Hatshepsut+--+Tessa+W.

Tessa W.

Hatshepsut was a great leader who ruled during the golden age of the New Kingdom era in Egypt. Greatness in leading is having the respect of and control over one’s people, and overcoming general ideas about an aspect that you were born with. Hatshepsut displayed greatness by ruling during one of Egypt’s golden ages, taking power that would have gone to a male successor even though she was a female, and by the length of her rule that was unchallenged. Hatshepsut’s rule was twenty-one years in length, and was entirely during a golden age in Egypt’s economy. She ruled during the eighteenth Egyptian dynasty, after the death of her husband, Thutmose II (2). During her rule, she was able to have constructed a great number of statues of herself, and a mortuary temple that took around fifteen years to complete (2). At the start of her rule, she was depicted as a female but with the clothing or stance of a king, but later was depicted as a man (3). She also had an obelisk constructed out of a single piece of granite, and it is one of the largest ancient Egyptian monuments. While she ruled, she took a great deal of care that her name would not be forgotten for many years by these many statues and carvings, even though most of them were destroyed and she was at first an anonymous mummy when her tomb in the Valley of the Kings was discovered (3). It was rare and unusual in Egypt that a woman would take the title of pharaoh. Hatshepsut was the firstborn daughter of Thutmose I, making her related to the gods. Originally, when Thutmose II died, power was to be passed down to Hatshepsut's stepson, known as Thutmose III. He was young when this event occurred, and pharaohs were also supposed to be a line of divinity, which Hatshepsut was linked to rather than Thutmose III. She ruled for Thutmose III for a while because he was so young, and then declared the title of pharaoh for herself (1). When she first took power as pharaoh, the decision was not liked by most, because their religion made it clear that that the duties of a pharaoh could not be carried out properly by any woman. She argued, though, that it had been a public statement that she was to be the successor of her father, and also emphasized her bloodline. In this way, she displayed greatness by defending her power due to her heritage, even though she was not the 'correct' gender. Hatshepsut ruled, as previously stated, for twenty-one years. Her ability to rule for so long in Egypt tells that she was a great ruler who was very capable of managing a kingdom. However, a weakness in her story as a whole is that when her step-son, Thutmose III claimed power after the death of Hatshepsut, he erased most statues and inscriptions on buildings having to do with her. However, it was discovered that the erasing of Hatshepsut's memory was begun by Thutmose III about twenty years after she died, and may have been to ensure that his son was to be next in power against other relatives(3). In this way as well, she displayed greatness by changing the qualifications of those who could take power.

PBS. "Hatshepsut." http://www.pbs.org/empires/egypt/newkingdom/hatshepsut.html.

2. Alchin, Linda K. "Hatshepsut." http://www.king-tut.org.uk/egyptian-pharaohs/hatshepsut.htm.

3. Brown, Chip. "The King Herself." National Geographic. http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2009/04/hatshepsut/brown-text.