Throughout the history of the Egyptians there where several women who came to rule their people, but none was brave or ambitious enough to assume the title of King and Pharaoh, except for Queen Hatshepsut, or more accurately put…. King Hatshapsu (dropping the “t” of the end of her name made it a masculine name instead). Before Hatshepsut there where queens who had ruled Egypt but until then ….never a female Pharaoh!

Contrary to any ancient culture, where women were expected to stay at home, women of ancient Egypt had a lot more freedom. They were allowed to own property and hold official positions, they were also given rights to inherit from deceased family members and were allowed to present their cases in court. They also played a cardinal role in the religion, where religion was integral to a ruler’s role so royal women acted as priestesses and officiated at the rites in temples.

Hatshepsut ruled Egypt between 1479-1458/57. She was a unique and intelligent individual, who brainstormed, not only to legitimize her position as pharaoh but also make herself god-like, to win the complete approval of her subjects. Due to her boldness she may have been the first to start a Feminist movement to seek out prominent women from antiquity and publicized their achievements.

Ma’at-ka-Ra Hatshepsut was the eldest daughter to Thutmose I and Queen Ahmose, the first king and queen of the Thutoside clan of the eighteenth dynasty. Upon the death of her father, Hatshepsut married her half-brother, Thutmose II, and assumed the title of Great Royal Wife. They had one daughter, Neferure, who Hatshepsut groomed to take over the roles she played as queen. Upon his death Thutmose II left behind a very young Thutmose III (born to Isis a lesser wife of Thutmose II) to succeed him. Being too young to assume the tasks of pharaoh, Hatshepsut became his regent not long before she proclaimed herself Pharaoh.

After the Oracle of Amun pronounced that the will of the god Amun was that Hatshepsut should become Pharaoh; she adopted many male attributes. She assumed all the regalia and symbols of the pharaonic office: the Khat head cloth, topped with the uraeus, the traditional false beard and shendyt kilt.

She ruled for about twenty years gloriously, during which Egypt witnessed a long period of prosperity. She was also known to be a strong, fair and just ruler. Besides being the only female pharaoh to erect the most monuments during her reign, the projects she commissioned took Ancient Egyptian architecture to higher standards that set the calibre for the pharaohs that succeeded her. The first and the most beautiful of the temples in the Valley of the Kings was her great mortuary temple Djeser-Djeseru. It is the focal point of the complex at Deir al-Bahari on the west bank of the Nile, opposite the city of Luxor.

Although she was known to be a peaceful queen, she made some conquests notably the expedition to the Land of Punt (perhaps present day Somalia) She re-established trading relations that were lost during a foreign occupation by the Hyksos, bringing great wealth to Egypt. The expedition to Punt brought back myrrh, frankincense, woods, sweet-smelling resin, ivory, spices, gold, ebony, ivory and aromatic trees, this was the first ever recorded attempt to replant foreign trees.

Hatshepsut was also the first Pharaoh to erect an obelisk; she had two erected in front of her temple yet only one still stands today, as the tallest surviving ancient obelisk on Earth. She is also the owner of “the Unfinished Obelisk” in Aswan as it establishes how obelisks were quarried.

With all her success and accomplishments she disappeared from history after about twenty years of her reign. To this day no one knows how and when she died exactly, or where her mummy is buried. However, if the recent identification of her mummy in KV60 is correct, CT scans of the mummy indicate that she died of metastatic bone cancer in her 50s.

Depicted in many novels and films, whether as a wicked step mother or a romantic amiable queen, it is undeniable that she was the first great woman in History!

About the Author:
Gawhara Hanem
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Egypt Tours

Copyright © EgyptHasItAll.com

About the Author:
Gawhara Hanem
—————————————————————–
Egypt Tours

Copyright © EgyptHasItAll.com

Just as Cleopatra sailed down the Nile in her luxurious royal barge, the bank along the river Nile probably looks the same for that many years. A timeless picturesque scene, life has not changed much over the years. Buffaloes and cows grazing, farmers working the land by hand, women washing cloths on the waters edge, children fishing or jumping into the water, waving and screaming at the passing boats. Egrets fly over the water surface alongside the boat and a kingfisher hovers, ready to dive down into the water to catch a fish. As an important migratory stopover between Africa and Europe, the banks of the Nile are the perfect place for bird-watching. Lining the banks are date palms, willows, acacias, mimosa and sycamore trees.

The river Nile, the source of all creation, life and beauty, is the life-line of the ancient Egyptian civilization, and the unending source of sustenance to its people. The Greek historian Herodotus wrote that ‘Egypt was the gift of the Nile.’ Sailing by the serene beauty on a Nile cruise ship, with all the luxuries of royalty of a Pharaonic barge, is a once in a life time experience. With all the facilities of a land based hotel, Nile cruise ships are fully air-conditioned, with a small swimming pool, bars, restaurants, shops, private baths and TVs.

The large sliding window of the cabin room opens directly on to the waters of the river emphasizing the closeness of nature even further. I can never tire of gazing out at the life on the Nile as it drifts by, and the single-sailed feluccas, that remind me of giant butterflies. My personal favorite is the sun-deck, especially during the early hours of the cool morning breeze.

During the actual motion of the Nile cruise ship there is little sense of motion, so even within the smallest cabin room there is no danger of any seasickness. With an all inclusive package, you can enjoy three meals a day with all the transportation to the tours and temples. A typical cruise will include visits to the Luxor Museum, the magnificent Temple of Karnak, the Valley of the Kings, the Temple of Queen Hatshepsut and the Colossi of Memnon on Luxor. In Esna the Temple of Esna and at Edfu, there is the Temple of Horus. At Kom Ombo, there is the temple of Sobek, the crocodile god associated with fertility; it is directly on the edge of the Nile where crocodiles were fed red meat in ancient times.

At Aswan the sites to see include a visit to the Aswan High Dam, Lake Nasser, the Unfinished Obelisk. The Temple of Philae is on one of the most romantic and beautiful site on Earth. It had become the center point to the worship of the cult of the goddess Isis. Optional is a relaxing felucca trip to the Botanical Island and a visit to a Nubian village as you float past the Elephantine Island and the Agha Khan Mausoleum.The cruises range from a quick, three-night cruise usually departing from Aswan to Luxor, to a moderate four-night cruise usually departing from Luxor to Aswan. The seven-night cruise either starts from Luxor to Aswan or Aswan to Luxor, this trip is for those who seek full relaxation.

Besides the day visits these cruise ships have active night life including cocktail parties, Nubian shows, belly dancers and whirling tanoura dancers, there is even a night where guests have a dress up parties putting on traditional Egyptian costumes. The meals onboard most Nile cruisers are usually buffet style and include a variety of international and local cuisine.

The best time to book your Nile cruise is between October and mid April, when the weather is cool and the locks along the Nile at Esna are all open. These locks will be closed around mid April because of the water levels. However there are cruise boats operating all year round, but due to the closed locks, cruise operators will arrange boats on either side of the locks, and a transfer must be made between boats. Although a visit to the Pyramids and the Sphinx maybe the pinnacle of your trip to Egypt, there is nothing like floating down the Nile on a cruise boat, truly an unforgettable and magical experience.

About the Author:
Gawhara Hanem
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Egypt Tours

Copyright © EgyptHasItAll.com

He died 3,300 years ago and we know that he was 19 years of age when he did. We know that he came to the throne at the age of 9 and was too young to have made his own decisions, and that they were made for him by Aye, his vizier and Horemheb, the commander-in-chief of his army. We think he was Akhenaton’s son not from the famous Nefertiti but from Kiya a minor wife. He may have had a brother Smenkhkare, or as some think he could have been is father after all. He did have six half-sisters from Akhenaton and Nefertiti (if Akhenaton was his father really!). He was married to his probably half-sister Ankhesenamun and had twin girls who were stillborn and buried with him in the tomb. But even Ankhesenamun’s fate is unknown, as she was made to marry Aye after her husband’s death then just disappeared out of existence.

We know that Tutankhamun was the King that brought back the old religion after the revolution of Akhenaton, who banned the worship of Amun in favor of the one god Aten (Atenism), which was represented by “the disk of the Sun”. This gained him instant popularity with the priests and the people, so he was a loved king! Contrary to what was concluded that he was buried in haste, clues have shown that the mummification process and burial took their due course.

For some reason when Horemheb came to power he deleted all evidence of existence of his predecessors Akhenaten, Neferneferuaten, Smenkhkare, Tutankhamun, and Aye who were erased from the official lists of Pharaohs which instead reported that Amenhotep III was immediately succeeded by Horemheb. This may have been a way for Horemheb to delete all trace of Atenism and of any pharaoh associated with it from historical record. Akhenaten’s name never appeared on any of the king lists compiled by later Pharaohs and it was not until the late 19th century that his identity was re-discovered and the surviving traces of his reign were unearthed by archaeologists.

Before Howard Carter discovered Tutankhamun’s intact tomb in 1922 the world had never heard of King Tutankhamun and the discovery led to a renewed public interest in ancient Egypt. Since then his burial mask has become synonymous with all of Egyptian history. But at the time of discovery Carter and his team basically dismantled the corpse while looking for amulets and other jewelry. The mummy’s head was removed and nearly every major joint severed, furthermore, many of its parts present at the original examination are now missing. But then if Carter hadn’t cut the mummy free from the hardened resin that cemented it fast in the wooden coffin, thieves would certainly ripped it apart to remove the gold.

Archaeology has significantly changed over the years, back then it was more important to discover and collect treasures, not paying enough or any attention to details of life and the intriguing mysteries of death, even if that meant leaving the antiquities badly damaged or in a critical state.

Since 1926, the mummy has been X-rayed three times: first in 1968 by a group from the University of Liverpool led by Dr. R. G. Harrison, then in 1978 by a group from the University of Michigan, and finally in 2005 a team of Egyptian scientists led by Secretary General of the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities, Dr. Zahi Hawass, who conducted a CT scan on the mummy, acquiring 1,700 three dimensional images during the 15 minute scan.

The early X-rays raised alarms that the deceased was murdered. But did the young pharaoh die from a blow to the head? Well …..apparently not!! After the detailed CT scans taken recently King Tut died of natural causes. Although some Egyptologists and amateur sleuths have long speculated that a stealthy foe murdered Tut by attacking him from behind, the evidence is all circumstantial, with very little reason to believe that murder was the primary scenario.
So lets look at evidence just a tad-bit closer. Among claims that King Tut may have died of the Black Plague (which had appeared at the time), of lung disease, poison or even a brain tumor, the major allegation of a fatal blow to the back of the head have all proved futile.

The damage to the skull that raised cahoots has proven to be due to damage by the embalmers during the mummification process or carelessness of the Carter team. What was actually determined, though speculation, but the most agreed on, is the fact that there was a fracture found on the left leg of the mummy, which did not show evidence of healing, meaning that it was received just before death.

And again from what we learnt of his life painted on the walls of his burial chamber, like all Pharaohs, King Tutankhamun studied reading, writing, mathematics, geology, astronomy, a foreign language and for fun and relaxation he learnt, archery, wrestling and how to drive a chariot. But as it seems he had a deep infatuation with hunting, which may have been the root cause of his demise. Whatever caused the fractured thigh bone is likely to have also caused an open wound that was serious enough to cause an infection, fever and death. Although the break itself would not have been life-threatening, but gangrene caused by a badly broken leg was the most likely culprit. So was it a hunting accident that brought the end to a Dynasty of Kings? We may never know.

Many questions have yet to be answered about the life and death of the Boy-King, and may even remain a mystery buried under the sands of time like many still unsolved mysteries of the Valley of the Kings.

About the Author:
Gawhara Hanem
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Egypt Tours