Shaping History [antikvár]

Statesmen Hatshepsut Queen Hatshepsut was the first Queen of Egypt (cl509-cM69 bc) and one of the greatest Egyptian pharaohs. She was the first powerful woman ruler in recorded history, and governed Egypt at a time of peace and commercial expansion. She sent a voyage of discovery down the Red Sea and erected two unsurpassed obelisks at the Temple of Amun in Karnak - events recorded in beautiful reliefs on her terraced temple at Deir el-Bahri. From very early times, women in Egypt were held in high esteem. In the early 18th Dynasty there was a strong maniarchal tendency Hatshepsut was the daughter of the great warrior king Tuthmosis I. Her half-brother, Tuthmosis II, succeeded Tuthmosis I after her two brothers died prematurely Portrait busts show Tuthmosis II as a soft yielding boy, while Hatshepsut, several years his senior, has an erect head, bold aquiline nose, firm mouth, and chin projecting considerably to give an air of vigour and resolution. She married her half-brother, reducing him to a cipher, and became the major influence in government. After only a few years, their joint reign ended with the murder of Tuthmosis II, perhaps through a conspiracy Hatshepsut then became regent for his son, Tuthmosis III, bom of a minor woman in the harem, and, while he served as a priest of the god Amun, she took control of the throne and was accepted as pharaoh. In inscriptions on her monuments, masculine and feminine designations of her person altemate. She is both son and daughter of Amun, the state god. Statues and reliefs show her with false beard and male dress. Though in the inscripnons masculine and feminine forms are inextricably mixed up, the personal and possessive pronouns which refer to her are feminine for the most part, with sometimes perplexing expressions such as 'His Majesty herself. As pharaoh, Hatshepsut's reign was largely peaceful, and this enabled her to carry out grand schemes of foreign commerce. Her expedition to the Land of Punt (probably modem-day Somalia) down the Red Sea can be seen as a parallel with the voyages of discovery of the European Renaissance. Her beautiful terraced mormary temple at Deir el- Bahri has reliefs showing this expedition. It is rare that any single event of ancient history is so profusely illustrated as Hatshepsut's expedition. The various phases are recorded, from the gathering of the fleet on the Red Sea coast to the triumphant return to the capital Thebes. Five large ships for the voyage were built in sections and ttansported overland and assembled