Thutmose IV

Thutmose IV was the son of Amenhotep II and Queen Tiaa, reigning for about ten years from approximately 1400 to 1390 BC, with chronological dates uncertain by about a decade. He achieved the throne through an unconventional succession, famously commemorated on the Dream Stela placed between the paws of the Great Sphinx at Giza. The inscription recounts that the sun god promised him the kingship in exchange for clearing the accumulating desert sands choking the monument.

His foreign policy shifted from direct military confrontation to diplomacy, highlighted by negotiating a peace treaty with the Mitanni empire sealed by his marriage to a Mitannian princess. At Karnak, he completed and erected the single towering obelisk begun under Thutmose III, which later stood as the Lateran Obelisk. He prepared his burial in tomb KV43 in the Valley of the Kings. Historians understand his short reign through the Dream Stela, inscriptions at Thebes and his mummy, which was discovered inside the tomb of his father Amenhotep II.

Monuments

• Dream Stela at Giza
• Tomb KV43
• Lateran Obelisk at Karnak

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Try the name on the Cartouche Desk, or see where the reign falls on the timeline.