I think we all know the famous female pharaoh Hatshepsut, right? But one thing almost nobody knows is that she was a scientific woman who worked in the field of botany.
Hatshepsut lived in 1500 B.C. in Ancient Egypt, and reigned between 1473 B.C. and 1458 B.C. Her appointment as pharaoh occurred differently than it usually did at the time, because women were not pharaohs unless something happened, and that's what happened to Hatshepsut. Her husband and half brother, Pharaoh Thutmose II, died, leaving her and her children to take over the reign. Usually, when this happens, the person who takes the throne is the son of the pharaoh with the queen, but since Hatshepsut had only one female daughter, Neferure, the person who would be appointed to the throne was the son of Thutmose II with one of his other wives*. Since Thutmose III was only a child, Hatshepsut assumed the throne with the intention of ruling until her stepson was old enough to become pharaoh. Something that didn't happen. After seven years of reign, Hatshepsut declared herself king, and began to be depicted in Egyptian scriptures as a muscular man with a beard and masculine features, in order to reinforce that she was king and that nothing would change. Even after Thutmose III was old enough, Hatshepsut continued in power, reigning jointly with her stepson, but evidently being the head king (“Hatshepsut | Biography, Reign, & Facts | Britannica,” 2021). The reign of Hatshepsut and Thutmose III is believed to have been peaceful, based on a policy of barter and negotiation rather than war, but there are traces of some military actions ordered by Hatshepsut in Nibia**.
It is through this policy of barter that Hatshepsut had her influence on science. Punt was a trading center on the East African coast, where the pharaoh collected numerous plants that were not common in Egypt (JANICK, 2007). Hatshepsut's greatest innovation in botany was that instead of just collecting and trading supplies of the plant resins to make incense and perfumes, she collected seedlings, plants, and living trees to take back to Egypt and make her own supplies (THE GARDENS TRUST, 2020). Being larger than today, the power of medicinal plants at that time was very valuable, so bringing seedlings of trees and some plants considered magical and remedies was something innovative and very important to Egyptian and world history. In this expedition, it is believed that the plants that the pharaoh brought to Egypt were the biblical olibanum resin from the Boswellia plant and the Commiphora (JANICK, 2007). It is believed that Hatshepsut lived and died fascinated by plants, which she planted in her temple and funerary monument, one of her greatest feats.
Why was Hatshepsut erased from history for so long?
Because Hatshepsut was a female pharaoh, and because she was crowned king along with her stepson, Thutmose III ordered that all statues made in honor of the pharaoh as well as her temple and funerary monument be destroyed, in order to erase her from history. Many historians believed that this was done out of feelings of envy, disgust and anger towards Hatshepsut, but today it is believed that Thutmose III did this in order to reset the history of the pharaohs, and in order not to cause confusion and complications in the future, he did not want there to be any traces that any woman would have been pharaoh, but that the throne would have gone directly to him (WILSON, 2006).
Hatshepsut, for sure, is a woman of extreme importance to the scientific area, not only for being the first of the few pharaohs that existed, but also for innovating in the area of botany, bringing exotic and different plants to Egypt while taking supplies from Egypt to the world.
*It was common in Ancient Egypt for pharaohs to have more than one wife, but only one was considered the chief queen, in this case, Hatshepsut.
**Territory currently divided between Egypt and Sudan.
Sources:
JANICK, Jules. Plant Exploration: From Queen Hatshepsut to Sir Joseph Banks. Department of Horticulture and Landscape Architecture, 625 Agriculture Mall Drive, Purdue University, West Lafayette, VOL. 42(2), p. 191-196, Abril, 2007, Disponível em: <https://www.hort.purdue.edu/>.
VIEW ALL POSTS BY THE GARDENS TRUST. Hatshepsut and Thutmosis. Disponível em: <https://thegardenstrust.blog/>.
TYLDESLEY, Joyce. "Hatshepsut". Encyclopedia Britannica. Disponível em: <https://www.britannica.com/>.
WILSON, E. B. The Queen Who Would Be King. Disponível em: <https://www.smithsonianmag.com/>.
Núbia. In Britannica Escola. Web, 2021. Disponível em:
O mistério de Hatshepsut, a faraó “apagada da história” - BBC News Brasil. Disponível em: <https://www.bbc.com/>.
JARUS, O. Hatshepsut: Powerful Female Pharaoh. Disponível em: <https://www.livescience.com/>.
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