Hatshepsut
(about 1507 BC – about 1458 BC)
The woman who reigned over Egypt with the male title of pharaoh
Until about 1479 BC, Hatshepsut had been the wife of the Egyptian ruler Thutmose II , her half-brother (both were sons of Thutmose I ). As the daughter and wife of a pharaoh she had held important roles, but always remaining seemingly in the background, as she suited a woman. When her husband died she awaited the onerous task of governing in place of the young stepson, the one who about twenty years later would reign under the name of Thutmose III . For some years she adhered to her role as regent, then she decided (it is not known exactly in which period) to assume, although she was a woman, the title of pharaoh: an event that had never occurred in the history of ancient Egypt.
From then on she was portrayed in the male clothes with the fake beard of the Egyptian rulers. Her official attitude was identical in all respects to that of a man. She surrounded by valid administrators, she supported a foreign policy based essentially on trade . During her reign there were no major wars, but massive attempts to open routes to African markets. The ships, set sail from Egypt with weapons and jewels, returned loaded with ivory, ebony, plants, animals. On her death, presumably in 1458 BC, Thutmose II, the lawful king long ousted, came to power, but Egypt lost a great and charismatic pharaoh … woman.
Nefertiti
(about 1370 BC – about 1330 BC)
The Great Egyptian Royal Bride of the Sun and Pharaoh Queen
Nefertiti, the wife of the pharaoh Akhenaten is undoubtedly one of the most fascinating characters of the New Kingdom (1580-1085 AC. BC) and of all Egyptian history. Much has been discussed about Nefertiti’s beauty and her origins.
“Lady of happiness, with a luminous face,” says of her the text of a stone-stone from the city of Aten “joyfully adorned with the double feather, endowed with all the virtues, at whose voice we rejoice, lady full of grace, great in love, whose feelings make the lord of the Two Countries happy. ” The name Nefertiti, typically Egyptian, Nefertiti means ” the beauty has arrived ” and refers to her divine function. This “beautiful” is the distant goddess who, after leaving the creator Sun, left for the Nubian desert.
Without her, the Two Lands are doomed to sterility and desolation. Thanks to the intervention of the gods, in particular of Thot and Shu, the distant goddess will return to Egypt, and nature and all living beings will know happiness again.
Nefertiti is the incarnation of this goddess who comes or, more precisely, who returns to bestow her love on the pharaoh, so that he may shine like a sun. Nefertiti joined her husband in the great but ephemeral religious revolution that tried to impose the cult of the one. god Aten, the solar disk. Together, Akhenaton and Nefertiti were responsible for the creation of a new henotheistic religion which caused upheavals within the ancient Egyptian religion and some political unrest for twenty years.
The royal couple used to reward their faithful, who presented themselves in front of the palace, from the window of which Nefertiti and Akhenaton looked out, with their heads encircled by the crown. Nefertiti could perform this rite alone and, more importantly, the beneficiary could be a woman. No other Egyptian queen appears as firmly linked to her husband’s throne as Nefertiti: the representations of her alongside Akhenaten conferred on her hitherto unmatched honors, as well as the numerous scenes of intimacy and affection of the royal couple that have survived until today. Some Egyptologists believe that Nefertiti reigned briefly as Neferneferuaton after the death of her husband (ca. 1334 BC).
Cleopatra
(Alexandria of Egypt, January 69 BC – Alexandria of Egypt, August 12 30 BC)
The best-known Egyptian queen in history
Cleopatra VII was born in Alexandria of Egypt in 69 BC, daughter of the pharaoh Ptolemy XII who, on the death of her father (51 BC), was forced to marry her twelve-year-old brother Ptolemy XII with whom she ascended the throne and who during the third year of reign exiled the young sister who finds refuge in Syria. From her exile Cleopatra manages to defend her cause so well that, with the arrival of Julius Caesar, she can fully claim her rights as queen. Despite her young age, she is intelligent, cultured, and polyglot (apparently she is able to speak seven or even twelve languages ​​and is the first Macedonian queen to learn Egyptian to better govern her people) and, above all, she is perfectly aware of its own charm.
The story of the meeting between the two is now almost a legend: Julius Caesar he arrives in Egypt in pursuit of Pompey, of which he is made to find only the head. Pompey was killed by the assassins of the pharaoh Ptolemy who tries in this way to obtain the favors of Caesar. While he is at the palace, however, he receives a precious carpet as a gift that begins to unroll and from which the splendid eighteen-year-old queen Cleopatra emerges. Much has been written about the love story of the two and even fabled, probably the union is the result of calculation by both Cleopatra and Julius Caesar, interested in an alliance with Egypt for economic reasons. From the relationship a son is born, to whom they give the name of Ptolemy Caesar or Cesarione. Meanwhile, Caesar defeats the Egyptians, kills the young pharaoh Ptolemy XII and installs Cleopatra on the throne .. However, respecting Egyptian traditions, Cleopatra must share the new throne with her younger brother Ptolemy XI, whom she is forced to marry. Once the stability of her kingdom is ensured, she moves to Rome with her son and here she officially lives as Caesar’s lover. The political intent of Cleopatra, who turns out to be an excellent strategist, is however to protect integrityof his reign from the increasingly invasive Roman expansionism. The fate of poor Caesarion, however, will not be happy, despite his descent; Caesar’s true male heir will be considered Gaius Julius Caesar Octavian, who will get rid of the importunate descendant at the first opportunity. After the assassination of Julius Caesar in the ides of March 44 BC, the political situation no longer allows Cleopatra to remain in Rome, and she leaves for Egypt.
According to some sources, back home, she poisons her brother Ptolemy XI and rules with her son Cesarione.
At the end of the civil war following the death of Julius Caesar, Cleopatra is linked to Antony. Marco Antoniohe has the task of governing the Eastern provinces and during a campaign, undertaken to put down a revolt, he meets Cleopatra. Characterized by an exuberant and lively personality, he is fascinated by the Egyptian queen and a relationship begins between the two. While he is at the court of Alexandria, Antonio receives the news of the death of his wife Fulvia, responsible for having led a revolt against Octavian. Antony returns to Rome and, to strengthen the bond with Octavian, marries his sister Octavia in 40 BC Dissatisfied with Octavian’s conduct in the war against the Parthians, Antony ends up returning to Egypt, where Cleopatra has in the meantime had twins, which will be followed by a third child and the marriage between the two, although Antonio is still married to Octavia. Cleopatra,great kingdom , whose capital should be the most evolved Alexandria of Egypt and not Rome. She therefore grants Antony the use of the Egyptian militias, with which he conquers Armenia. Cleopatra is named queen of kings, associated with the cult of the goddess Isis and appointed regent with her son Caesarion. The couple’s maneuvers worry Octavian who leads Rome to declare war on Egypt. The Egyptian militias led by Antony and the Roman ones led by Octavian clash in Actium on 2 September 31 BC: Antony and Cleopatra are defeated. When the Romans come to conquer the city of Alexandria, the two lovers resolve to suicide.
It is August 12 of the year 30 BC. In reality, Anthony commits suicide following the false news of the suicide of his Cleopatra, who, in turn, commits suicide by being bitten by an asp.
Some recent studies, however, deny the possibility that she could have died as a result of the bite of an asp. Cleopatra is a great expert on poisons and she knows that using that methodology her agony would be very long. She probably must have concocted this story to make her people appear even more like the reincarnation of Isis, but she must have poisoned herself using a previously prepared mixture of poisons.
Elizabeth I
(Greenwich 1533 – Richmond 1603)
The Virgin Queen who transformed England into a maritime power
The Virgin Queen held her empire for fifty years without marrying and therefore without relying on a king, she participated in the golden age of England so much so that no queen, except the current one, could catch up and take that name. Originally she was appealed with the name of “the bastard” as the daughter of the clandestine relationship between Henry VIII and Anna Bolena while he was still trying to divorce his first wife Catherine of Aragon with whom she had her first daughter Maria.
On November 17, 1558 Elizabeth ascended the English throne in place of her half-sister Maria Tudor .
The country over which she was called to reign, England, was torn internally by the struggles between Catholics and Protestants.
The government of the Catholic Maria (known as the “Sanguinaria” for the systematic elimination of dissidents) had in fact contributed to creating a deep furrow among the subjects of the various religious faiths. Raised amid conspiracies and assassinations, not least that of her mother, Anna Bolena, the new queen had to learn from an early age to juggle the pitfalls of politics.
The means she employed did not differ much from those of the deceased sovereign, but combining them with an innate diplomatic ability and a predisposition for politics, Elizabeth managed to achieve what none of her predecessors, not even the skilled father Henry VIII , was managed to achieve: unity, and consequently, the strengthening of England.
After reiterating the Act of Supremacy in 1559 (drawn up in 1534 by his father) and having established, with the Act of Uniformity , a book of prayers valid for all, he definitively consecrated the Anglican (Protestant) religion. His reign was marked by the flourishing of art and commerce. Surrounded by writers, a lover of dance and music, Elizabeth was essentially a practical woman. Secretly backing piracy(the corsairs in his service attacked and robbed foreign ships, especially Spanish ones), gave new impetus to the merchant fleet. Following the victory of his ships over those of the Spanish king Philip II in the English Channel (1588), England became the true ruler of the seas. On her death in 1603, her nephew James I of Scotland, son of her murdered cousin Mary Stuart, inherited the English crown.
Maria Teresa of Austria
The empress who fought to have her right to the throne recognized
Archduchess, queen, duchess, and empress.
At the end of October 1740 the Austrian sovereign Charles VI passed away, leaving the Habsburg dominions (Austria, Hungary, Bohemia and the Milanese dukedom) to his daughter Maria Teresa.
This passage was possible thanks to a document, the Pragmatic Sanction , issued in 1713 by the emperor to guarantee a lineage also to the women of the Habsburg family.
However, some European sovereigns contested this succession and started a long eight-year war, later remembered as the ” War of the Austrian Succession ” (1740-1748). The first years of Maria Theresa’s reign were marred by continuous conflicts, which on several occasions seriously threatened her domains.
Grown up without adequate preparation for command, she managed, thanks to her practical nature, to limit the damage caused by the inefficiency of her generals, proving to be much more shrewd than her husband, Francesco Stefano di Lorena, (married in 1736) in managing the army. At the end of the war, with the peace of Aachen(1748), which cost her the cession of a region rich in mineral deposits, Silesia, to Prussia, the queen, who had understood, on the ground, the military and organizational limits of her nation, carried out a series of administrative reforms public: financial, scholastic, military … Thanks to its clever system of government, the territories of the Habsburgs flourished both economically and culturally. In 1756, allying herself with the French monarchy, she clashed again with the bitter Prussian rival Frederick II for the reconquest of Silesia (” Seven Years ‘ War“) and once again she was severely defeated. From 1765 the queen, whom the Austrian people had learned to respect and love as a strict and just mother, ruled together with her son Joseph II, who succeeded her in 1780.
To marry Maria Theresa, Francesco Stefano di Lorena was forced in 1736 to cede the Lorraine he had inherited from his father to France, in order to allow the immediate conclusion of the war between the future father-in-law Charles VI and the French Louis XV. This loss, however, was amply rewarded by the honors that his wife reserved for him throughout his life. In 1745 Maria teresa was the architect of her coronation as emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. Theirs was a marriage of love, as evidenced by the birth of sixteen children in just twenty-nine years of union. When Marie Antoinette(1755-1793), penultimate of the sixteen children of Maria Theresa, arrived in France for the first time in 1770, was the young wife of the heir to the French throne, the future Louis XVI (1754-1793), and was therefore celebrated with warmth from the French people. A few years after the wedding, the feelings of the subjects towards the charming princess had already changed profoundly. She scornfully referred to as “the Austrian”, she began to be harshly criticized for her excessive spending and lack of attachment to France. Her voices and discontent were replaced, with the passage of time, by real signs of revolt culminating in the outbreak of the French Revolution (1789). Four years later, in 1793, Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI were sentenced to death and destined for the guillotine.
Catherine II of Russia
(Stettin 1729 – St Petersburg 1796)
The tsarina who ruled with an iron fist and called poets and writers to her court
In the years between 1725 and 1796, Russia was ruled by four women. If you think that, before the reforms of the Tsar (emperor) Peter I “the great”, Russian noblewomen were granted almost no relationship with men who did not belong to their family, this long female domination seems even more amazing. The tsarine who succeeded each other to the throne, Catherine I , Anna Ivanovna , Elizabeth Petrovna and Catherine II, they were united by their charisma, their unscrupulousness and their lively intelligence. In various ways they all continued the work begun by Tsar Peter I, that is to bring Russia closer to Europe culturally, calling foreign intellectuals to their court and sponsoring art and science.
On June 28, 1762, Catherine, wife of Tsar Peter III, carried out a coup d’état supported by the army . Her husband, dismissed and incarcerated, died, probably murdered, a few days later. From then on, a courageous woman, Catherine II, known as ” the great “, would have reigned over Russia (for over thirty years). Daughter of a German prince, no one would have expected, given her low rank of nobility, such a great success. From the moment of her arrival in Russia, to marry the heir to the throne (1745) until her official proclamation as Tsarina(22 September 1762), however, Catherine had to fight not to succumb to the climate of suspicion and intrigue that reigned at the Tsar’s court. Intelligent and a lover of culture, she was dominated by her husband, a narrow-minded man devoted to drinking, and by the fluctuating moods of the Empress Elizabeth. Having reached the imperial throne, she worked hard to give the Russian people a more just legislative code . Taking a cue from the theories developed by European thinkers, you wrote a document, the Nakaz, which was to serve as a basis for the legislative assembly’s discussions. However, this closed in 1768 without having actually changed the legal system in force. If Caterina did not achieve great results in terms of domestic politics, she achieved incredible military successes. Defeated the Turks in the First Russian Turkish War (1768-1774), it met again with success against the Ottoman Empire between 1787 and 1792. During his reign, as a consequence of the fall of the Polish monarchy, Russia was able to annex immense expanses of land in the West at the expense of Poland.
Victory of England
(London 1819 – Osborne 1901)
The queen who turned England into a colonial empire
On June 20, 1837, less than a month after coming of age, Victoria Hanover became Queen of England. Up to that point she had lived in Kensington Palace almost as if she were a recluse. Her contacts with her court had been sporadic, hampered by her mother’s aims for power and by the distrust of King William IV . Upon the death of the ruler, she Victoria freed herself completely of her maternal tutelage, so that she could rule independently, and she moved to Buckingham Palace. Not yet crowned queen (her solemn investiture took place on June 28, 1838 in Westminster Cathedral), she had to face a difficult moment for the internal politics of her country.
The growing exasperation of the humblest strata of the population led in 1837 to the birth of Chartism , a movement that demanded, through petitions and riots in the streets, a series of social reforms (from the right to vote to the reduction of working days). The first decade of his reign was therefore troubled by popular discontent, by the continuous parliamentary crises and by the news of the national uprisings that afflicted most of the European states (Italy, France …). Many members of the British political class and the queen herself feared that identical insurrections against the monarchy could also take place in England. During this dramatic period Vittoria, inexperienced in the art of command, found a valid consultant in her balanced husband.Albert of Saxe Coburg , married on 10 February 1840. In 1851, the year in which the first International Exhibition was held successfully in London, the dangers run by the English crown seemed in part to be averted, also thanks to the advice and directives proposed by the wise Alberto. Vittoria, however, could not count for long on her beloved wife, who died prematurely in 1861, on the eve of the second world fair in London. The determination that she had marked her from a young age did not fail, however. In addition to managing a very large family (she had nine children and a surprising number of grandchildren), she knew how to ferry her people towards the new century, the twentieth century. Although during her reign there was no lack of lacerating contradictions (such as increasing industrialization at the expense of the deterioration of the living conditions of workers), at her death England was a prosperous country, technologically at thecolonial possessions in Africa and Asia (in 1876 Vittoria had assumed the title of empress of the Indies). With the death of the great sovereign, a century of economic, political and social transformations ended definitively, giving way to modernity.
Elizabeth II
The queen with the record of longevity on the throne
Queen of Great Britain and Ireland, eldest daughter of the Duke and Duchess of York, was born in London on April 21, 1926. Five weeks later, she was baptized in the chapel of Buckingham Palace with the name of Elizabeth Alexandra Maria .
His childhood is stimulating and full of insights into the most varied interests: literature, and theater, but he also studies art and music; in addition, she learns to ride a horse until she becomes an excellent rider.
At the age of only eighteen he became Councilor of State , an important figure who supported the king in important decisions. To practice politics, he meets with the Prime Minister weekly to discuss important decisions.
During the Second World War he spent himself on the front line practicing as a soldier (with the role of second lieutenant) in army duties involving the use of women. However, he also learns to drive trucks, among other things learning to repair engines and to cope in any situation or problem that sees vehicles or vehicles used.
On November 20, 1947, she finally married a distant cousin, the Duke of Edinburgh Philip Mountbatten. The princess is only 21 years old but she is already a mature woman with a strong and determined character. This will be of considerable help, given that shortly thereafter, and precisely in 1951 , during a trip around the world (which included the most disparate stages, from Kenya to Australia via Canada), her father King George YOU dies and Elizabeth finds herself catapulted onto one of the most important thrones in the world, with centuries of tradition behind her. It is 1952 and the queen is only 26 years old, the Second World War has just ended, leaving the whole of Europe prostrate, not excluding England. Indeed, your country has made a fundamental contribution in coping with the barbaric Nazi troops, who tried several times to make the Anglo-Saxon people capitulate.
It should be noted, among other things, that his coronation , which takes place on June 2, 1953 , is the first event of its kind to have enjoyed television coverage . The ceremony is attended by all the political representatives of Brittany, the prime ministers and heads of all the countries of the Commonwealth and the major representatives of foreign states. In this sense, one can already glimpse a sign of the enormous media exposure that will mark the reign of the Windsor family in the years to come.
Extremely popular queen, she does not spare her presence in public, with a devotion to the “cause” truly commendable and much appreciated by her subjects. In terms of travel and travel, she beats all the records of previous throne holders.
In 1977 Elizabeth celebrates the Silver Jubilee, the 25th anniversary of her accession to the throne, while in 2002 solemn celebrations celebrate her 50th anniversary with the crown. On a strictly family level, four children are born from her marriage: the well-known and talked-about Prince Charles, Prince Andrew, Princess Anne and Prince Edward.
On 9 September 2015, he surpassed the record of longevity on the throne that belonged to Queen Victoria (over 63 years of reign) and on Monday 6 February 2017 he celebrated his 65 years of reign, thus begins the first year of the Sapphire Jubilee in British history .
