Hatshepsut

黄叶知得汉宫秋

Hatshepsut (around 1479–1458 BCE) was a powerful female pharaoh of Egypt’s 18th Dynasty. She first acted as regent for her young stepson Thutmose III but soon took the full title of king. To support her rule, she was often shown in art wearing male pharaonic clothes and a false beard. Her time in power brought peace and great building projects. One of her biggest achievements was sending a trading expedition to the land of Punt, which returned with valuable goods such as gold, ebony, and incense.
Her most famous monument is the mortuary temple at Deir el-Bahri (called Djeser-Djeseru, meaning “Holy of Holies”). Built against steep cliffs on the west bank of the Nile near Luxor, the temple has three wide terraces connected by long ramps. It includes beautiful colonnades, chapels for gods like Amun and Hathor, and wall carvings that show her divine birth and the Punt voyage. The design fits perfectly into the natural landscape and is considered a masterpiece of ancient Egyptian architecture. After her death, some later rulers tried to remove her name from the records, but the temple still stands today and is a major tourist site.


Britannica, “Hatshepsut | Biography, Reign, & Facts”
Wikipedia, “Mortuary temple of Hatshepsut” (with references to archaeological sources)
Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities website (egymonuments.gov.eg), page on Hatshepsut Temple
National Geographic, article on the Temple of Hatshepsut in Luxor