I interviewed Dr. Kara Cooney, Egyptologist, in July, 2007. Cooney appears in the 2007 Discovery Channel documentary, Secrets of Egypt's Lost Queen, about the identification of the mummy of the female Egyptian Pharaoh, Hatshepsut. Cooney is a post-doctoral teaching fellow at Stanford University, and has appeared in several other television programs about ancient Egypt.
While Cooney was not part of the research highlighted in the film, she was "the storyteller and the teacher." She brought both the perspective of cultural archaeology and -- important to telling the story of a female pharaoh -- a woman's perspective.
We talked mostly about Hatshepsut's story. It's important to remember, Cooney said, that Hatshepsut's historical record is "full of half-truths and embellished." What we see from the public images of Egyptian royalty in any case are "results not processes." Especially with the special circumstances of Hatshepsut's history, it's necessary to piece together Hatshepsut's history using circumstantial evidence.
Hatshepsut is important in history not just because she's a woman who ruled Egypt. Other women ruled Egypt -- but no other took on the full identity of a Pharaoh, fulfilling what was seen as inherently a male role. Other women ruled in uncertain times, and had "dramatic downfalls." Hatshepsut's rule was a time of "political stability and economic prosperity."
Cooney explained that it was likely necessary for Hatshepsut to take the extraordinary step of taking on the full pharaoh role. Hatshepsut was young when the deaths first of her father, Thutmose I, and then of her husband, Thutmose II, left her with a daughter but not a son. She was aunt and stepmother of the very young Thutmose III, son of her husband (and half-brother) by a minor wife. She would have known of the power wielded by earlier queens in the 18th dynasty -- they'd reigned as King's Mother (there's no Egyptian word equivalent to the English "queen"). In year seven of Hatshepsut's regency, she takes the unprecedented "big jump" -- she was, Cooney said, "probably partly forced into it."
Did Cooney accept the theory that the documentary seems to put forward, that Hatshepsut was actually groomed by her father (Thutmose I) to rule Egypt? She says in the documentary "I would love to believe it" but added, "it just doesn't make sense." That addition didn't make it into the documentary. "It's incredibly unlikely," Cooney added. The images of Hatshepsut being groomed or accepted as heir are part of Hatshepsut's propaganda -- the image she created after assuming the pharaoh role, to show that she was wielding legitimate authority. There's "no evidence" beyond these later images to suggest that Thutmose I ever actually considered Hatshepsut as a more legitimate heir than his son by a minor wife, Thutmose II.
Maleness and kingship went together in this period. The king's role was sexual, not just a gender role. It was linked to mythical creation and rebirth stories: Atum; Osiris, Isis, and Horus; Amun, Mut, and Khonsu. Hatshepsut taking on maleness was a ritual necessity. The "king on earth is Horus -- there is no 'next Isis.'"
So for what was Hatshepsut preparing her daughter, Neferure? For marriage to Thutmose III, when they were old enough? We don't know, Cooney said. It could have been to become high priestess, or marriage to Thutmose II, or something else. We do know that Hatshepsut in her identity as a male pharaoh needed a God's Wife -- usually the role of the pharaoh's Great Wife, usually a royal spouse. That role was also necessary for the complementarity required by the creation and rebirth myths. Atum masturbates himself and the universe into existence -- his hand is the female complement. Osiris has his Isis. Atum has Mut.
I asked Cooney about Hatshepsut's assumption of a male identity as pharaoh. Was this just for ceremonial purposes, or did she extend what some have described as cross-dressing or a transvestite preference into her private life?
Cooney responded that we really don't know. Hatshepsut's private life was, well, private. But even after her assumption of a male pharaoh identity, Hatshepsut's representation where it has to do with her expectations of the afterlife remain female. Hatshepsut expected, Cooney explained, to exist as a female in the afterlife.
