Thutmose IV’s reign of at least eight years was brief but active. It is a commonplace observation that Egyptian rulers built numbers of monuments in direct proportion to the amount of peace and affluence they enjoyed. As king, Thutmose IV had the wealth and peace, but time apparently was cut short. He began construction at most of Egypt’s major temple sites and at four sites in Nubia. The original sizes of the monuments and of their remains vary greatly, but in general he added to pre-existing temples. The distribution of Thutmose IV’s monuments, within the context of the mid-i8th Dynasty, is unremarkable. He honoured the established cult centres and was hardly an iconoclast. On the other hand, at several locations he left certain harbingers of things to come. Indeed we may suggest that he deliberately followed in the footsteps of his grandfather and father, building additions to their temples, and in similar fashion suggested new sites and monuments to his son.
Monuments of the reign have been found at the following places: in the Delta at Alexandria, Seriakus, and Heliopolis {}); in the Memphite region at Giza, Abusir, Saqqara, and the city of Memphis itself; in the Faiyum at Crocodilopolis; in Middle Egypt at Hermopolis and Amama; and in Upper Egypt at Abydos (where he left a chapel of brick with limestone revetments), Dendera, Medamud, Karnak, Luxor, western Thebes (where he built a mortuary temple and a tomb, KV43, in the
Valley of the Kings), Armant, Tod, Elkab, Edfu, Elephantine, and Konosso. In Nubia he left blocks at Faras (?) and Buhen. He decorated the peristyle court at Amada, began a building at Tabo (later completed by Amenhotep III), and left a foundation deposit at Gebel Barkal. In addition, some decoration was carried out in the Hathor temple at the Serabit el-Khadim turquoise mines in Sinai.
The king’s interest in the sun-gods may be documented throughout his building campaigns and in his inscriptions as well. At Giza, he devoted himself not to a display of equestrianism and archery, but to the god Horemakhet and the Heliopolitan cult. He made no reference to Amun-Ra on the Sphinx Stele, allowing the northern deity (Horemakhet-Khepri-Ra-Atum) to dominate both as sun-god and as royal legitimator. Given that Amun, even on Amenhotep ITs Sphinx Stele, was the primeval creator and the god who determined the kingship, Thutmose’s omission of Amun from his stele must surely have been deliberate, perhaps reflecting both the increasing importance of the Heliopolitan gods and the political influence of the north itself as the administrative centre of Egypt.
At Karnak, the king shifted the main axis back to east-west, thus reducing the importance of Amenhotep ITs north-south entranceway. Placing a porch and door before the Fourth Pylon, Thutmose IV probably first left the original court untouched and changed only the monumental doorway itself. He erected a porch for the Fourth Pylon doorway with columns made of wood (ebony and mem according to an inscription), probably gilded with electrum. This porch would have been a protected space used during court rituals, and two contemporary representations of it have been preserved.
A few years later he created a new appearance for the Fourth Pylon limestone court erected by Thutmose II. Over the earlier limestone walls, Thutmose IV built a sandstone peristyle court elaborately decorated with reliefs showing treasures donated by the king to the god Amun. This was to have commemorated the celebration of a first jubilee planned without waiting for thirty years to elapse, as was certainly the case with Amenhotep II too. The style of Thutmose’s sculpture from Karnak changed in the last years of rule, becoming more elaborate and expressive.
The king also erected a single obelisk at the eastern end of the precinct at Karnak. It had been produced for Thutmose III but lay in the stone workshop for thirty-five years until Thutmose IV ordered it to be set up. It became a focus of the solar cult place designed by Thutmose III, and it was placed directly on the temple axis.
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