About Queens
I didn’t find the queenly facts as heroic or interesting as some of the kingly ones, except for this story that I was fascinated by when I traveled to Egypt a few years ago.
“A female pharaoh was unknown in Egypt before Hatshepsut, who began her reign in 1502 B.C. In order not to shock convention, she had herself portrayed in male costume, with a beard, and without breasts.”
Hatshepsut’s temple, in the great temple complex at Deirel-Bahri, was unearthed in 1927. In it, nearly every statue depicting her had been defiled. Eyes scratched out or simply smashed altogether. It was a sight to behold nearly 100 years later.
Turns out her stepson was pretty pissed that she took over the throne (or at least needed to look that way, as some scholars point out), in the first female led coup of ancient Egypt, and she wouldn’t let it go easily. She reigned from 1479-1458 B.C.
It gets really interesting, or cringe, when digging deeper into the family lineage. She was the wife of Thutmose II and became Queen when she was 12 years old. Interestingly, because she had no full brothers, her father, Thutmose I, allegedly named her successor to his throne soon after her birth. But instead, she got to marry her half brother.
When he died, she became his regent until one of the sons of a harem wife, Thutmose III, made it out of diapers. She decided…nah. She's just go ahead and be pharaoh.
The rest is ancient history.
Also, there were probably one or two female pharaohs before Hatshepsut, but most of their history is missing. Sobekneferu ruled for four years (1760-1756), at the end of the 12th dynasty after her husband, also her brother, the previous Pharaoh, died.
If there’s a lesson in here, it may be that it pays to marry your brother? Gross. I need to wash my brain out now.