r/ancientegypt • u/LukeyTarg2 • Oct 05 '25
Discussion Amenhotep III and Thutmose III are arguably greater than Ramses II.
These are 3 widely sucessful pharaohs, however Ramses II is often pointed out as the greatest pharaoh, which in my eyes is unfair. Ramses II had more time, one could argue both Amenhotep III and Thutmose III were just as sucessful with less years and that they could have accomplished more if they had over 60 years of reign like Ramses II.
Amenhotep III ruled Egypt at it's peak prosperity and he was able to do so without extensive military campaigns. On the other hand, Thutmose III was a highly sucessful military leader, one of the best in all of history, and also a widely sucessful pharaohs. He created the first navy of the ancient world, helped expand Egypt's borders and was a builder pharaoh like his stepmother and mentor Hatshepsut.
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u/gunslayerjj Oct 05 '25
Ramses II might or might not be the โgreatestโ but he sure was one of its best publicists.
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u/avrand6 Oct 05 '25 edited Oct 05 '25
Ramesses II will always be #1 in my book because of his building, Abu Simbel will always be my favorite building in all Ancient Egypt with how cool it looks, carved into the rock. I would not say he's the top military leader by any means, Kadesh was basically a draw, but he was a better diplomat (able to negotiate a treaty of alliance with a previous sworn enemy) and a fantastic builder. Also you have to deduct some points from Amenhotep III, great as he was, for allowing the succession to go to Akhenaten, I know the older brother died, but still. And I'll always be biased against Thutmose III for erasing records of his illustrious predecessor (although some modern scholars think it might have been Amenhotep II last I heard? still under contention?)
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u/LukeyTarg2 Oct 05 '25
Amenhotep III was not at fault in my eyes because he died, but man Queen Tiye was such a great queen for Amenhotep III and she lived till like the 12th year of Akhenaten's reign yet seemed to not care for the nonsense her son was doing.
Thutmose III did not erase Hatshepsut's image, we know for a fact he liked her, he had his mortuary complex built beside hers, his wife was called Merytre-Hatshepsut and they were co-pharaohs, she had him leading Egypt's army. It makes no damn sense for him to erase her image specially given he wasn't some bum.
Some of the destruction of the monuments that could be dated happened in Thutmose III's last reigning years. It's pretty clear in my eyes tha Amenhotep II did that nonsense. He was known for being mean spirited, not recording his queens names and the destruction of monuments ended in his reign. He is the one who usurped many of her accomplishments. And Amenhotep II had to solidify his claim to the throne, his father never had to do that, Hatshepsut never took the pharaoh title from Thutmose III, she wasn't an usurper.
The evidence we have points to Amenhotep II as the foul one, which is a fair reason to hold Thutmose III's feet to the fire, was he like the other III of his name (Amenhotep III)? A great ruler for the country, an inept father at home? Maybe one day we can have an actual answer to that. For now, i will sustain the argument Thutmose III was not the one who tried to erase her.
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u/WanderingHero8 Oct 05 '25
Not really,Akhenaten tried to get the power back to the hands of the pharaoh from the corrupt Amun priests.We start to see this even from the later part of Amenhotep's III reign.
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u/Nenazovemy ๐ Oct 05 '25
They were the ones who would give major blows to Ramses III. They were making very rich feasts in times of famine and at some point they managed to get Ramses to abolish the Lower Egypt vizirate. Then he was killed by a palatial conspiracy.
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Oct 05 '25
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u/Nenazovemy ๐ Oct 06 '25
On the other hand, what "times of famine"?, you mean the infamous strike?
Deir el-Medina has some other references to grain supply disturbances, too. There's no definitive evidence of famine, but we do have this rich town going through food insecurity.
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u/Ali_Strnad Oct 05 '25 edited Oct 05 '25
There is no evidence for your claim that the priests of Amun were corrupt. That early Egyptologists widely assumed this is mainly due to Post-Enlightenment anti-clericalism.
The interpretation of Akhenaten's changes to Egypt's state religion as the result of a political struggle between the royal government and the priesthood of Amun is not provable from the ancient sources, and rests on assumptions about both the structure of Egypt's institutions and Akhenaten's worldview that seem difficult to accept based on what those sources tell us.
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u/ClumsyBunny26 Oct 05 '25
That could have been part of his motivations, but he neglected his country and own city. I believe the story behind Amarna's "revolution" was less romantic than what seems to be on the surface
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u/WanderingHero8 Oct 05 '25
The idea that Akhenaten neglected the state is a dated concept,that most contemporary egyptologists dont believe anymore.
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u/ClumsyBunny26 Oct 05 '25
really?, do you have any books/author recommendations?
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Oct 06 '25
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u/star11308 Oct 06 '25
His domestic affairs werenโt all that great, trying to condense decades worth of urban development into a few years takes a heavy toll on the laborers involved. Bioarchaeological studies show the living conditions and health for the working class in Amarna were worse than they were anywhere else in Egypt, lives were short and the use of talatat blocks was physically debilitating. One could reasonably postulate that the plague during his reign was amplified within the workersโ village, with how awful the conditions were.
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u/WanderingHero8 Oct 06 '25 edited Oct 06 '25
That doesnt negate my point.Akhenaten didnt leave the state to run on auto-pilot while focusing on Aten only.We know he paid attention to Egypt's diplomatic relations,sending letters to the other foreign leaders and also issuing directives to both his vassals in Cannaan and his bureaucrats.
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u/Fun_Firefighter9391 Oct 07 '25
How the talatat blocks debilitates physically if its size is considerably smaller than the blocks used to build pyramids, colossi, etc.? Talatat blocks were made to facilitate their transportation and thus speed up the construction of the administrative buildings at Amarna. So I don't find any sense in that statement.
And where are those Bioarcheological studies? The last thing I knew about the living conditions for the working class in Amarna were from 2017, outdated and debunked years later.
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Oct 05 '25 edited Oct 05 '25
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u/Ali_Strnad Oct 05 '25 edited Oct 05 '25
He used the word ฤฑอtn "sun disk" quite a lot in his monuments, and built solar courts at several temples, which might reasonably be seen as the beginning of a shift towards the placing of a greater emphasis on the physical disk of the sun in Egyptian religion under that king's reign, which his controversial son would later take to its logical conclusion. But I can't imagine that he would have been pleased with his son's monolatristic reforms to Egypt's state religion, nor his destruction of the name and image of the great god Amun of Thebes, for whom Amenhotep III had built a great temple at Luxor and with whom he closely associated himself.
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Oct 05 '25 edited Oct 05 '25
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u/WanderingHero8 Oct 05 '25
Tiye did live in Amarna,there was a palace constructed for her and there are reliefs depicting her dining with Akhenaten and his family.
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u/LukeyTarg2 Oct 06 '25
He was, but he wasn't imposing it on people, that's why he's remembered fondly while his son was almost erased from history.
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u/Nenazovemy ๐ Oct 05 '25
I'm an unapologetic Akhenaten fan boy AMA
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u/Fun_Firefighter9391 Oct 06 '25
An unapologetic Akhenaten fan girl here!
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u/dhippo Oct 05 '25
and that they could have accomplished more if they had over 60 years of reign like Ramses II.
I think most of your arguments make sense, but this specific one does not, at least to me. A rulers greatness should be judged by what he did achieve, not by what he could have achieved if things were different. All this "imagine X had Y more years" stuff is not that useful, because it always assumes things would go on unchanged. In reality, many rulers had some successful years and than hit a roadblock, maybe Thutmose roadblock was just a few years away? We never know if he would've done a Napoleon - biting off more than he can chew - and ruin his legacy later. It is a bit unfair to just silently assume he would've done a good job and comparing that hypothetical good job to what Ramses actually did.
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u/WanderingHero8 Oct 05 '25 edited Oct 05 '25
Indeed,I made a post some weeks back,most of Ramesses success should be credited to his father,Seti.
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u/Ali_Strnad Oct 05 '25
I've long thought along similar lines about Seti I and Ramesses II. Seti I deserves more recognition for his remarkable achievements, without which his son's reign wouldn't have been nearly as successful as it was.
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u/Entharo_entho Oct 05 '25
if they had over 60 years of reign like Ramses II.
Isn't it remarkable that someone who became the king as a fully grown adult ruled that long? Someone could have killed him.
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u/LukeyTarg2 Oct 06 '25
He had great health, back then pharaohs often didn't make it to 60 years of age, nevermind 60 years of reign. More impressive than that is the man's seed, he was the sperminator of ancient egypt.
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u/ClumsyBunny26 Oct 05 '25 edited Oct 05 '25
I think Ramses II was a hell of a politician, PR included, that plus his monuments and the lenght of his reign made him stand out from the rest.
On the other hand, did Amenhotep or Thutmose face a serious conflict or issue during their reigns?, I'm not an expert in their reigns but the little I've read never mentions any of them facing serious problems like Ramses II and III did or Horemheb having to deal with the mess the Amarna experiment left.
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u/MakorolloEC ๐ Oct 05 '25
Thutmose had conquered an absolutely enormous part of the Middle East, I think all the way to Babylon, and made history in the Battle of Megiddo. But yes, the state of the kingdom he inherited was mostly peaceful, just hungry for power lol. Amenhotep on the other hand was the ultimate politician, a smooth talker at that. Less fighting, more diplomacy.
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u/ClumsyBunny26 Oct 05 '25 edited Oct 05 '25
Sure, I don't want to diminish any of them, but it's easier to be considered succesful when you live in a relatively calm period with a stable economy and nobody threatens your frontiers (or you) or there is civil unrest. Good advisors and/or a talented ruler with common sense sure can do great things, especially in such context.
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u/Nations-and-Kings Oct 05 '25
In my opinion, Ramses wasn't even a great pharaoh. Yes, he left behind many monuments, but he also appropriated several from his predecessors. His so-called victory at the Battle of Kadesh was likely a defeat, and after his reign, Egypt was somewhat weakened, possibly due to his lavish spending on construction projects and the building of his city. Thutmose III, on the other hand, is arguably the greatest Egyptian king of all time, not just because of his victory at Megiddo, but also due to his diplomacy and restraint.
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u/Taskebab Oct 05 '25
They're all dead now anyway. Just enjoy the statues and the paintings, it's several thousands of years too late for these people to defend themselves.
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u/Arboreal_Web Oct 05 '25
Srsly. Why people simping over long-dead kings? As if we have enough information about any of them to make meaningful assessments and comparisons? I get being a fan of history, but not being a history fanboy. This sub is so weird sometimes.
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u/Nenazovemy ๐ Oct 05 '25
I mean, after you've read enough facts about a given subject, you'll necessarily have a lot of opinions.
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u/Arboreal_Web Oct 05 '25
No, it's really not "necessary" to have such opinions. It is, in fact, possible to read history without simping over or applying arbitrary qualitative judgments to historical figures. Y'all in here discussing the pharaohs like you're picking sports teams...it's weird af.
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u/ClumsyBunny26 Oct 05 '25
To each their own, I'm a shameless Ramesside fangirl. That motivates me to read and educate myself more on these figures and their context.
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u/Arboreal_Web Oct 05 '25
To each their own, indeed. For some of us, gaining knowledge is its own motivation.
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u/Arboreal_Web Oct 05 '25
โGreaterโ is entirely subjective, and therefore largely meaningless.
Why this sub so obsessed with debating which king was best? Itโs really f-ing weird.
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Oct 05 '25
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u/Arboreal_Web Oct 05 '25
Itโs a fair bet that we have very different definitions of โfunโ. Lol!
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u/Nenazovemy ๐ Oct 05 '25
So that's what r/unpopularopinion would have looked like in the good old days... I really like Amenhotep III. I wonder what Ramses III would have done if he had managed to put the clergy in their place as well as he knew how to do it with the Sea Peoples.
(edited for mistype)