Other than cleopatra is there any evidence of ancient females leaders?

TL;DR Yes!

Ancient History has many examples of female rulers, and whilst they are not all as common or as prolific as male rulers, we have plenty of evidence to support their existence. I am going to look at a few societies (including Assyria and Rome)- but since you mentioned Egypt that is the best place to start!

The Ancient Egyptian had a handful of female rulers over its 3000-year history, the most famous of whom is obviously Cleopatra. The earliest we know if is Mereneith- [who appears in an Early King List of the 1st dynasty (c. 3100-2900 BCE) and was buried in a royal cemetery.] (https://books.google.ie/books?id=gekdRf5lcxAC&pg=PT286&dq=john+romer+mereneith&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiZgNa8x7nVAhWFCcAKHQk3AB0Q6AEIJzAA#v=onepage&q=john%20romer%20mereneith&f=false) Like many 1st Dynasty monarchs, we know very little about Mereneith, and she is absent from some king lists, and may have ruled as regent, but without more evidence it is impossible to know.

At the end of the 12th Dynasty was another female ruler of Egypt, Sobekneferu, daughter of Amenemhat III and sister of Amenemhat IV, she reigned for 4 years after her brother’s death, and is recorded in several inscriptions, including from a Nubian fortress which recorded flood levels, and her name can also be found on this cylinder seal at the British museum. Sobekneferu also adopted the title of ‘King’ (there was no word for queen in the Egyptian language, merely ‘Kings wife’) and wears masculine attire in her depictions, suggesting a desire to be recognised as a legitimate masculine ruler.

Hatshepsut is perhaps the most famous female ruler of Egypt after Cleopatra, she ruled in the 18th dynasty, at the height of the empire’s power, and embarked on vast trade missions, and sought to solidify her rule by constructing a massive mortuary temple at Deir el-Bahri. Placed next to the temple of a revered 12th dynasty King, Montuhotep, Hatshepsut was likely trying to create a visual connection between herself and the beloved Pharaoh to consolidate her own power. Hatshepsut also depicted herself as male, with almost no female attributes. We have lost a lot of evidence about Hatshepsut as her stepson, Thutmosis III, ruled following her (and had in fact been meant to rule instead of her, she began as his regent when he was too young, and then just never stopped!) and attempted to erase mentions of her from the historical record.

There are probably other examples from Egypt (a brief google mentions Tsowet) but I don’t have the time to research them and their historicity, so time to look at some other ancient queens!

In Assyria we have Shammuramat who was regent for the empire in the late 9th and early 8th Century BCE. Her reign is recorded in Eusebius of Caesarea, who refers to his earlier sources (she is here called Semiramis) In Diodorus Siculus the same queen is mentioned as building temples and palaces. I’m certainly not an Assyriologist myself and as both Eusebius and Diodorus wrote much later they are problematic sources, so I don’t want to go into too much detail here as I’m sure someone with a greater knowledge of the period could provide more comprehensive information on her rule, but we certainly have evidence she existed.

Zenobia was queen of Palmyra in the 3rd Century CE, and she declared her independence from Rome, this did not go down well with the Roman’s, and her rebellion was quelled, but she did rule for a period. Her reign is recorded in several sources, both literary (the Historia Nova by Zosimus and the Historia Augusta) and material, in the coins she minted herself.

And finally my personal favourite of the ancient female rulers, Aelia Pulcheria. Even though Pulcheria was never officially an Empress Regnant of the Roman empire, she was regent during the minority of her brother, Theodosius II. and later the wife of the next emperor, Marcian. She was alive in the first half of the 5th Century CE, and so probably lies right at the boundary for what we can consider ‘Ancient’. The reason I have included her in the list is because she encapsulates a lot of the ways women did hold power in Antiquity, even if not as Queen regnants’. We have letters written to Pulcheria by the reigning Pope, asking for her assistance in religious matters indicating a working partnership between the two as well as letters requesting her interference in administrative matters, as is shown in letters she received from the Bishop of Cyrus. Pulcheria inherited a tradition in Rome which had been in existence since Livia, the first Roman empress, in which whilst woman may not have been the official ruler of an ancient empire, there were intrinsically involved in the ruling itself (I could go on for hours about Pulcheria’s influence on religious policy).

I hope this list is helpful! It is by no means exhaustive, but does hopefully show we have substantive evidence for female rulers in Antiquity other than Cleopatra! (Who seems to get all the credit…)