Hatshepsut had tremendous influence. Thutmose II had only one child with Hatshepsut, a daughter, Nefrure but managed to father a male heir, Thutmose III, by a common wife named Isis before his death.
As Thutmose III’s aunt and step mother Hatshepsut was selected to be regent until the boy king came of age. At first it seemed that Hatshepsut was patterning herself after the powerful female regents of Egypt’s then recent history, but it soon became apparent that she had only one model in mind, Sobeknefru, the last monarch of the 12th dynasty who ruled in her own right. She took one step further than Sobeknefru and had herself crowned Pharaoh in 1473 BC and took the throne name Maatkare. Pharaoh was an exclusively male title, at this point in Egyptian history there was no word for a female ruler (the closest equivalent, the one used by Sobeknefru, was King's Wife), thus Queen Hatshepsut became King Hatshepsut. She assumed all of the regalia and symbols of that office including the false beard. The false beard was a symbol of Pharonic power and by wearing it Hatshepsut was asserting her right and position as King or Ruler and not King’s Wife or ruler's wife of Egypt. Her motivation for wearing men’s clothing was political not sexual.
The wealth of the 18th dynasty that has become so famous with the discovery of the burial of Tutankhamun began to be colleceted under Hatshepsut. She personally lead a mission to Punt to buy myrrh, which was said to be her favorite fragrance, and other goods. Though her foreign policy was mainly peaceful, she did lead a successful military campaign in Nubia.
As Pharaoh, Hatshepsut initiated building projects that were grander and more numerous than any of her New Kingdom predecessors. She employed two great architects Ineni, who had worked for both her husband and father, and her friend and presumed lover the royal steward Senemut. Hatshepsut, like most Pharaohs, had monuments constructed at the Temple of Karnack. She had twin obelisks, at the time the tallest in the world, erected at the entrance to the Temple of Karnack. One still stands today, the other broke in two and toppled centuries ago. The Red Chapel or l'Chapelle Rouge, was intended as a barque shrine and may have originally stood between the two obelisks.
The masterpiece of her building projects was her mortuary temple complex at Deir el-Bahri. It was designed and implemented by Senemut on a site on the West Bank of the Nile at the entrance to the Valley of the Kings. The focal point was the Djeser-Djeseru or "the Sublime of the Sublimes," a colonnaded structure of perfect harmony nearly one thousand years before the Parthenon. Djeser-Djeseru sits atop a series of terraces that once were graced with gardens. Djeser-Djeseru is built into a cliff face that rises sharply above it. Djeser-Djeseru and the other buildings of the Deir el-Bahri complex are considered to be among the great buildings of the ancient world.
Several decades after her death, Thutmose III had many of her monuments defaced or destroyed and replaced her name with those of himself and of previous rulers.
See also: List of Pharaohs
