The shapely figure of Akhenaten

[meryt-tetisheri]

5 hours ago, back to earth said:

... and while we are waiting ... 

considering the significance  of the different crowns and 'head dresses' . 

What's with Tawaret's little pill box hat  ? 

Frankly, I don't know!

Pentawere murdered his father Ramses III in a palace coup

[docyabut2]

On ‎3‎/‎1‎/‎2017 at 10:50 PM, kmt_sesh said:

Recently in another thread the subject popped up about the weird way a lot of the artwork looks from the Amarna Period of Egypt. I tired to steer us away from too much discussion of it because it wasn't relevant to the topic in that thread, and suggested a separate thread because the appearance of Amarna artwork is an interesting topic unto itself. No one took me up on it so I'm taking myself up on it.

For an historical perspective the Amarna Period defines a short period of time during the New Kingdom of ancient Egypt, specifically in Dynasty 18. It most directly involves the heretic king Akhenaten (1351-1334 BCE) but would extend to the immediate royal successors Smenkhkare (1335-1334 BCE), Tutankhamun (1332-1323 BCE), and Ay (1323-1319 BCE). I pulled these dates from Wikipedia just to provide a frame of reference.

Amarna artwork is a noticeable departure from previous pharaonic artwork, especially of the figural variety, and had a lasting effect to a lessening extent into the Ramesside period of Dynasty 19. The most famous examples are the colossal statues of Akhenaten that show him with a long face, pouty lips, breasts, spindly limbs, and wide hips:

Amarna relief carvings show a similar appearance:

But why? When almost all previous kings showed themselves with perfect manly physiques and handsome faces, why did Akhenaten portray himself and his family in this bizarre manner?

Rather than my usual tendency to turn this into a tedious historical discourse of great length, I am going to behave and turn this over to you posters. What do historians have to say? What do fringe writers propose? Are there real answers out there? I say yes, but I want everyone to have a say in the matter.

Perhaps  Akhenaten was a bi sexual and wanted to portray him self  as such, and rulers of the big brains.  Like you said there are no mummies found that have those straits. Don't they think Nefertiti  was Smenkhkare  his wife in a reverse role?

Edited March 9, 2017 by docyabut2

[kmt_sesh]

On March 6, 2017 at 11:46 PM, back to earth said:

 I kept dropping hints .... but  it was like I was on ignore 

I even wrote a hymn  !   

I can tell you ... I am VERY SERIOUS  about winning one of those  lollipops !  

 

 

 

 

 

Duats forbid !      I would never do that ! 

I do have a nice coffin for your mummy after it  all plays out naturally by itself though . 

... would you like to try it now .... just  for size  ?     

 

Yummy, do those lollipops come sugar free? Those are pretty neat. Is there a website for them?

As for the coffin, the cautious side of me says no but something...intrigues me. I am compelled to try it out. You'll help me back out, won't you?

On March 7, 2017 at 1:55 AM, ShadowSot said:

You aren't familiar with him, but there was this David Mabus guy that used to use images like this in his posts. 

I wasn't familiar with Mabus so I went looking. Is this the notorious troll who ended up in legal trouble for his wayward ways? Was he ever at UM? We've had enough goofballs as it is.

[back to earth]

25 minutes ago, kmt_sesh said:

Yummy, do those lollipops come sugar free? Those are pretty neat. Is there a website for them?

?  I just googled  'Egyptian lollipops' ,  there are a few types .    

I know why you want some . To hand them out to little boys at the museum who ask far to many questions .

" Ahhh ... no, little boy, I have told you several times .... ahhhhh   ....  look , have a lollypop . " 

 

25 minutes ago, kmt_sesh said:

As for the coffin, the cautious side of me says no but something...intrigues me. I am compelled to try it out. You'll help me back out, won't you?  .

 Really ?  I would not even close the lid !

I had a nasty experience as a small child where this weird  new kid in the street looked me in a trunk in his cubby house !   A few families even ended up looking for me, it went for so long .     people thought I had been abducted . 

 

 

[kmt_sesh]

On March 7, 2017 at 9:14 PM, blackdogsun said:

hi kmt

while i await with eager anticipation your next informative post on the enigmatic Akhenaten (excellent topic and info by the way) i was wondering: if the mummy KV55 is not his, is there any academic speculation of where his actual mummy or tomb might be found?

the supposed secret chambers behind Tutankhamun's come to mind and have been suggested (if they exist) may be the tomb of Nefertiti, but is it possible they also could be the final resting place of Akhenaten's and other family members remains from the Amarna period?

Thanks, blackdogsun, and I'm glad you're enjoying the discussion.

We know where Akhenaten's tomb is. After he had abandoned Thebes and the other traditional centers and necropoli, he built his new city Akhetaten at the Middle Egyptian site of Amarna (modern name). Akhenaten established his own small royal necropolis off to the east in a narrow valley. You see it indicated as "Royal wadi" on this map, toward the center at right. An arrow points off in the direction of the tomb. It was a fairly large tomb meant for both Akhenaten and Nefertiti and, probably, one or more daughters who died during the king's reign.

Akhenaten died in the seventeenth year of his reign and was almost certainly interred in that tomb. The problem is, raiders had entered it in ancient times and destroyed everything. No mummies were found in there. The sarcophagus itself had been smashed to bits and not much of it has survived. It's been re-assembled and now sits outside the National Museum in Cairo. This photo shows the original fragments reset with an off-colored, pinkish matrix.

Now, the defaced coffin found in KV55 included inscribed gold bands wrapped around the mummy within. These bands are fragmentary today but the best estimation is that they include the throne name of Akhenaten (Neferkheperure-Waenre). So it's possible this coffin did belong to Akhenaten and was moved to the Valley of Kings after Tutankhamun took the throne. However, as I've described, forensic examination of the body inside it shows it was a male no older than his early twenties, so much too young to have been Akhenaten. It seems it was just used to store this young man (probably Smenkhkare) in the rush to bring things from the abandoned Amarna site once Tut was king.

I've always believed it's highly possible Akhenaten's mummy was destroyed deliberately by tomb raiders. It's possible these raiders were even sent by the government, in the earliest efforts to erase Akhenaten from pharaonic history. And destroying his body would effectively destroy his soul, in the ancient way of thinking.

As for the supposed secret chambers in KV62 (Tut's tomb), like many others I await the latest round of ground imaging. So far nothing has been proved to be there. I don't discount the possibility of more chambers. The precedent is certainly there and, well, how cool would that be? As for who might be buried in there, if the chambers do exist, it could be any royal body of notoriety. Personally I doubt it would be either Akhenaten or Nefertiti, but only time will tell.

Sorry for droning on. I tend to do that. 

Edited March 9, 2017 by kmt_sesh

[back to earth]

Of course , these depictions  of  Akhe just go along with an old theory of mine, that I have espoused here before  

 

http://www.freshstartguy.com/why-bald-fat-men-get-gorgeous-women/

[kmt_sesh]

10 hours ago, meryt-tetisheri said:

...

On a more serious note, is there a possibility that Akhenaton may have been denied mummification? His 'sin/crime' against almost all deities, could have been considered even greater than that of Pentawere (strangled and buried in impure goat skin).

It's altogether possible Akhenaten was mummified. His city of Akhetaten was not immediately abandoned after he died, and in fact, one of the wine jugs in Tut's tomb was inscribed with a sealing saying it came from the Estate of the Aten. That city lost its status once Tut took the throne, but it doesn't seem that true reprisals against its buildings and monuments began until Horemheb took the throne at the very end of Dynasty 18. It's really Horemheb who launched the destruction of Akhenaten's legacy.

I'm rambling again. All of this is to say, there was plenty of time to bury him before the real prescriptions began against his reign. The question is, did he want to be mummified? As much as we know about pharaonic rituals of death and burial, royal Amarna death and burial is something of a black hole. After all, the primary god of the underworld, Osiris, and of mummification, Anubis, were two of the deities erased by Akhenaten. As many religious texts as we have from the heretic king's reign, very few of them even mention afterlife beliefs.

In my reply to blackdogsun I posted a photo of Akhenaten's sarcophagus. I might as well post it here too: click. In many ways it's a traditional royal sarcophagus, but in other ways it's certainly not. For instance, on a normal royal sarcophagus of this dynasty you would see the protective goddesses Isis, Nephthys, Selket, and Neith at the four corners (and similarly on the canopic chest). But in Akhenaten's sarcophagus all of these goddesses were replaced by protective images of his primary queen, Nefertiti. So in some ways the burial was traditional, in some ways it was not.

And there's the problem that no single mummy is agreed to be Akhenaten's. Zahi Hawass seems alone in identifying KV55 as his mummy, but practically everyone else disagrees (and most believe it is Smnekhkare). So without a mummy we just can't know. Like I mentioned to blackdogsun, I believe it's possible his mummy was destroyed in ancient times. Quite possibly it's now nothing more than dust.

[ShadowSot]

33 minutes ago, kmt_sesh said:

Yummy, do those lollipops come sugar free? Those are pretty neat. Is there a website for them?

As for the coffin, the cautious side of me says no but something...intrigues me. I am compelled to try it out. You'll help me back out, won't you?

I wasn't familiar with Mabus so I went looking. Is this the notorious troll who ended up in legal trouble for his wayward ways? Was he ever at UM? We've had enough goofballs as it is.

Yeahp. 

 I don't think he posted here, ran into him a few times on other forums. He also turned up to a conference a friend of mine went to.

 He's a bit of a sad case, very much mentally disturbed and doesn't take to treatments. 

 Haven't seen anything from him in a while though, so maybe it stuck finally.

[kmt_sesh]

14 minutes ago, back to earth said:

Of course , these depictions  of  Akhe just go along with an old theory of mine, that I have espoused here before  

 

http://www.freshstartguy.com/why-bald-fat-men-get-gorgeous-women/

Pffft! I'm bald, and perhaps not fat but stout, and I don't get gorgeous women. Is it because I'm not a powerful king with gold coming out of my...

Not much I can do about that.

[ShadowSot]

9 minutes ago, kmt_sesh said:

Pffft! I'm bald, and perhaps not fat but stout, and I don't get gorgeous women. Is it because I'm not a powerful king with gold coming out of my...

Not much I can do about that.

Well... you do work in a museum with lots of nice gold crowns and such, right?

 

 I wouldn't be surprised if Akhenaten mumy managed to survive to the modern day, only to be destoryed by the Victorians.

[back to earth]

22 minutes ago, kmt_sesh said:

Pffft! I'm bald, and perhaps not fat but stout, and I don't get gorgeous women. Is it because I'm not a powerful king with gold coming out of my...

Not much I can do about that.

 

Dont tell me  

 

you got no bling ? !  

 

 

 

 

Edited March 9, 2017 by back to earth

[kmt_sesh]

2 hours ago, docyabut2 said:

Perhaps  Akhenaten was a bi sexual and wanted to portray him self  as such, and rulers of the big brains.  Like you said there are no mummies found that have those straits. Don't they think Nefertiti  was Smenkhkare  his wife in a reverse role?

Yes, some have argued that Nefertiti and Smenkhkare are the same person. I personally don't agree because, to me, there's just enough evidence to show that Smenkhkare was a male who reigned sometime between Akhenaten and Tutankhamun, although very briefly. And in the tomb of Meryre II at Amarna, Smenkhkare is shown in the company of his queen, Meritaten, one of Akhenaten's daughters. It's probable that Smenkjare was Tutnakhamun's father.

However, many believe Nefertiti is one and the same as another shady Amarna royal named Ankheperure-mery-Neferkheperure. In this guise she may well have reigned independently for a short time after Akhenaten's death; and there is a theory she was regent to Tutankhamun for a short time. But this is only theoretical, mind you. Others have argued that Ankheperure-mery-Neferkheperure was in fact Meritaten.

Whether Akhenaten was gay or bi is an interesting thought. We should take care not to pigeon-hole him as such merely because he depicted himself in an odd manner. One's sexual persuasion does not generally affect physical appearance. But considering one in every ten people is believed to be gay, it's certainly possible. No such writing hints at Akhenaten being so, but I recall a story from much earlier about the great king Khufu (he of the Great Pyramid) getting it on with one of his generals. But that was only a fable, of course. Homosexuality was not officially proscribed in Egyptian society so far as we can tell, but it was frowned on because such a union could not produce children. But we know many men in ancient times practiced homosexuality (especially in Greece and Rome) and were married at the same time and produced children, which was acceptable. Whether Akhenaten was we can't say with any certainty, but it's always possible. I don't think it would account for the odd appearance of Amarna art, much less why his wives, concubines, and daughters were depicted that way, but it's a creative thought. 

[kmt_sesh]

12 minutes ago, ShadowSot said:

Well... you do work in a museum with lots of nice gold crowns and such, right?

 

 I wouldn't be surprised if Akhenaten mumy managed to survive to the modern day, only to be destoryed by the Victorians.

Now wouldn't that be something? Maybe he was one of those mummies ignominiously "unrolled" at some Victorian mansion for the entertainment of others. The guests went home with bits of his wrappings as party favors, and one person used his foot as a pen holder.

Plenty of gold at the Field Museum and Oriental Institute, but no gold crowns as far as I'm aware. They're probably hiding them from me. 

[back to earth]

6 minutes ago, kmt_sesh said:

Yes, some have argued that Nefertiti and Smenkhkare are the same person. I personally don't agree because, to me, there's just enough evidence to show that Smenkhkare was a male who reigned sometime between Akhenaten and Tutankhamun, although very briefly. And in the tomb of Meryre II at Amarna, Smenkhkare is shown in the company of his queen, Meritaten, one of Akhenaten's daughters. It's probable that Smenkjare was Tutnakhamun's father.

However, many believe Nefertiti is one and the same as another shady Amarna royal named Ankheperure-mery-Neferkheperure. In this guise she may well have reigned independently for a short time after Akhenaten's death; and there is a theory she was regent to Tutankhamun for a short time. But this is only theoretical, mind you. Others have argued that Ankheperure-mery-Neferkheperure was in fact Meritaten.

Whether Akhenaten was gay or bi is an interesting thought. We should take care not to pigeon-hole him as such merely because he depicted himself in an odd manner. One's sexual persuasion does not generally affect physical appearance. But considering one in every ten people is believed to be gay, it's certainly possible. No such writing hints at Akhenaten being so, but I recall a story from much earlier about the great king Khufu (he of the Great Pyramid) getting it on with one of his generals. But that was only a fable, of course. Homosexuality was not officially proscribed in Egyptian society so far as we can tell, but it was frowned on because such a union could not produce children. But we know many men in ancient times practiced homosexuality (especially in Greece and Rome) and were married at the same time and produced children, which was acceptable. Whether Akhenaten was we can't say with any certainty, but it's always possible. I don't think it would account for the odd appearance of Amarna art, much less why his wives, concubines, and daughters were depicted that way, but it's a creative thought. 

But what a way to market an Amarna  exhibit at a museum  !    Probably even give the whole field of Egyptology a boost ! 

 

[back to earth]

7 minutes ago, kmt_sesh said:

Now wouldn't that be something? Maybe he was one of those mummies ignominiously "unrolled" at some Victorian mansion for the entertainment of others. The guests went home with bits of his wrappings as party favors, and one person used his foot as a pen holder.

Plenty of gold at the Field Museum and Oriental Institute, but no gold crowns as far as I'm aware. They're probably hiding them from me. 

He could have been eaten ? 

" ...    The History of Corpse Medicine from the Renaissance to the Victorians, reveal that for several hundred years, peaking in the 16th and 17th centuries, many Europeans, including royalty, priests and scientists, routinely ingested remedies containing human bones, blood and fat as medicine for everything from headaches to epilepsy. There were few vocal opponents of the practice, even though cannibalism in the newly explored Americas was reviled as a mark of savagery. Mummies were stolen from Egyptian tombs, and skulls were taken from Irish burial sites. Gravediggers robbed and sold body parts.  ... "

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-gruesome-history-of-eating-corpses-as-medicine-82360284/

[ShadowSot]

6 minutes ago, kmt_sesh said:

Now wouldn't that be something? Maybe he was one of those mummies ignominiously "unrolled" at some Victorian mansion for the entertainment of others. The guests went home with bits of his wrappings as party favors, and one person used his foot as a pen holder.

Plenty of gold at the Field Museum and Oriental Institute, but no gold crowns as far as I'm aware. They're probably hiding them from me. 

Plenty of gold, just use it to make a crown. 

 Then go to the nearest bar. Problems solved. 

 Or he could have been used to make paint. 

 Heck of an ending for such an infamous pharaoh.

[kmt_sesh]

8 hours ago, back to earth said:

... and while we are waiting ... 

considering the significance  of the different crowns and 'head dresses' . 

What's with Tawaret's little pill box hat  ? 

Why not a pill box hat? It was all the rage at Harrods-hotep up and down the Nile.

In truth the little hat is just a modius, a common crown or royal headgear, It comes in different styles, including the one on the famous bust of Nefertiti.

Why Taweret's is so small I'm honestly not sure. I see it described in the literature but not why it's so little. Then again, imagine trying to fit a hat on a hippo!

We have a beautiful Taweret at the Field Museum. I like pointing it out to visitors:

[ShadowSot]

*obligatory reminds me of my ex remark*

[kmt_sesh]

14 minutes ago, ShadowSot said:

Plenty of gold, just use it to make a crown. 

 Then go to the nearest bar. Problems solved. 

 Or he could have been used to make paint. 

 Heck of an ending for such an infamous pharaoh.

I always liked the story about the butcher in Boston back in the nineteenth century. He had friends who visited Egypt bring him back mummy bandages so he could use them as butcher paper. I always picture his clients coming back and saying, "All of your cuts have such an unusual seasoning to them!" Lo and behold, about that time a cholera epidemic broke out in Boston.

But you know how the later kings felt about ol' Akhenaten. They referred to him as "the criminal" and would not let his name be spoken, so there was no love lost. You just know they would approve of his mummy being stripped for entertainment.

[kmt_sesh]

I want to take the opportunity to thank everyone for taking part in this discussion. It's onto five pages as I write this! I know, a whopping five pages, but for me that's pretty good. So I bow to you...

[kmt_sesh]

27 minutes ago, back to earth said:

But what a way to market an Amarna  exhibit at a museum  !    Probably even give the whole field of Egyptology a boost ! 

 

Look, even the pigeon wants to go in. Where's its ticket?

I almost mistook that for the Field Museum. Almost. The pigeon gave it away. It's much too clean and healthy looking for a Chicago pigeon.

[kmt_sesh]

1 hour ago, back to earth said:

?  I just googled  'Egyptian lollipops' ,  there are a few types .    

I know why you want some . To hand them out to little boys at the museum who ask far to many questions .

" Ahhh ... no, little boy, I have told you several times .... ahhhhh   ....  look , have a lollypop . " 

LOL I love the kids I work with and enjoy their questions. They can ask as many as they want. It's usually the parent who tires of it before I do. "Okay, Timmy, let's move on and let the man talk to someone else." I get along great with the parents too, but I don't think they'd like me to be handing out candy to their kids. Instead I write their names in hieroglyphs for them.

Quote

Really ?  I would not even close the lid !

I had a nasty experience as a small child where this weird  new kid in the street looked me in a trunk in his cubby house !   A few families even ended up looking for me, it went for so long .     people thought I had been abducted . 

Is that true? What's a cubby house? Goodness, you'd think that would leave you with permanent claustrophobia. I hope that kid got in trouble...poor little back to earth jammed in a trunk. For me it's arachnophobia. I can't stand spiders!

[ShadowSot]

21 minutes ago, kmt_sesh said:

I always liked the story about the butcher in Boston back in the nineteenth century. He had friends who visited Egypt bring him back mummy bandages so he could use them as butcher paper. I always picture his clients coming back and saying, "All of your cuts have such an unusual seasoning to them!" Lo and behold, about that time a cholera epidemic broke out in Boston.

But you know how the later kings felt about ol' Akhenaten. They referred to him as "the criminal" and would not let his name be spoken, so there was no love lost. You just know they would approve of his mummy being stripped for entertainment.

Im sure the cholera epidemic was completely unrelated. Simple misfortune, not at all from using linens left in a cave for a thousand odd years, wrapped around a dead body. No siree. 

 Fair point, don't think they could have wished for better ending. 

 A bunch of pompous twits using the inmortal remains as snorting powder? Wonderful. 

 Just imagine his Ka sitting there watching. 

"What... what are you doing?" 

"No, put my kingly arm down!"

"What.. no! My kingly arm does not go there! Stop it!"

"Not the nose!"

[Sundog]

3 hours ago, kmt_sesh said:

Thanks, blackdogsun, and I'm glad you're enjoying the discussion.

We know where Akhenaten's tomb is. After he had abandoned Thebes and the other traditional centers and necropoli, he built his new city Akhetaten at the Middle Egyptian site of Amarna (modern name). Akhenaten established his own small royal necropolis off to the east in a narrow valley. You see it indicated as "Royal wadi" on this map, toward the center at right. An arrow points off in the direction of the tomb. It was a fairly large tomb meant for both Akhenaten and Nefertiti and, probably, one or more daughters who died during the king's reign.

Akhenaten died in the seventeenth year of his reign and was almost certainly interred in that tomb. The problem is, raiders had entered it in ancient times and destroyed everything. No mummies were found in there. The sarcophagus itself had been smashed to bits and not much of it has survived. It's been re-assembled and now sits outside the National Museum in Cairo. This photo shows the original fragments reset with an off-colored, pinkish matrix.

Now, the defaced coffin found in KV55 included inscribed gold bands wrapped around the mummy within. These bands are fragmentary today but the best estimation is that they include the throne name of Akhenaten (Neferkheperure-Waenre). So it's possible this coffin did belong to Akhenaten and was moved to the Valley of Kings after Tutankhamun took the throne. However, as I've described, forensic examination of the body inside it shows it was a male no older than his early twenties, so much too young to have been Akhenaten. It seems it was just used to store this young man (probably Smenkhkare) in the rush to bring things from the abandoned Amarna site once Tut was king.

I've always believed it's highly possible Akhenaten's mummy was destroyed deliberately by tomb raiders. It's possible these raiders were even sent by the government, in the earliest efforts to erase Akhenaten from pharaonic history. And destroying his body would effectively destroy his soul, in the ancient way of thinking.

As for the supposed secret chambers in KV62 (Tut's tomb), like many others I await the latest round of ground imaging. So far nothing has been proved to be there. I don't discount the possibility of more chambers. The precedent is certainly there and, well, how cool would that be? As for who might be buried in there, if the chambers do exist, it could be any royal body of notoriety. Personally I doubt it would be either Akhenaten or Nefertiti, but only time will tell.

Sorry for droning on. I tend to do that. 

thanks, kmt

please do drone on, the entire story is just fascinating and you tell it with such clarity

even if nothing of significance is found behind king tut's tomb i'm hoping that akhenaten's family, knowing that efforts to erase his memory and desecrate his tomb were inevitable once the old priesthood was reinstated, would have secretly spirited away his remains and re-interred them in a discrete final resting place somewhere where he would never be found (and his ka destroyed)

[back to earth]

14 hours ago, kmt_sesh said:

LOL I love the kids I work with and enjoy their questions. They can ask as many as they want. It's usually the parent who tires of it before I do. "Okay, Timmy, let's move on and let the man talk to someone else." I get along great with the parents too, but I don't think they'd like me to be handing out candy to their kids. Instead I write their names in hieroglyphs for them.

Is that true? What's a cubby house?

A ramshackle kids playhouse , often self made ... a tree house on the ground.  yeah, its true .... its part of my strange life episodes where I seem to have ti enact some forms of mythology  ... unless they are archetypal experiences or something .

Quote

Goodness, you'd think that would leave you with permanent claustrophobia.

Yes, in a way , I have always had trouble going in under things ; working under a car ( when it isnt jacked up very high )  small caves when snorkeling.   LUckily it wasnt air tight  ! 

Quote

I hope that kid got in trouble...

Apparently the adults, in their search asked him if he had seen me and said no  - b****** .  

Quote

 

poor little back to earth jammed in a trunk.

 

 

Quote

 

For me it's arachnophobia. I can't stand spiders!

But ..... 

 

 

( Spiderman would have rescued me out of that trunk !  ) 

Edited March 9, 2017 by back to earth