Hatshepsut is considered the first major female ruler in history. she ruled egypt for over 20 years during the fifteenth century bce, becoming the longest reigning female pharaoh. today, she is still considered one of the most successful egyptian leaders.
hatshepsut was born into a royal family. she was the daughter of the pharaoh thutmose i and wife to another pharaoh, thutmose ii. when her husband died, his son was too young to rule, so hatshepsut was appointed regent, or someone who makes decisions for future rulers until they are old enough. after about seven years, however, hatshepsut proclaimed herself pharaoh.
in the past, historians believed that her declaration of power came from an ambition for power and control. more recently, evidence suggests that her decision may have been made in the midst of political crisis and meant to protect the throne for her stepson.
either way, egypt thrived under hatshepsut's reign. as pharaoh, her main interest was economic prosperity. this set her apart from rulers before and after her, whose priority was gaining control over new territory. she began a huge program to renovate temples and monuments and build new ones, including a magnificent funerary temple for herself. her building projects also allowed her to create monuments in which she depicted herself with a false beard, a detail only allowed on the portraits of a pharaoh. probably as a way to assert her power, hatshepsut also showed herself with a male body in the king's traditional clothing and crown.
when thutmose iii was old enough to rule, he quickly assumed control of the army. perhaps because she feared an uprising, hatshepsut dispatched the army on an expedition to the land of punt, which is believed to have been somewhere on the northeast coast of africa. previous pharaohs had also sent expeditions to punt. hatshepsut's expedition succeeded in bringing back rare myrrh trees, gold, and ivory, among other treasures. this expansion of egyptian trade is thought of as one of the greatest achievements of her reign.
hatshepsut died around 1458 bce and thutmose iii became pharaoh. later in his rule, he had all the images of his stepmother removed from the buildings and temples she had built. perhaps he wanted to stomp out her example of such a powerful and effective ruler from the people's memory and from egypt's history. if this is true, his plan succeeded until 1822, when a group of scholars came across hatshepsut's story in the ancient writing on a temple's walls. fortunately, hatshepsut and her prosperous reign have now been firmly carved back into egypt's history.