Akhenaten and Nefertiti, original rebels??

[danlo]

Akhenaten (also refered to as Inkhenaten) is one the the most controversial and mysterious Pharoahs in ancient Egyptian history. I have been fascinated by his life ever since I took Ancient History as a freshman in High School (1970...now that's ancient! ). Originally born Amenhotep IV, Akhenaten ruled Eqypt between 1350-1332 BC. He is famous for being the first recorded monotheist (according to Western History), forming the cult of Aten (the Sun disc), moving his capital to Tel-El Armarna and undercutting his father's large and prosperous bueracratic priesthood. You may know that his principle wife was Nefertiti--thought by many to be the most beautiful Queen of Eqypt (sorry, to disappoint: recent discoveries, including coinage of both Marc Anthony and Cleopatra-indicate that ol' Cleo was, actually, relatively, ugly) ever.

Nefetiti is a mystery herself. Some think she was Eqyptian from non-royal blood and some theories extend that she came from as far away as the Indus valley. In any case there is no record of any male hiers she bore, Akhenaten and Nefertiti's mummies have never been discovered. Many Eqyptologists (like my step-grandfather who worked in Thebes and Karnak after Carter [see King Tut]) believe a second wife, Kiya, bore him Smenkhare, who was subsequently followed by Tutankhamen.

There are all sorts of controversial theories about Akhenaten: that he was actually a woman or that his protruding belly and breasts were a result of Frohlich's Syndrome. Some actually believe that he was the model for the biblical Moses, or was Moses himself! In anycase Akhenaten was viewed as extremely heretical by the Pantheists who detroyed his new city and as much evidence of his reign as possible after his death. Heck, they could have buried the bodies in the desert, for all we know.

Some food for thought...

[Menolly]

The bust of Nefertiti is the one with the really long neck, right? Beautiful face on that sculpture, be it a true rendering or not.

Akhenaten is also the only pharoah who promoted true perspective and likeness in paintings, right?

[danlo]

That's all true. More on Nefertiti:

We know quite a lot about Nefertiti, Akhenaten, and the age in which they lived, considering the effort made by their successors to obliterate all signs of their existence. Unfortunately, there is even more that we don’t know, and the fact that Akhenaten was a revolutionary who made many changes makes it difficult to draw definite conclusions unless the evidence is substantial.

So far no one has suggested that Nefertiti arrived in a polka-dotted spaceship from Venus, but it is possible to find respected and qualified Egyptologists arguing just about everything else. Hopefully some day we will find the evidence to prove or disprove these suggestions, but for the time being we just don’t know. The following presents some of the ideas that have been put forth along with the arguments for and against. The reader should note that, despite the vigor with which some scholars argue their opinions, there is no proof one way or the other for any of them

The first question is whether or not Nefertiti was thought to be a goddess. This is a little more complicated than it might appear at first glance. We are all familiar with the joke about the young woman who admitted to being “a little bit” pregnant, but according to the world view of the ancient Egyptians it may well have been possible to be partly divine. The pharaoh was definitely a god but he was seldom worshipped as such until after his death; divinity simply enabled the pharaoh to understand and communicate with the other gods and explain to them the needs of his people.

Tradition dictated that it was the king, as chief priest of all the religious cults, who made offerings to the gods. Women participated in worship and the Queen was an important part of any service, but it was the King who offered the sacrifices. What then do we make of the scene painted in Karnak early in the reign showing Nefertiti making an offering to Aten?

At the four corners of Akhenaten’s sarcophagus are representations of Nefertiti. Since other pharaohs placed various goddesses there to provide protection some scholars have argued that this must mean that Nefertiti was divine. Others, however, argue that since Akhenaten was a strict monotheist it would have been reasonable for him to replace the divinities in which he did not believe with a mortal but much loved wife.

The Egyptians worshipped many gods and goddesses and it made sense to group them together in worship. A very common combination involved three divinities; there were many such triads involving different sets of gods. While Akhenaten worshipped only the one god Aten, he wanted to retain as many traditions as he could and seems to have set up a triad involving himself, Aten and Nefertiti. Does that mean he thought of Nefertiti as a goddess or merely a suitable human to complete the much-needed threesome.

Records of Nefertiti disappear some time between Year 12 and Year 14 of Akhenaten’s reign. For a while it was assumed she had retired in disgrace to the Northern Palace, but that idea has been discarded. The simplest explanation would be that she died, but it is surprising that no record of such an important event has survived.

Nefertiti’s shawabti (a small doll made after a person’s death and buried with the mummy to do any labor required of the deceased in the afterlife) shows her with the scepters of a king but with the titles of a King’s Great Wife and not the titles of a ruling monarch. Was she a pharaoh as the scepters suggest or was she merely the wife of a king as the inscription suggests?

The “smiting scene” is a very common portrayal of a pharaoh killing the enemies of Egypt. It was a standard way to proclaim a pharaoh’s power and his kingly qualities and did not necessarily refer to any real event. Nefertiti is unique among kings' wives in being pictured in such a way. Since she is shown in a king’s clothing some argue this is proof she was a king; others point out that the crown in this scene was the usual feminine one and maintain that the picture is simply a reflection of the growing prestige of Eighteenth Dynasty queens and not a sign of kingship. Nefertiti is also portrayed as a sphinx; again one must decide if this reflects her kingly state or simply the increased prestige of a queen. A favorite piece of evidence for the Nefertiti was a king side is a scene in the Amarna tomb of Panehesy showing Nefertiti and Akhenaten both wearing the Atef crown of kingship, but her crown is smaller and less elaborate, so the question remains: is this a sign she was a pharaoh or is this a sign of her importance.

All of the above would be cheerfully accepted as signs of a queen’s growing prestige if it weren’t for the “Smenkhkare question”. Nefertiti began life with a fairly simple name which later in the reign she changed to Neferneferuaten-Nefertiti. There is also, however, a record of Ankhkheperure-Neferneferuaten and Ankhkheperure-Smenkhkare. The latter ruled Egypt in the brief interval between Akhenaten and Tutankhamun. Do these names represent three different people, two people, or just one? It is possible that the switch in role from Great Wife to Pharaoh required a change to a more regal sounding name. If all three names are the same person it would fully explain the regal nature of some of the pictures of Nefertiti and how she disappeared so completely.

Manetho, a Third Century BCE. historian, referred to a female named Akenhkeres ruling Egypt at the end of the Eighteenth Dynasty. Manetho regularly transcribed Egyptian names into something that would sound better to his Greek audience and it is possible that Akenkheres is his rendering of Ankhkheprua. Nefertiti is certainly the only possible candidate for a female ruler at the end of the Eighteenth Dynasty.

A mummy found in KV55 (King’s Valley Tomb 55) is that of a king from this period. Specialists in 1963 identified it as a male who died at about the age of 20, just about destroying the Nefertiti is Smenkhkare theory, for a king’s mummy that young could belong to no one but Smenkhkare.

Although there is yet no written report documenting the medical evidence, a number of Egyptologists are arguing that the mummy in KV55 is actually that of someone in his mid thirties. If the theory should be vindicated then the mummy could very well be that of Akhenaten, eliminating the biggest objection to the idea that Nefertiti and Smenkhkare are one and the same.

A third possibility, of course, is that Nefertiti shared the throne with her husband using the name Ankhkheperure and that there really was a young man who followed her on the throne adopting as a form of honor and respect the same name. This would explain why Ankhkheperure is sometimes written in the feminine form and sometimes in the masculine and why Akhenaten’s eldest daughter, Meretaten, is attested as the Great Wife of both Akhenaten and Ankhkheperure. It seems improbable that Akhenaten would allow another man to share a wife but quite reasonable to accept that if Akhenaten and Nefertiti were both pharaohs and in need of a “wife” for ceremonial purposes they might both use the services of their daughter.

This is an issue of great interest to professional Egyptologists and of very little importance to anyone else. The general reader should note the status attached to women who could call themselves a king’s mother, king’s wife, king’s sister, or king’s daughter, and should also note the growth in power and prestige of the pharaoh’s Great Wife throughout the Eighteenth Dynasty and especially in the reign of Akhenaten. Whether Nefertiti was officially a pharaoh and took the name of Smenkhkare is not as important as the fact she was accorded a degree of prominence that no other major civilization in the ancient world was willing to concede to a woman.

[Damelon]

Here's a translation of Akhenaten's Hymn to the Aten, the Sun. Akhenaten's one god.

AKENATEN'S THE HYMN TO THE SUN


When you set in the western horizon of the sky,
The earth is in darkness like the dead.
They sleep in their chambers
Their heads are wrapped up.
Their nostrils are stopped
And none see the other.
While all their things are stolen
Which are under their heads
And they know it not
Every Lion comes forth from his den
All Serpents they sting
Darkness - The world is in silence.
He that made them rests in his horizon.

Bright is the earth when you rise in the horizon.
When you shine as Aten by day
You drive away the darkness.
When thou send forth you rays
The two lands are in daily festivity.
Awake and standing upon their feet
When you have raised them up.
Their limbs bathed, they take their clothing
Their arms uplifted in adoration to your dawning
Then in all the world they do their work..

All cattle rest upon their pasturage
The trees and the plants flourish,
The birds flutter in their marshes,
Their wings uplifted in adoration to you.
All sheep dance on their feet.
All winged things fly,
They live when you have shone upon them.

The barges sail upstream and downstream alike.
Every highway is open because you have risen.
The fish in the river leap before you.
Your rays are in the midst of the great green sea.
Creator of the germ in woman
Maker of the seed in man
Giving life to the son in the body of his mother
Soothing him that he may not weep.
You are Nurse in the womb.


Giver of breath to animals, every one that you make
When it comes forth from the womb
On the day of their birth
You open its mouth in speech
You supply its necessities.

When the fledgling in the egg chirps in the shell
You give him breath to preserve him alive.
When you brought him together
to (the point of) bursting in the egg
To chirp with all his might,
He goes about on his two feet
When he has come forth.

How manifold are your works,
They are hidden from before (us)
O Sole God, whose powers no other possesses.
You did create the earth according to your heart
While you were alone
Man, all cattle, large and small
All that are upon the earth
That go about on their feet
(All) That are on high
That fly with their wings

The foreign countries, Syria and Kush,
The land of Egypt
You set every man into his place
You supply their necessities
Everyone has his possessions
And his days are reckoned
The tongues are divers in speech
Their forms likewise and their skins are distinguished
(For) you made different the strangers.

[Menolly]

Some actually believe that he was the model for the biblical Moses, or was Moses himself!

From what little I know, I think it's the wrong time period. But, is it possible he was Pharoah to Joseph's dreams and prophesies? Could Joseph had introduced the concept of monotheism to Akhenaten?

[Avatar]

Was Akhenaten the one whose name they tried to erase from the monuments and things?

--A

[I'm Murrin]

He was. even the new capital city he founded was abandoned.
IIRC, they changed his son's name from Tut-Ankh-Aten as part of the effort to erase his religion and rule.

[Avatar]

Thought he sounded familiar...

--A

[Damelon]

They also erased the images of the woman Pharaoh Hatshepsut, who reigned a couple of generations earlier.

[Avatar]

That was the one who was legally a man, right?

--A

[Damelon]

Yes, she ruled as a man.

[Avatar]

Sorta remember that one too. Was always referred to as "He," depicted with a beard, and, IIRC, even married her sister or something.

--A

[Damelon]

I remember something along the same lines as well.

A little off topic, but I work in government, and one of my old bosses used the phrase "When a new pharaoh comes in he chisels out the old pharaoh's name" to describe a change of administration.

[Avatar]

The winners write the songs that become history huh?

(Now I'm sure that whenever I say that, Malik or somebody pops up to disgaree... )

--A

[Revan]

What I find most interesting when reading about Akhenaten is how he used his personal religious beliefs to secure his own power why destabilizing his High Priests power. By forming the concept of Aten, Akhenaten effectively cut off all power from the Priests and placed it in his own hands. As the Pharaoh, he was the sole conduit of God.

Was this intelligent thinking on his part; a ploy to increase his power? Or was this actual devout belief?

[Damelon]

Hard to tell from this distance in time, Revan. Without knowing anything about his character, it could be either. Both your arguments, I think, are equally valid.

[Avatar]

The cynic in me suggests the former though.

--A

[Revan]

The cynic in me suggests the former though.

--A

I agree Avatar. However our theory cannot be certified in any way; it is just speculation without evidence. Damelon is correct in this.

[Avatar]

Agreed. Much history, especially gong so far back, is. We have no way of uncovering the motivations of people who did things.

--A

[CovenantJr]

Was Akhenaten the one whose name they tried to erase from the monuments and things?

--A

I like the irony there.