=146.= Royal women were treated with higher respect in Egypt than in any other ancient monarchy. Thothmes I, the third king of the Eighteenth Dynasty, was succeeded by his daughter, Mesphra or Amen-set, who reigned as regent for her younger brother, Thothmes II. He died a minor, and she held the same office, or, perhaps, reigned jointly with her next younger brother, Thothmes III; but not with his cordial consent, for when she, too, died, after a regency of twenty-two years, he caused her name and image to be effaced from all the sculptures in which they had appeared together. =147.= B. C. 1461-1414. This king, Thothmes III, is distinguished not more for his foreign wars than for the magnificent palaces and temples which he built at Karnac, Thebes, Memphis, Heliopolis, Coptos, and other places. Hardly an ancient city in Egypt or Nubia is unmarked by remains of his edifices. The history of his twelve successive campaigns is recorded in sculpture upon the walls of his palace at Thebes. He drove the Hyksos from their last stronghold, Ava´ris, where they had been shut up since the days of his father. The two obelisks near Alexandria, which some Roman wit called Cleopa´tra’s Needles, bear the name of this king. His military expeditions extended both to the north and south; inscriptions on his monuments declare that he took tribute from Nineveh, Hit (or Is), and Babylon. [Sidenote: B. C. 1400-1364.] =148.= His grandson, Thothmes IV, caused the carving of the great Sphinx near the Pyramids. Amunoph III, his successor, was a great and powerful monarch. He adorned the country by magnificent buildings, and improved its agriculture by the construction of tanks or reservoirs to regulate irrigation. The two _Colossi_ near Thebes, one of which is known as the vocal Memnon, date from his reign; but the Amenophe´um, of which they were ornaments, is now in ruins. Amunoph maintained the warlike fame of his ancestors by expeditions into all the countries invaded by Thothmes III. He is styled upon his monuments, “Pacificator of Egypt and Tamer of the Libyan Shepherds.” He built the gorgeous palace of Luxor, which he connected with the temple at Karnac by an avenue of a thousand sphinxes. He made a similar avenue also at Thebes, lined with colossal sitting statues of the cat-headed goddess Pasht (Bubastis). [Sidenote: B. C. 1327-1324.] =149.= B. C. 1364-1327. In the reign of Horus, his son, the nation was distracted by many claimants for the crown, most of whom were princes or princesses of the blood royal. Horus outlived his rivals and destroyed their monuments. He had successful foreign wars in Africa, and made additions to the palaces at Karnac and Luxor. With the next king, Rathotis (or Resitot), the Eighteenth Dynasty ended.