The Origins of Akhenaten
There is much that is known about Akhenaten the heretic pharaoh. More lies in speculation. Since his time, the Amarna period is one the ancient Egyptians themselves wished to forget much about Akhenaten remains unknown. What we do know is often confusing, different hypothesis piled upon each other make it difficult to distinguish what is fact and what speculation.
We do know that Akhenaten, or Amenhotep IV, was the second son of Amenhotep III, an 18th Dynasty pharaoh and his Queen Tiye. Although we know he had an older brother Thutmose and several sisters, he was never shown in family portraits or records, the only documented proof we have linking him to Amenhotep III is a wine seal with his name and the inscription “estate of the true king’s son Amenhotep” . One of the theories why Akhenaten was never shown with his family is that he suffered from some sort of disease such as Froehlich syndrome (tumor of the pituitary gland) or Marfan syndrome. His elder brother the original heir to the throne died early and this could support the theory that there was a genetic defect running in the family. If this was the case however, why would the royal family hide Akhenaten from public view, if both sons suffered from the same disease?
Both Froehlich syndrome and Marfan’s syndrome correspond with some of the physical characteristics Akhenaten is portrayed as having , the full lips, elongated ear lobes, long arms and fingers, misshapen head, high cheekbones, slanted eyes, paunch belly, breasts and full hips and thighs. The first to offer the hypothesis that Akhenaten suffered from Froehlich syndrome was Dr. G. E. Smith, however, some facts do not fit this hypothesis. Victims of Froehlich syndrome are usually attributed with endocrinal mutation resulting in impotency. This seems unlikely, even though Akhenaten is in some images portrayed without his sexual organs, we know he fathered six daughters and possibly a son Tutankhamen.
It can be argued both that Akhenaten really looked like this or that his portrayal is simply a result of the changing art forms during the Amarna period. The evidence on hand could point either way, for example Egyptologists have argued that the fact that Akhenaten is sometimes portrayed as more or less normal looking points to his other portraits as being the result of the changing art form. The counter argument is o...
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... The old gods were reinstated and Akhenaten’s son and daughter changed their names to Tutankhamen and Ankhesenamen. Under their reign, and the reign of the pharaohs Aye and Horumheb who followed them, all memories of the Amarna period were eradicated. Akhenaten, Tutankhamen and Aye were purged from the list of kings and Akhetaten was razed to the ground. It is believe that the mummy of Akhenaten was destroyed; it is certainly true that there is great difficulty concerning the burial places of Akhenaten, Tiye, Nefertiti and many other people of the Amarna period. The one thing that is clear is that the reign of Akhenaten was highly unpopular with someone in power, all though it was almost a tradition for pharaohs to cut each others names from their statues and claim them for there own, there was a deliberate attempt to pretend that the Amarna period never happened.
Akhenaten The Heretic King, Donald B Redford, Princeton University Press, 1984
Moses and Monotheism, Sigmund Freud, New York, Alfred A Knopf, 1947
The Life and Times of Akhenaton, Arthur Weigall, New York G P Putnam’s Sons, 1923
Akhenaten Egypt’s false Prophet, Nicholas Reeves, Thames and Hudson, 2001
During the New Kingdom of Egypt (from 1552 through 1069 B.C.), there came a sweeping change in the religious structure of the ancient Egyptian civilization. "The Hymn to the Aten" was created by Amenhotep IV, who ruled from 1369 to 1353 B.C., and began a move toward a monotheist culture instead of the polytheist religion which Egypt had experienced for the many hundreds of years prior to the introduction of this new idea. There was much that was different from the old views in "The Hymn to the Aten", and it offered a new outlook on the Egyptian ways of life by providing a complete break with the traditions which Egypt held to with great respect. Yet at the same time, there were many commonalties between these new ideas and the old views of the Egyptian world. Although through the duration of his reign, Amenhotep IV introduced a great many changes to the Egyptian religion along with "The Hymn", none of these reforms outlived their creator, mostly due to the massive forces placed on his successor, Tutankhamen, to renounce these new reforms. However, the significance of Amenhotep IV, or Akhenaten as he later changed his name to, is found in "The Hymn". "The Hymn" itself can be looked at as a contradiction of ideas; it must be looked at in relation to both the Old Kingdom's belief of steadfast and static values, as well as in regards to the changes of the Middle Kingdom, which saw unprecedented expansionistic and individualistic oriented reforms. In this paper I plan to discuss the evolvement of Egyptian Religious Beliefs throughout the Old,
Horemheb waited a little bit longer and then killed Ay, leaving him to be king. Horemheb erased Akhenaten, Tut, and Ay from the list of pharaohs. He was obviously had personal reasons to kill the two
- Boardman, Griffin and Murray, the Oxford History of the Classical World (Oxford University Press, 1986)
In conclusion, the portrayal of ancient rulers is dependent not only on the style of art popular during the era, but also on the evolution of the political climate. The portrayal of Menkaure, a pharaoh of the Old Kingdom in ancient Egypt, is of complete authority, control and power. His face does not show concern or grief over his people, because he is not challenged politically, the image of control coincides with his sole power over the kingdom. While the depiction of Alexander the Great, in ancient Greek coins is deified. Alexander’s leadership ended with world domination; therefore, his deified portrayal on monetary funds is particularly appropriate. By contrast, Philip the Arab’s portrait sculpture almost resembles a present day photograph with its capture of fleeting expression. This expression of anxiety and sadness is a representation of the political turmoil during the time period of his rule. Taking the progress of ancient cultures into account, how does the art of sculpting improve in the manipulation of the medium used?
"Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History." The Achaemenid Persian Empire (550–330 B.C.). N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Feb. 2014.
King Tut was a fascinating pharaoh at most. There isn’t much on who king Tut was or when he was born or how he died. But some people have dedicated there lives to find out who he was. He was born during the Golden Age. He became king a surprisingly young age. He achieved many things and had an important job. His death was and still is a mystery to most. It was said he wasn’t in his original tomb. But he was eventually found. King Tut became a Pharaoh at a really young age and he had many achievements but died at a relatively young age. (Hawass 29-56)
In the glorious Eighteenth Dynasty, when Egypt became for the first time a world power, a young Pharaoh ascended the throne about 1375 B.C., who first called himself Amenhotep (IV) like his father, but later on changed his name to Akhenaten (1370-1358 B.C.). This king undertook to force upon his subjects a new religion, one contrary to their ancient traditions and to all their familiar habits. It was a strict monotheism, the first attempt of its kind in the history of the world, as far as we know; and religious intolerance, which was foreign to antiquity before this and for long after, was inevitably born with the belief in one god. But Amenhotep’s reign lasted only for seventeen years; very soon after his death in 1358 B.C. the new religion was swept away and the memory of the heretic king proscribed. From the ruins of his new capital, which he had built and dedicated to his god, and from the inscription in the rock tombs belonging to it, we derive the little knowledge we possess of him.1
Queen Nefertiti was an Egyptian queen eminent for her beauty. Nefertiti ruled alongside her husband, Pharaoh Akhenaten, during the mid-1300s B.C. She played a leading role in the political and religious life of the people of Egypt during her husband’s rule. She and her husband established the cult of Aten, the sun god. They also promoted Egyptian artwork that was radically different from its predecessors. This was vehemently important because it shows that they understood the power of art, and the fact that new art brought a new perspective. Nefertiti was one of the most powerful women ever to have ruled and this is shown because her husband went to great lengths to display her as an equal. Some works showed her leading worship of the sun God and striking enemies. This proves the fact that she was almost an equal counterpart to her husband and his ruling. She is definitely one of the most powerful women of ancient Egypt. A bust of Nefertiti is one of the most iconic symbols of women in Egypt.
In the portrait Akhenaton worships his god Aton, who appears as the sun at the top of the relief. At Aton’s end of his rays appears to be hands holding ankhs which were symbols of eternal life. In the scene of the relief Akhenaten and his wife Nefertiti are holding their 3 daughters displaying affections in an Egyptian family, unlike in the old kingdom which the portraits of royalty couples were stiff and emotionless postures. The portrait of Akhenaten and Nefertiti does not correspond to the Egyptian canon as their proportions and physical characteristics were not
The human form transcends throughout time persistently present in art. Dating all the way back to Paleolithic human beings our renderings of idealized forms have served many purposes. Though the Neolithic and Paleolithic purpose of these renderings is widely speculative the range of reason for these depictions ranges from idolization and worship to assertion of aristocratic and economic status even to simply serving as statements of self-expression. Amongst ruins and artifacts, sculptures of ancient cultures demonstrate the ways in which humans perceptions of what is aesthetically desirable have progressed. Two idealized sculptures the Woman from Willendorf and the Khafre statue with approximately 21,500 years separating their individual gestations this demonstrate the stylistic progression of idealized imagery through time.
In conclusion, although Mycerinus and Kha-merer-nebty II and Augustus of Primaporta, do appear very different, come from entirely different geographic regions and were separated by thousands of years, they do have many things in common. When we consider subject, style, and function; perhaps other works of art have more in common than they appear to have.
"Morton, Thomas - Introduction." Literary Criticism (1400-1800). Ed. Thomas J. Schoenberg. Vol. 72. Gale Cengage, 2002. eNotes.com. 2006. 21 Feb, 2011
Stocks, J. L. "Plato and the Tripartite Soul." Mind, New Series ns 24.94 (1915): 207-21.Jstor.
...n 1163 B.C., Egypt entered a period of slow decline (Scarre 1997:116). Pharaohs became less powerful, and their prestige dwindled. Hungry soldiers were terrorizing the community, while tomb robbers were raiding the pyramids for resources that were very much needed. They had buried their pharaohs with food, goods and jewelry, all of which were needed to keep the civilization in tact. They had built too many pyramids, and there were setbacks in Asia which corrupted trade. People did not understand why the pharaohs could not fix the problems that were going on. They viewed them as gods and lost trust and faith. Egypt fell apart as these things culminated with loss of belief in the pharaohs.
William E. Stephenson. The Comedy of Evil in Apuleius, Arion pp. 87-93. Boston University. Web. 1964. http://www.jstor.org/stable/20140428