![]() Groomed for an important role as a high priestess from birth, Hatshepsut, through a combination of good fortune and ruthless strategy, “scaled the mountain to kingship.” Her role ostensibly “decreed by nothing less than a divine revelation” is shrouded in mystery by a limited historical record concerned too frequently with the “supernatural mechanisms of divine authority.” The high points of this ambitious project are to be found in Cooney’s keen sense for the visual elements of Hatshepsut’s gender-defying rule and expert inferences on the psychologies of Hatshepsut and her contemporaries. What it lacked, however, was comprehensive documentation-something UCLA Egyptologist Cooney offers in a narrative biography supplemented by scholarly hypotheses that attempt to flesh out the uncertainties. The life of Hatshepsut, Egypt’s second female pharaoh, was replete with opulent living, complex royal bloodlines, and sexual energy in short, the kind of drama that fuels Ancient Egypt’s enduring appeal. ![]()
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