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Usermaatre: the throne name of Ramesses II and the kings who copied it

20 October 2026

User-maat-ra, usually written Usermaatre, is wsr-mꜣꜥt-rꜥ, 'the justice (Maat) of Ra is strong'. It is the throne name of Ramesses II, the first of the two cartouches he wrote after the title 'king of Upper and Lower Egypt'. In full it reads Usermaatre Setepenre, 'the justice of Ra is strong, chosen of Ra'.

At least ten later kings took the same three words as their own throne name, from Ramesses III to Piye of Nubia. The word after it in the cartouche, such as Setepenre or Meryamun, tells you which king you are looking at.

Three signs write the whole name

The core of the name is three signs, often stacked inside the ring. The sun disc writes rꜥ, the god Ra, and stands at the top although it is read last. Egyptian scribes moved a god's name to the front out of respect, a habit Egyptologists call honorific transposition.

Under the sun comes the head and neck of a canine, wsr, said user, 'strong'. Maat follows, either as a single ostrich feather or as the goddess herself, seated with the feather on her head. Both write mꜣꜥt, the order of the world, truth and justice. Read in Egyptian order, the words give wsr mꜣꜥt rꜥ, 'strong is the Maat of Ra'.

Sun disc: rꜥ, Ra, written first, read last
Canine head and neck: wsr, 'strong'
Feather: mꜣꜥt, Maat
Seated goddess with a feather: mꜣꜥt, the same word

Sun Head and neck of a canine Feather Goddess Maat

Draw Usermaatre Setepenre in a cartouche

Ramesses II fixed the epithet in his second year

In his first regnal year Ramesses II wrote plain Usermaatre, followed by changing epithets such as 'image of Ra', 'heir of Ra' and 'beloved of Ra'. A stela at Gebel el-Silsila dated to year 1 shows four of these variants. In year 2 he settled on Setepenre, written with the adze (stp, 'to choose') and the water ripple (n), and kept it for the rest of his 66-year reign.

The Egyptologist William Murnane tied the change to the death of his father Seti I, so walls carved with the short form would date from the years father and son ruled together. How long they shared the throne is disputed, but walls with the short cartouche date from the first year or two of the reign.

Adze Ripple of water

Read both cartouches of Ramesses II

Five more Ramesside kings took the name

Ramesses III, second king of the 20th Dynasty, took his model's throne name and changed the ending: Usermaatre Meryamun, 'beloved of Amun', written with the canal (mr) and Amun's name (the reed, the game board and the water ripple). Amun's name moves up in the ring by the same respect that lifts the sun disc.

His successors kept borrowing. Ramesses IV came to the throne as Usermaatre Setepenamun, 'chosen of Amun', then took Heqamaatre Setepenamun, a change Wikipedia's titulary dates to after his second year. Ramesses V was Usermaatre Sekheperenre, Ramesses VII Usermaatre Setepenre Meryamun and Ramesses VIII Usermaatre Akhenamun.

Canal Flowering reed Game board

See both cartouches of Ramesses III

Libyan and Nubian kings borrowed it at Tanis and Thebes

About three centuries after Ramesses II, the kings of Libyan descent who ruled from Tanis in the Delta wanted his prestige. Osorkon II, who reigned from about 872 to 837 BC, was Usermaatre Setepenamun and was buried at Tanis in a tomb found by Pierre Montet in 1939. Shoshenq III, who ruled for about four decades, and his successor Pami took the exact name of Ramesses II, Usermaatre Setepenre. Many blocks at Tanis were hauled from Pi-Ramesses, the old capital of Ramesses II, so his cartouches and theirs can share a site.

At Thebes, Osorkon III and his son Takelot III, of the 23rd Dynasty, were both Usermaatre Setepenamun. The Nubian king Piye, who conquered Egypt in the late 8th century BC, used two throne names, one of them Usermaatre, spelled Usimare in many books, and the other Sneferre.

Meet the kings buried at Tanis

The second cartouche settles the shared endings

Usermaatre Setepenre belongs to Ramesses II, Shoshenq III and Pami, and Usermaatre Setepenamun to Ramesses IV, Osorkon II, Osorkon III and Takelot III. When the throne name is shared, read the birth name in the ring beside it. Ramesses Meryamun, with the three fox skins of ms, is Ramesses II. Shoshenq, written with two pools (š) and the sandy hill (q), is a Libyan king.

A Usermaatre on the Ramesseum, at Abu Simbel or on most obelisks abroad is Ramesses II, and at Medinet Habu the cartouches read Usermaatre Meryamun, for Ramesses III.

Setepenre, the adze and the sun: Ramesses II, Shoshenq III, Pami
Meryamun, the canal and Amun: Ramesses III
Setepenamun, the adze and Amun: Ramesses IV, Osorkon II, Osorkon III, Takelot III
Sekheperenre: Ramesses V
Akhenamun: Ramesses VIII

Three fox skins Folded cloth Pool Sandy hill

Ozymandias is Usermaatre heard by Greeks

Diodorus Siculus, writing in the first century BC and drawing on Hecataeus of Abdera, describes the tomb of a king called Osymandyas at Thebes, with a giant seated statue bearing the words 'King of Kings am I, Osymandyas. If anyone would know how great I am and where I lie, let him surpass one of my works.' The building is usually identified as the Ramesseum, and Osymandyas as a Greek hearing of Usermaatre.

Cuneiform letters from the Hittite capital Hattusa show how the name sounded in his own time: Wasmuriya for Usermaatre. Percy Bysshe Shelley read Diodorus and published his sonnet 'Ozymandias' in The Examiner on 11 January 1818. His friend Horace Smith wrote a sonnet on the same passage a few weeks later.

Questions

How do you pronounce Usermaatre?

It is usually said as it is spelled, user-maat-ray. Its vowels are a modern convention, since hieroglyphs wrote none, and the Hittite spelling Wasmuriya is the closest record of how it sounded.

Are User-maat-ra, Usimare and Weser-maat-re different names?

They are one name, wsr-mꜣꜥt-rꜥ, in different modern spellings. Older books often write Usermare or Usimare.

Was Ozymandias a real pharaoh?

Yes. Ozymandias is the Greek form of Usermaatre, the throne name of Ramesses II, and the broken colossus at the Ramesseum is usually taken as the statue Diodorus described.

Is Usermaatre the name of a god?

It is a king's name that praises two gods. Ra is the sun god and Maat the goddess of order, and the name says the king's rule makes Ra's order strong.

Glossary

birth name: The name a king was given at birth, written in the second cartouche after the title "son of Ra". Egyptologists also call it the nomen.
cartouche: An oval ring drawn around a royal name, a loop of rope tied at one end. Kings wrote their two main names in cartouches.
dynasty: A line of kings counted together, usually one family. Egyptologists number Egypt's kings in about 30 dynasties, following the priest Manetho.
Egyptologist: A scholar who studies ancient Egypt: its language, writing, objects, buildings and history.
epithet: A title or phrase added to a name, such as "beloved of Amun" after a king's name or "true of voice" after the name of someone who has died.
honorific transposition: Writing the name of a god or king first, out of respect, even where it is read later in the phrase.
Lower Egypt: The north of Egypt, the flat Nile Delta from around Memphis to the sea. It is called lower because it is downstream.
Maat: Truth, justice and the right order of the world, shown as a goddess with an ostrich feather on her head. Kings claimed to uphold it.
scribe: A person trained to read and write, who kept accounts, wrote letters and copied texts. Few Egyptians could write, and scribes were well respected.
stela: An upright stone slab carved with words and pictures, set up in tombs and temples or to mark a border.
throne name: The name a king took when he came to the throne, written in the first cartouche after the title "King of Upper and Lower Egypt". Egyptologists also call it the prenomen.
tomb: A burial place: a pit, a mastaba, a pyramid or rooms cut into rock. Its chapel was where the family brought offerings.