The star. (Reynoldsville, Pa.) 1892-1946, 1907-02-13
QUEEN HATAsUs CAREER.
Prof. NaviIIe's Account of the Woman
Who Ruled All Egypt.

monuments of the only woman who In
the course of 5000 years ever ruled
over United Egypt. Hatasu, Hatshep-
sut or Hatshopsitu, as the vagaries of
Egyptian transliteration have caused
her ito be successfully called, was the
daughter Of Thothmes l. and Queen
Aasmes. AS she was Of royal blood on
both sides, she had claims to the
throne superior to those of her half
brother, also called Thothmes, and as
she must have early shown a capacity
for sovereignty, she was during her
fathers lifetime associated with him
on the throne and brought up with the
masculine name of Ka-ma-ra, or, as NJ.
Maspero prefers to read it, Makeri.
Yet the Egyptians evidently did not
take kindly to the idea of a female
sovereign, and Hatasu found it expe-
dient-as NJ. Naville thinks, while her
father was alive-to marry her half
brother, who later reigned with her as
her consort under the title of Thoth-
mes ii.
On her husbands death, which, ac-
cording to M. Naville, occurred about
the third year Of his reign. Hatasu
usurped the throne, though acknowl-
edging the right of her nephew to sue
ceed her husband. For some twenty
years she reigned, calling herself
King and not Queen of Egypt, as she
had done during her husbands life
time. Yet she associated her nephew
with her on the throne, as her father
had done with herself, and when she
died he succeeded her and became the
greatest conqueror that Egypt ever
produced. M. Naville thinks that the
relations of the aunt and the nephew
were better than is generally sup
posed, and points out that the whole
sale erasure of Hatasu's name from
the monuments did not take place un-
til the close of the conqueror's sole
reign. But all the facts that can
be verified about Hatasu are as here
stated, and the recent attempt of the
Berlin school to establish a series of
dethronements and restorations, In
the course of which Thothmes III.
married his aunt and Thothmes II. al
lied himself with his still living father
and cast the pair off the throne, has
been entirely knocked on the head by
M. Legrain's discovery at Karnak Of
many bas-reliefs showing Thothmes
II. as king. with Hatasu, in the de.
pendent position of queen, standing
behind him.
In other matters, too M. Naville,
without travelling out of the record Of
ascertained facts, gives us much need
ed information. He was still suffer
ing from the waste and ruin of the
Hyksos invasion, and that 1t was prob
ably due to her wise and peaceful rule
that Thothmes III. found the land able
to support the drain of blood and
treasure imposed by his own Napo-
lenoic policy. That she throughout
strove with success to establish COM
mercial relations with neighboring ma
tions is shown by her famous expedi-
ton to Punt, and M. Naville explains
that much of the treasure which Egyp-
tan kings were in the habit of dis
playing on their monuments as tribute
really consisted Of foreign goods OBJ
tanned by purchase or barter.
He is also very instructive on the
ceremonies attaching to Egyptian roy
atty, and shows from many examples
taken from Hatasu's monuments that
the royal ka, or double, was wor-
shipped during the life Of its living
counterpart, and that the many cor
onation scenes where the Pharoah is
depicted as being crowned, baptized
and installed on different thrones by
various animal headed gods represent
ceremonies that were actually per-
formed, the parts of the deities being
filled by masked priests. 1t is curl
GUS also to note that the cutting out
Of former kings name from public
monuments-a practice which has de-
scended to modern times-was
thought really to lead to his annihila-
tion in the under world, and that the
fashion Of walking backward in the
presence of royalty seems to be also
derived from the ways of the priests
in the sanctuary where the royal
image was set up. In all these mat
ters M. Naville's long study Of the
temples that he has for many years
successfully excavated at DER ell Ba-
hari makes his conclusions especially