KarlMarx
06-27-2007, 06:20 AM
CAIRO, June 26 -- The centuries-old search for the mummy of Queen Hatshepsut, Egypt's most famous female pharaoh, may finally have ended.
According to US-based Discovery Channel, Egypt's antiquities supremo Zahi Hawass will announce at a media conference in Cairo on Wednesday "the most important find in Egypt's Valley of the Kings since the discovery of Tutankhamun" in 1922.
Egyptology discussion boards have been abuzz with the news that the one of the most important discoveries in Egypt's history could be announced soon.
A broken tooth was the latest clue which led archaeologists to explore the possibility they had indeed found Hatshepsut.
.... remainder of article at link below
http://news.africast.com/africastv/article.php?newsID=62289
This is, indeed, big news. In spite of popular belief, few mummies of pharaohs have survived to this day. Even fewer of the more well known ones. Hatshepsut is one of the most well known pharaohs, in Egyptological circles that is.
Hatshepsut was one of a handful of female pharaohs (the most famous being Cleopatra). Hatshepsut was King Tut's great-great aunt (sort of). She reigned during the Eighteenth Dynasty, when Egypt was at the peak of its power. Her biggest claim to fame, however, isn't just the fact that she was a female pharaoh, but how she went about it. She reigned as a co-regent to her young step-son Thutmose III, but as he grew older, she pushed him aside and reigned as pharaoh in her own right. She also had herself portrayed as a male in temple inscriptions and in her tomb to pass herself off as a valid pharaoh.
Eventually, however, Thutmose found a way of getting her out of the way and established himself as pharaoh. With divine order (Ma'at) restored, Thutmose began a systematic campaign of having her name expunged from all inscriptions and kings' lists. Her existence was rediscovered by archaeologists in the 18th or 19th centuries.
You could say (and I definitely do ) that Hatshepsut was a lot like a modern day female presidential candidate and just as big a schemer!
According to US-based Discovery Channel, Egypt's antiquities supremo Zahi Hawass will announce at a media conference in Cairo on Wednesday "the most important find in Egypt's Valley of the Kings since the discovery of Tutankhamun" in 1922.
Egyptology discussion boards have been abuzz with the news that the one of the most important discoveries in Egypt's history could be announced soon.
A broken tooth was the latest clue which led archaeologists to explore the possibility they had indeed found Hatshepsut.
.... remainder of article at link below
http://news.africast.com/africastv/article.php?newsID=62289
This is, indeed, big news. In spite of popular belief, few mummies of pharaohs have survived to this day. Even fewer of the more well known ones. Hatshepsut is one of the most well known pharaohs, in Egyptological circles that is.
Hatshepsut was one of a handful of female pharaohs (the most famous being Cleopatra). Hatshepsut was King Tut's great-great aunt (sort of). She reigned during the Eighteenth Dynasty, when Egypt was at the peak of its power. Her biggest claim to fame, however, isn't just the fact that she was a female pharaoh, but how she went about it. She reigned as a co-regent to her young step-son Thutmose III, but as he grew older, she pushed him aside and reigned as pharaoh in her own right. She also had herself portrayed as a male in temple inscriptions and in her tomb to pass herself off as a valid pharaoh.
Eventually, however, Thutmose found a way of getting her out of the way and established himself as pharaoh. With divine order (Ma'at) restored, Thutmose began a systematic campaign of having her name expunged from all inscriptions and kings' lists. Her existence was rediscovered by archaeologists in the 18th or 19th centuries.
You could say (and I definitely do ) that Hatshepsut was a lot like a modern day female presidential candidate and just as big a schemer!