Pharaoh Akhenaten
Akhenaten (r. 1353-1336 BCE) was a pharaoh of 18th Dynasty of the New Kingdom of Egypt.He is also known as 'Akhenaton' or 'Ikhnaton' and also 'Khuenaten', all of which are translated to mean 'successful for' or 'of great use to' the god Aten.
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Akhenaten the Heretic 1352–1336 BC
Amenhotep IV changed his name to Akhenaten and defied tradition by establishing a new religion that believed that there is but one god; the sun god Aten. By the time Akhenaten took the throne, his family had been ruling Egypt for nearly two hundred years and had established a huge empire dominating Palestine, Phoenicia, and Nubia.
A century before, Thutmose III had swept all before him, conquering the Middle East and Nubia and establishing a military priesthood which now controlled the empire. At the center was the god Amun of Thebes and his priests had become powerful. The imperial elegance of Egypt was supreme. It was rich and confident, with soldiers and officials established in foreign countries. Of course foreigners, in turn, came to live in Egypt, bringing new customs and ideas. The young prince and future king grew up in this new and changing Egypt.
At the beginning of his reign, the young pharaoh, Amenhotep IV, still worshiped the old gods, especially Amun of Thebes and the sun god, Re-Harakhte. However, within a few years there were changes. He abandoned work on a temple dedicated to Re-Harakhte and began to build a new temple to worship the sun god Aten.
The Aten was never shown in human or animal form, but represented as the sun disk with extended rays ending in hands. Aten was the life-giving and life-sustaining power of the sun. Unlike the old gods, he had no carved image hidden in a dark room deep within a temple, but was worshiped out in the light of day.
Queen Nefertiti, famous from her portrait bust, is thought to have been an Asian princess from Mitanni. She encouraged and supported her husband in his revolutionary ideas and together they took on the religious establishment. In the fifth year of his reign, the king changed his name from Amenhotep (“Amun is Pleased”) to Akhenaten, or “Servant of the Aten” thus formally declaring his new religion. He moved his capital from Thebes to a place now called Tell el-Amarna or Amarna, more than 200 miles (300 km) north, on a desert bay on the east side of the Nile River. Here he began to build a new city, which he called Akhetaten, “Horizon of Aten.”
The new city had many spacious villas with trees, pools, and gardens. Akhenaten encouraged artistic inventiveness and realism and the walls of the temples and houses were painted in an eccentric new style. Among the surviving works of this period are the colossal statues of Akhenaten, the paintings from his private residence, the bust of his wife Nefertiti, and that of his mother, Queen Tiy. These works are unique in Egyptian art, as they do not flatter the king and his family but reveal them as real people, in all their beauty and decay.
The religion of the Aten is not completely understood today. We do know that Akhenaten and his wife Nefertiti worshipped only the sun god, and the names of other gods and goddesses were removed from view. The funerary religion of Osiris was dropped, and Akhenaten became the source of blessings for people after death. But this religious and artistic renaissance was short lived; Akhenaten made himself unpopular by closing the old temples, and his lack of enthusiasm for the practical duties of kingship was detrimental to Egypt’s Imperial interests. Surviving documents show that Akhenaten paid little attention to the army and navy, foreign trade began to fall off, and internal taxes began to disappear into the pockets of local officials.
Letters to the king discovered in the ruins of Tell el-Amarna, known as the Amarna Letters, show the discontent of the army commanders and high commissioners in Palestine and Syria. The local princes, who had been loyal to Egypt, no longer saw any advantage in trading with Egypt. The Hittites from the north began to make gains and this led to a general disintegration of the empire. Eventually, dissatisfied priests and civil officials combined with the army to discredit the new religion. There is some evidence that at the urging of Tiy, the queen mother, Akhenaten made compromises to placate the different factions growing within Egyptian society. He also became estranged from Nefertiti.
When Akhenaten died, he was succeeded briefly by Smenkhkare, his favorite, and then by Tutankhaten who change his name to Tutankhamun, dropping the Aten and embracing Amun.
Tutankhamun eventually returned Egypt to its traditional values and Akhenaten’s memory was erased. Later Egyptian historians would refer to him only as “the heretic king.”
The city of Akhenaten was abandoned and the court returned to Thebes. Later Horemheb razed the city to the ground and Rameses II reused the stone blocks of its temples for his work at nearby Hermopolis.
Akhenaten was an intellectual and philosophical revolutionary who had the power and wealth to indulge his ideas. However, the ancient Egyptians were a deeply religious people who loved their ancient traditions and were not ready to embrace such radical changes. It would not be until the Christian era that the Egyptians would finally reject the old gods in favour of a single universal deity.
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the Pharaoh Akhenaten. Guests include Kate Spence, Richard Parkinson and Elizabeth Frood.
http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/radio4/ioth/ioth_20091001-0900a.mp3Ancient Egyptian Anecdotes
The Ancient Egyptians in their own words
Illustrated Papyri translations edited for the modern reader.
#1 His father is known as Amenhotep the Magnificent Colossal granite head of Akhenaten’s father Amenhotep IIIBorn Amenhotep, Akhenaten was the son of Amenhotep III and Tiye. Amenhotep III, also known as Amenhotep the Magnificent, was the ninth pharaoh of the Eighteenth dynasty of Ancient Egypt and had a long and prosperous reign. Tiye was Amenhotep III’s Great Royal Wife, the title given to the principal wife of the pharaoh.
Their eldest son Crown Prince Thutmose died before Amenhotep III thus making Akhenaten next in line for the throne. #2 He ruled over ancient Egypt for seventeen yearsAkhenaten ruled as Amenhotep IV for the first few years of his reign. Amenhotep IV was crowned in Thebes. The date of his succession to the throne is not known with certainty and varies between 1370 BC and 1358 BC. His reign lasted for seventeen years till his death in 1336 BC or 1334 BC. Amenhotep IV was pharaoh of the Eighteenth dynasty of Ancient Egypt.
#3 Amenhotep IV was the husband of the famous NefertitiAmenhotep IV married Nefertiti at the beginning of his reign. From inscriptions it can be deduced that Nefertiti and Akhenaten had at least six daughters. Though Nefertiti was not his only wife, Akhenaten is shown openly displaying love for Nefertiti and their daughter in depictions.
Most probably, the couple had a genuine romantic relationship. Nefertiti became an icon of feminine beauty after the rediscovery of her bust in 1912. Akhenaten, Nefertiti And Three Of Their Daughters#4 Amenhotep IV instituted the first monotheistic religion in history Depiction of the Egyptian God AmunWhen Amenhotep IV came to the throne, many gods were worshipped in Egypt with Amun being the King of Gods. Initially he allowed worship of Egypt’s traditional deities but soon he took steps to establish sun god Aten as the supreme god of Egypt.
By year 9 of his reign Akhenaten declared that Aten was not merely the supreme god, but the only god. This was a radical step and the first instance of monotheism in all history. #5 He took the name Akhenaten in year five of his reignIn year 5 of his reign that Amenhotep IV disbanded priesthoods of all the other gods, rejected the primary god Amun as superstition and replaced the traditional image of falcon as the symbol of deity with the sun disk. To show his loyalty to Aten, he changed his name from Amenhotep, which meant ‘Amun is content’, to Akhenaten, meaning ‘Living Spirit of Aten’.
#6 Akhenaten ordered the eradication of all of Egypt’s traditional godsIn year 9 of his reign, Akhenaten ordered the eradication of all of Egypt’s traditional gods. He ordered the defacing of Amun’s temples throughout Egypt and imposed a ban on images except the ones which referred to Aten. By these measures he tried to instil in people that Aten was the one true god. He also declared that he was the only intermediary between Aten and the people of Egypt thus eliminating the priests.
Pharaoh Akhenaten and his family worshiping the Aten#7 He is the founder of the city of AmarnaIn year 5 of his reign Akhenaten ordered the construction of his new capital which was named Akhetaten or ‘Horizon of Aten’. Akhentaten was dedicated to his new religion of worship to the Aten. The temples built there were roofless so that rays of the sun would fall on the worshipers. The site today is known as Amarna.
It is one of the most important historical sites in Egypt and exploration of the city continues to this day. Small Temple of the Aten at Amarna#8 Art was revolutionized during the reign of AkhenatenAkhenaten presided over one of the wealthiest period of ancient Egypt. Numerous structures were constructed during his reign, the most famous being the Temple of Amenhotep IV. Art was revolutionized during his reign with more realistic artistic portrayals. It was radical for its time as it focused on ordinary activities and domestic scenes.
Also royal women became more prominent in portrayals of the period. Reconstructed wall decorations from the Temple of Amenhotep IV at Karnak.#9 Akhenaten and Atenism were erased from records after his death Statue of Akhenaten from Temple of Aton, KarnakAfter the death of Akhenaten, his monotheistic religion was discarded and traditional religious practices were gradually restored. He was referred to as the ‘heretic king’ and all traces to him and Atenism were erased. His name doesn’t appear in any of the king lists compiled by later Pharaohs and it was only after the discovery of the site of Amarna in the nineteenth century that the world came to know about Akhenaten #10 Akhenaten was the father of King TutOne of Akhenaten’s sons was Tutankhaten. Tutankhaten went on to become pharaoh and took the name Tutankhamun. He became famous when his nearly intact tomb was discovered in 1922 and is now popularly known as King Tut.
Previously it was not certain that King Tut was the son of Akhenaten but DNA tests in 2010 established this fact. It is also now known that King Tut’s mother was a biological sister of Akhenaten and one of his wives. Bust of Akhenaten’s son TutankhamunAn Interesting TheorySince Akhenaten was the first monotheist, there is a theory that after his death his followers were forced to leave Egypt and were led by an Atenist priest who was the biblical Moses. That Akhenaten’s monotheist religion later went on to become Judaism cannot be definitely established. However there are several points that support this theory including the fact that three principal Judaic terms for God have a connection to Aten. This seems to be the true start of Judaism because Genesis is really the Babylonian Myth of Creation written into the Torah by the Prophet Daniel during the Captivity during the Babylonian Capture around 600 BC under King Naburkanazur? Also, the stories of Abraham lending his wife to the Pharaoh and pretended it was is Sister?
Also, that Abram change his name to Abraham and also his Wife change hers from Sarai to Sarah? Also, the stories of Joseph, servant to the Pharaoh, who was it Thutmose iv that when the Aten God appeared or the Great Amenhotep the Third, the Sun God Pharaoh! The true Ancestry of Israel is in the Egyptian Desert at Armana and yes Judaism is an Egyptian Monotheist Religion! Also, Moses was probably A grandson of Akhenaten and probably the pharaoh Horembeb chase those religious followers of Aten across the REED SEA which is the Delta Nile into the SINAI!