Atlantis and the Ten Plagues of Egypt: The Secret History Hidden in the Valley of the Kings (7 page)

Perhaps the most important aspect of the boundary stelae is the insight they provide into Akhenaten's unique religious status and his personal attitude to the god. In the initial proclamations Akhenaten addresses his courtiers and nobles, informing them
of his plans for the new city. He tells them that the Aten himself directed him to this site, and they respond in praise, accepting that the god communed solely with the king and with no one else.

From the rock-tombs we can gather that Akhenaten had not only usurped the priesthood as sole spokesman for divine will, but had personally replaced the old funerary deities. Although the traditional funerary practices such as mummification and the depositing of grave goods with the deceased were retained, the wall reliefs show that Akhenaten had taken over the role previously played by gods like Osiris in caring for his subjects in the afterlife. It is to him they pray for favours in both life and death. An inscription in the tomb of the courtier Parennefer, for instance, calls Akhenaten 'Lord of Burial', while one in the tomb of the chief minister Ay asks Akhenaten for 'a life prolonged by thy favours'. Another inscription in Ay's tomb further echoes the acceptance of Akhenaten's infallibility: 'Thou arisest fair in the horizon of heaven, O living Aten, beginner of life . . . there are none who know thee save thy son Akhenaten. Thou hast made him wise in thy plans and thy power.'

Akhenaten is unquestionably the one and only prophet of the Aten, and the boundary stelae provide a rare insight into how Akhenaten personally regarded his god. The initial proclamations include a text praising the Aten, seemingly in Akhenaten's own words:

The great and living Aten [damaged section] . . . ordaining life, vigorously alive, my father [damaged section] . . . My wall of millions of cubits, my reminder of eternity, my witness of what is eternal. He who fashions himself with his own two hands, he whom no craftsman has devised, he who is established in rising and setting each day ceaselessly,
whether he is in heaven or earth, every eye beholds him without hindrance while he fills the land with his rays and makes everyone to live. In seeing him my eyes are satisfied daily when he rises in the temple of the Aten at Akhetaten and fills it with his own self by means of his rays, beauteous with love, and embraces me with them in life and power for ever and ever.

Although Akhenaten, like other pharaohs, sees himself as the son of a god, his god is very different from other gods. In the phrase, 'he whom no craftsman has devised', Akhenaten affirms that, unlike other gods, the Aten cannot be represented by a physical likeness. Indeed, throughout the site the Aten is only ever represented by the sun disc symbol, and never by a statue or image – human or animal. Since the earliest dynastic times the gods of Egypt had been thought to inhabit their images, and the making of such idols was rigidly defined in the sacred texts. Once the image was made and consecrated it was regarded as a living being: it lived in its own 'great mansion', where it was tended by servants (the priests) who not only clothed and fed it (in the form of offerings), but actually woke it in the morning and put it to rest at night. All this ritual was condemned by Akhenaten, who prohibited the making of any such image of the Aten.

The manner in which Akhenaten acted as both ruler and supreme prelate can be gained from the inscriptions in various tombs. Although the king still bears the title the pharaohs had used since the Old Kingdom – 'Son of the Sun-God' – he now he has an additional title: 'The Beautiful Child of the Aten'. It would seem that Akhenaten wished to distinguish himself from all his predecessors, in that he was not merely the vessel of his god, a nominal son, but of the same substance as his god,
literally his offspring. Moreover, it would seem that Akhenaten and the Aten were seen to rule Egypt side by side. A particular event referenced in the tomb of Meryre, the overseer of the royal harem, is dated to year 12 of Akhenaten's reign, and the same event referenced in the tomb of the high steward Huya is dated to the twelfth year of the reign of the Aten. Evidently, like a king and his son, the pharaoh and his god were regarded as co-regents.

Although Akhenaten is the sole spokesman for his god, his family apparently shares something of his divinity. Indeed, it is only they who are privileged to include the Aten in their names. Beside Akhenaten, whose name means 'Living spirit of the Aten', only his offspring such as Meritaten, Meketaten and Ankhesenpaaten, and his queen Nefertiti, whose title was Neferneferuaten, 'Fair is the beauty of the Aten', are granted such a distinction. In both the tombs and on the boundary stelae, the subjects which occur most frequently are the royal family making offerings before altars, bestowing decorations on favoured courtiers, and eating and drinking together at home. In all these scenes, no matter who else is present, the rays of the Aten only ever touch the royal family's bodies or hold an
ankh
– the symbol of life – to their nostrils, an honour denied all others, no matter how high their rank. It seems that the royal family was regarded as a holy family, and their daily prayers replaced the rituals once performed by the priesthood to keep the world in motion.

Although, in theory, the pharaoh had always been absolute ruler, his religious role was more that of an icon or figurehead. The priesthood had the real authority in sacred matters. This is why the pharaohs had so indulged them, sometimes to the extent of their own ruin. It is wrong to think of the Egyptian priests simply as ministers of a modern church, attending to the
spiritual well-being of their congregations. Various gods were considered responsible for the forces of nature, cultural accomplishments and fortunes of war, and each of them had to be appeased. The multitude of priests who saw to their veneration would have been regarded more like workers in the modern utilities industries than clergymen – essential to keep the wheels of the nation turning. In many ways Egypt was structured like a technological civilization without technology. As modern civilization would collapse without its power workers, Egypt imagined it would collapse without its priesthood.

The general populace played no part in the temple activities. They did not go there once a week to worship or pray, or visit the priests for seek solace or to ask for guidance. In fact, if they did attempt to enter a temple they would probably have been executed for sacrilege. Personal religion was a personal matter: the state and priesthood couldn't care less which gods you prayed to, or venerated with altars in the privacy of your own home. In Amarna, however, all this changed. Although there was still a priesthood of sorts, the royal family carried out the principal veneration of the god, and it was to Akhenaten you prayed to secure favours and blessings from the Aten.

Akhenaten had, it seems, abandoned superstition, rejected graven images, and instigated a monotheistic faith. Just one of these innovations would have been unique for the period, not only in ancient Egypt but anywhere in the contemporary world. However, he apparently went even further – for the first time in history he made state religion accessible to the masses. At face value Akhenaten would seem to have been a religious visionary, years ahead of his time.

Since the discovery of ancient Amarna, scholars have regarded Akhenaten as everything from a mystic to a maniac. The first, Flinders Petrie, saw him as a gentle sage and a moral
philosopher: 'No king of Egypt, nor of any other part of the world, has ever carried out his honesty of expression so openly . . . Thus in every line Akhenaten stands out as perhaps the most original thinker that ever lived in Egypt, and one of the greatest idealists of the world.'

Over the following century Akhenaten was seen in many different lights. In 1911 Arthur Weigall saw him as a great reformer, in the 1920s the British Egyptologist James Baikie saw him as a utopian romantic, and in the 1930s the philologist Alan Gardiner saw him as a godless heretic. Opinions range from such extremes as Akhenaten the pacifist to Akhenaten the religious fanatic. Even today the debate continues, the problem being that the evidence appears so contradictory.

At first glance Akhenaten would seem to have been a kindly idealist. Other pharaohs are depicted, without fail, as austere personifications of absolute power; they are seen leading armies into battle, smiting enemies or sitting in judgement. Akhenaten's portrayals completely depart from this stereotype, depicting him as a caring, loving human being. Again and again, Amarna reliefs show him in intimate detail as a family man with his children on his knee, caressing them or dangling trinkets for them to snatch. He is even seen kissing his wife. A particular scene in the royal tomb actually shows him groping for Nefertiti's supportive arm as he sorrowfully mourns his daughter's death. No other pharaoh would dream of having himself revealed in such a familiar fashion. He also seems to have been an animal lover – unlike other kings of the dynasty he is never depicted hunting for sport. Akhenaten clearly sees himself as the benevolent and caring sovereign, something which one of his titles was chosen to emphasize: 'The good ruler who loves mankind'. Moreover, the king seems to have rated honesty as the prime virtue. Everywhere we find inscriptions using a phrase
which appears to have been something of a royal motto: 'living in truth'.

A popular theory in recent times has been to regard Akhenaten as a mild-mannered dreamer who lived in a world of his own and had no real authority over his country. Regardless of the merits or flaws of his regime, Akhenaten clearly had the personal influence to instate his religion, control the army and contain opposition. Any notion of some dainty young romantic skipping his way through the great temple at Karnak, clapping his hands and shouting 'everybody out', is clearly absurd. The deposition of the mighty priesthood would have required amazing resolve, remarkable aplomb, and the strategy of a
coup d'état.
Even if he played no direct part himself, he must either have had widespread support or an iron grip on power. Either way, Akhenaten was no idealist with his head in the clouds, but a strong and determined leader.

Akhenaten certainly had no interest in maintaining the empire, however, which rapidly disintegrated during his reign. We have first-hand evidence of his personal responsibility for this predicament, thanks to a remarkable discovery made in the late nineteenth century. In 1887, a peasant woman digging for fertilizer among the ancient ruins of Akhetaten unearthed a cache of over 300 inscribed clay tablets now called the Amarna Letters. Written in Akkadian, a Babylonian dialect which became the international diplomatic language of the ancient Near East, they were dispatches received from Asiatic envoys during Akhenaten's reign. They included repeated appeals for help in overcoming local insurrections and external aggression, and numerous communications from antagonists bandying accusations at one another, all of which went unheeded. Akhenaten was obviously far too busy playing prophet to concern himself with foreign affairs.

On the other hand, Akhenaten was definitely no pacifist. The Amarna reliefs repeatedly emphasize his military authority. In many he is shown wearing either the Blue Crown or Nubian wig, both part of the king's military paraphernalia, rather than the ceremonial crowns of Upper and Lower Egypt. Scenes of military activity abound in Amarnan art: parades and military processions are commonplace, while soldiers are seen everywhere, guarding temples and palaces or manning the fortified watchtowers that bordered the city. According to American Egyptologist Alan Schulman, who made an extensive study of the military background to the Amarna period in the 1960s: 'If we may take the reliefs from the tombs of the nobles at face value, then the city was virtually an armed camp.' There can be little doubt that Akhenaten not only enjoyed the full support of the army, he revelled in military might.

This seemingly paradoxical nature of Akhenaten's reign has led to opposing academic camps – 'Akhenaten the righteous' versus 'Akhenaten the despot' – with each of them emphasizing either the militaristic or the domestic scenes in support of their case. This dispute is nothing, however, compared to the most hotly debated issue of all – the mystery of Akhenaten's extraordinary physical appearance.

In all the Amarna depictions the king's physique is distinctly feminine, with heavy breasts, swelling hips and ample thighs. Since he occasionally wears a long clinging robe similar to a woman's gown, some representations of the king were at first confused with those of his queen. In many of the reliefs, without accompanying inscriptions, there is no way of telling if Akhenaten is a man or a woman. In the late nineteenth century, the French scholar Eugène Lefébure even surmised that Akhenaten had really been a woman masquerading as a man. He drew attention to Hatshepsut, a female pharaoh earlier in the eighteenth
dynasty, who had herself represented in male clothing and a pharaonic beard attached to her chin. However, Akhenaten's profile is not only effeminate, it is also deformed. The legs, for instance, are fatty around the thighs but spindly below the knee, making them look like emaciated chicken legs. There are also malformations to the skull, face and neck: the cranium is excessively large, as are the mouth and jaw, which hang down over an elongated neck.

These abnormalities have led various pathologists to suggest that Akhenaten may have suffered from a disfiguring disorder known as Frohlich's Syndrome. A complaint in which male patients exhibit physical peculiarities similar to Akhenaten's, it is caused by damage to the pituitary body, a pea-size gland at the base of the brain which secretes hormones controlling the function of other glands. The subsequent effect on the thyroid gland, which controls growth and metabolism, can result in features such as a lantern jaw and extended neck; damage to the hypothalamus, responsible for water distribution, can result in the accumulation of fluid in the cranial cavity which can enlarge the skull; and interference with the adrenal cortex, influencing the secretion of natural steroids, results in a feminine-like distribution of fat around the breasts, abdomen, thighs and buttocks. Invariably, Frohlich's Syndrome afflicts the gonads, rendering the patient sterile.