Thutmose III

Early life and Hatshepsut

Thutmose III was the son of King Thutmose II and a secondary wife named Iset. He was still a small child, about three years old by one estimate, when his father died around 1479 BCE. His father's principal wife, Hatshepsut, became regent and then took the full titles of pharaoh, ruling for about two decades. Dates for Thutmose's reign are therefore usually counted from 1479 BCE, though he ruled alone only after Hatshepsut died around 1458 BCE. Before the end of her reign he had already been given command of the army.

Megiddo

When Hatshepsut died, a coalition of Canaanite and Syrian city-states led by Kadesh and Megiddo rose against Egyptian control. In his year 23, around 1457 BCE, Thutmose marched north. The Egyptian account, carved in the Temple of Amun at Karnak and based on records kept by the military scribe Tjaneni, describes his officers urging him to avoid a narrow mountain pass. The king insisted on taking it himself at the head of the army. The Egyptians routed the coalition outside Megiddo, but soldiers stopped to plunder, giving the enemy time to reach the city, which then had to be besieged. The account lists hundreds of prisoners, more than 2,000 horses, 924 chariots and great quantities of livestock. World History Encyclopedia notes it is the first battle recorded in such detail.

Empire

Over about twenty years Thutmose led some seventeen campaigns. He eventually moved against Kadesh in Syria and set up a stele on the bank of the Euphrates, recalled in a victory hymn at Karnak. His campaigns in Nubia were just as successful, extending Egyptian control as far as the Fifth Cataract of the Nile. By the end of these wars Egypt's empire reached from the Euphrates in the north to the Fifth Cataract in the south.

Builder

Thutmose commissioned more than fifty temples, according to World History Encyclopedia, and gave more to the Temple of Amun at Karnak than any other king. The Metropolitan Museum holds a colossal granite statue of him from the temple of the war god Montu at Medamud, near Thebes, carved in the mature style of his later years.

Hatshepsut's erasure and legacy

At some point after her death, Hatshepsut's names and images were cut from many public monuments. Scholars disagree about exactly when this happened and why. World History Encyclopedia says it certainly did not happen in the early years of his sole reign and suggests the aim was to keep her from serving as a model for future female rulers, while some have proposed that his son Amenhotep II was responsible. Thutmose died around 1425 BCE and was succeeded by Amenhotep II. He is often called "the Napoleon of Egypt" for his military record.