58 Facts About Thutmose III

Thutmose III, sometimes called Thutmose the Great, was the sixth pharaoh of the 18th Dynasty.

Thutmose III's firstborn son and heir to the throne, Amenemhat, predeceased Thutmose III.

When Thutmose III died, he was buried in the Valley of the Kings, as were the rest of the kings from this period in Egyptian history.

Thutmose III is regarded, along with Ramesses II, as one of the two most powerful and celebrated rulers of the New Kingdom Period of Ancient Egypt, itself considered the height of Egyptian power.

The second name is transliterated as Thutmose or Tuthmosis and means "Born of Thoth" or "Thoth is born".

Thutmose III was the son of Thutmose II by a secondary wife, Iset.

When Thutmose II died, Thutmose III was too young to rule.

Thutmosis Thutmose III had little power over the empire while Hatshepsut exercised the formal titulary of kingship.

Thutmose III's rule was quite prosperous and marked by great advancements.

When Thutmose III reached a suitable age and demonstrated the capability, she appointed him to head her armies.

Some Egyptologists speculate that Thutmose III married his half-sister, Neferure, but there is no conclusive evidence for this marriage.

Several other wives of Thutmose III are attested to by surviving records.

Thutmose III is known to have at least three foreign wives, Menwi, Merti, and Menhet, who were buried together.

Thutmose III was the mother of several of his children, including the future king Amenhotep II and another son, Menkheperre, and at least four daughters: Nebetiunet, Meryetamun, Meryetamun and Iset.

Thutmose III reigned from 1479 BC to 1425 BC according to the Low Chronology of Ancient Egypt.

The length of Thutmose III's reign is known to the day thanks to information found in the tomb of the military commander Amenemheb-Mahu.

Widely considered a military genius by historians, Thutmose III conducted at least 16 campaigns in 20 years.

Thutmose III was an active expansionist ruler, sometimes called Egypt's greatest conqueror or "the Napoleon of Egypt" by the Egyptologist James Breasted.

Thutmose III is recorded to have captured 350 cities during his rule and conquered much of the Near East from the Euphrates to Nubia during seventeen known military campaigns.

Thutmose III was the first pharaoh after Thutmose I to cross the Euphrates, doing so during his campaign against Mitanni.

Thutmose III is consistently regarded as one of the greatest of Egypt's warrior pharaohs who transformed Egypt into an international superpower by creating an empire that stretched from the Asian regions of Syria to the North, to Upper Nubia to the south.

Meyer, believed that Thutmose III had subjugated the islands of the Aegean Sea.

Thutmose III was able to conquer such a large number of lands because of revolutionary developments in military technology.

Thutmose III encountered little resistance from neighbouring kingdoms, allowing him to expand his realm of influence easily.

Thutmose III mustered his own army and departed Egypt, passing through the border fortress of Tjaru on the 25th day of the eighth month.

Thutmose III was forced to besiege the city, but he finally succeeded in conquering it after a siege of seven or eight months.

The fifth, sixth and seventh campaigns of Thutmose III were directed against the Phoenician cities in Syria and against Kadesh on the Orontes.

Thutmose III then moved inland and took the city and territory around Ardata; the town was pillaged and the wheatfields burned.

Unlike previous plundering raids, Thutmose III garrisoned the area known as Djahy, which is probably a reference to southern Syria.

Thutmose III found that by taking family members of these key people to Egypt as hostages, he could drastically increase their loyalty to him.

Thutmose III sailed directly to Byblos and made boats which he took with him over land on what appeared to otherwise be just another tour of Syria, and he proceeded with the usual raiding and pillaging as he moved north through the lands he had already taken.

Thutmose III continued north through the territory belonging to the still unconquered cities of Aleppo and Carchemish and quickly crossed the Euphrates in his boats, taking the Mitannian king entirely by surprise.

Thutmose III then went freely from city to city and pillaged them while the nobles hid in caves, or at least this is the typically propagandistic way Egyptian records chose to record it.

Thutmose III then returned to Syria by way of Niy, where he records that he engaged in an elephant hunt.

Thutmose III collected tribute from foreign powers and returned to Egypt in victory.

Thutmose III returned to Syria for his ninth campaign in his 34th year, but this appears to have been just a raid of the area called Nukhashshe, a region populated by semi-nomadic people.

Thutmose III's 11th is presumed to have happened in his 36th regnal year and his 12th is presumed to have happened in his 37th year since his 13th is mentioned at Karnak as happening in his 38th regnal year.

Thutmose III moved his troops by land up the coastal road and put down rebellions in the Arka plain and moved on Tunip.

Thutmose III engaged and destroyed three surrounding Mitannian garrisons and returned to Egypt in victory.

Thutmose III attacked Nubia, but only went so far as the fourth cataract of the Nile.

Thutmose III was a great builder and constructed over 50 temples, although some of these are now lost and only mentioned in written records.

Thutmose III commissioned the building of many tombs for nobles, which were made with greater craftsmanship than ever before.

Thutmose III's reign was a period of great stylistic changes in the sculpture, paintings and reliefs associated with construction, much of it beginning during the reign of Hatshepsut.

Thutmose III built Egypt's only known set of heraldic pillars, two large columns standing alone instead of being part of a set supporting the roof.

Thutmose III's artisans achieved new heights of skill in painting, and tombs from his reign were the earliest to be entirely painted instead of painted reliefs.

Thutmose III dedicated far more attention to Karnak than any other site.

Thutmose III built a temenos wall around the central chapel containing smaller chapels, along with workshops and storerooms.

Thutmose III undertook building projects to the south of the main temple between the sanctuary of Amun and the temple of Mut.

Thutmose III set royal colossi on both sides of the pylon and put two more obelisks on the south face in front of the gateway.

Thutmose III commissioned royal artists to depict his extensive collections of fauna and flora in the Botanical garden of Thutmosis III.

Thutmose III was in another coregency, this one with his son, who would become Amenhotep II, who is known to have attempted to identify the works of Hatshepsut as his own.

All of this evidence casts serious doubt upon the popular theory that Thutmose III ordered the destruction in a fit of vengeful rage shortly after his accession.

Thutmose III's tomb was discovered by Victor Loret in 1898 in the Valley of the Kings.

Thutmose III died one month and four days shy of the start of his 54th regnal year.

Thutmose III's mummy was discovered in the Deir el-Bahri Cache above the Mortuary Temple of Hatshepsut in 1881.

Thutmose III was interred along with those of other 18th and 19th Dynasty leaders Ahmose I, Amenhotep I, Thutmose I, Thutmose II, Ramesses I, Seti I, Ramesses II and Ramesses IX, as well as the 21st Dynasty pharaohs Pinedjem I, Pinedjem II and Siamun.

Thutmose III's mummy was not securely hidden away, for towards the close of the 20th dynasty it was torn out of the coffin by robbers, who stripped it and rifled it of the jewels with which it was covered, injuring it in their haste to carry away the spoil.

The mummy of Thutmose III resided in the Royal Mummies Hall of the Museum of Egyptian Antiquities, catalog number CG 61068, until April 2021 when his mummy was moved to National Museum of Egyptian Civilization along with those of 17 other kings and four queens in an event termed the Pharaohs' Golden Parade.