Amarna, a Utopia built by Children

King Akhenaten (Amenhotep IV), often thought of as a dreamer-philosopher in a land of warrior-kings, cast aside the mighty pantheon of deities and raised his gaze to a single blazing sun: the Aten. With eyes wide to the heavens and feet planted in the desert dust, he declared a revolution not of armies, but of light. Temples were emptied, idols fell, and in their place rose the alabaster city of Akhet-Aten; a capital for the Sun Disc, crafted in radiant haste.

It was in Akhet-Aten, where Akhenaten ruled beside his Great Royal Wife, the famous and timeless beauty, Nefertiti, not as conquerors, but as chosen poets of divine radiance. But revolutions, even those bathed in sunlight, cast shadows. And behind the golden facades lay the untold toll of toil, youth, and sacrifice.

Akhenaten’s decision to abandon Thebes and build a new capital at Akhet-Aten was one of the most radical undertakings in all of Ancient Egyptian history, and to this day is still recognized as a bold, almost theatrical gesture of religious and political revolution. In doing such, Akhenaten not only disrupted centuries of tradition but also attempted to reshape the very soul of Egypt. Akhenaten’s devotion to the Aten was not just religious; it was artistic and philosophical. In hymns likely written or commissioned by the king himself, such as the Great Hymn to the Aten, Akhenaten exalts the sun’s warmth as the giver of all life, with language that reads more like sacred poetry than royal decree. This idealised vision of divine love, natural order, and unity under one god stands in stark contrast to the complex pantheon of Ancient Egypt’s past, making Akhenaten appear as a spiritual visionary ahead of his time.

Around his fifth regnal year, Akhenaten, then still known as Amenhotep IV, declared that the gods of Egypt, particularly the powerful Amun of Thebes, had been supplanted. In their place, he exalted the Aten (the radiant disc of the sun) as the sole divine presence worthy of worship. The great temples of Amun, once pulsating with incense and chants, were shuttered or defaced. Priests were disempowered, old cults diminished, and offerings rediverted to the Aten’s new shrines.

Akhenaten, after already shaking Egypt to it’s core, then ordered the laying of a new foundation to stabilise the nation, in the form of an entirely new capital city, Akhetaten, “The Horizon of the Aten”. It was to be built on virgin ground, far from Thebes, Memphis, or any existing sacred site. The location, a stretch of desert nestled against a natural curve of cliffs on the eastern Nile bank, was chosen not for its strategic value, but for spiritual symbolism: the horizon here formed a cradle for the rising sun, a sacred theatre for Aten’s daily rebirth, it was perfect for Akhenaten’s vision.

Egyptologists believe the construction of Akhetaten began swiftly after a boundary stela was inscribed with Akhenaten’s vision and commands. Work commenced at breakneck speed, likely mobilising vast labour forces. The speed of construction is evident in the city’s architecture: buildings were erected using talatat blocks, small, standardised limestone bricks that could be easily carried and laid, allowing rapid progress. The entire city (temples, palaces, homes, gardens, and administrative quarters) may have taken as little as two to three years to reach functional completion, though expansion continued throughout Akhenaten’s reign. The plan, it seems, was to sever ties with the old gods and their entrenched power structures entirely, creating an ideological and physical distance that gave Atenism room to flourish.

As pharaoh, Akhenaten held near-absolute authority, so the state’s resources, its bureaucracy, and even its theology were his to command. By suppressing Amun’s priesthood and redirecting temple wealth, he gained financial freedom. By founding a new city, he created a space where the old powers held no sway. The move was less about administrative efficiency and more a grand re-staging of Egypt’s relationship with the divine; a theocratic coup played out in sandstone and sunbeams.

However, despite the holy and divine ideals Akhenaten and his new-found ideology projected, beyond the light of the sun’s rays were dark shadows that were cast and have been unearthed some 3000 years later with the discovery of the worn bones of those who lived and died to make the king’s dream a reality.

Labour at Amarna

Just behind the sun-bleached cliffs that fringe the city of Tel el-Amarna lie two unassuming stretches of desert; the South and North Tombs Cemeteries. These quiet sands, conceal one of the most poignant chapters in Akhenaten’s short-lived utopia, and may change the way we view the king and his queen.

These wadis, first noted by Professor Barry Kemp at Amarna Project, conceal the most poignant testimony to Akhenaten’s utopia. Looted shafts and bleached bone fragments hinted at the drama below; systematic excavation is now revealing it in painful detail.

The South Tombs Cemetery, lying beneath the noble chapels, holds a broad cross‑section of the city’s populace; men and women, elders and infantsinterred with care. It whispers of community and continuity, cradling the remains of everyday souls. Here were men and women, elders and infants, laid to rest near to the Tombs of the Nobles, with modest offerings; a bead here, a pot there…tokens of love and remembrance. They were buried with care, side by side, wrapped in linen or reed matting, some even adorned with the simple trappings of dignity. But far to the north, where the desert winds sweep through a lonely wadi behind the cliffs, the North Tombs Cemetery tells a darker tale.

The North Tombs Cemetery, by contrast, murmurs of sacrifice. In 2015, a six‑week season directed by Anna Stevens, Mary Shepperson and Mindi King Wetzel opened twenty‑seven five‑metre squares on the southern bank of a wadi behind the northern cliffs. Beneath a crust of flood‑laid marl and drifted sand the team uncovered 85 graves containing 115 individuals. Twenty‑five of these graves were essentially mass graves; in one pit five juveniles had been stacked like cord‑wood, divided only by a dusting of sand. Artefacts were almost non‑existent; no offerings of tribute, just small trinkets; mere strings of faience beads, a Wedjat Eye ring, a wooden ear‑plug, a solitary metal needle, all the while coffins and carved stelae documenting these souls were wholly absent.

Here within these somber graves, lie those barely grown; teenagers and children, their bones twisted by burden, spines compressed from toil. No remnants of funerary tokens, no tender signs of family; only bodies hastily laid, sometimes one atop another, as if death had become routine. This was no place of peaceful sleep, but a pit of the weary and forgotten. If the South speaks of community and continuity, the North murmurs of sacrifice; a quiet lament for those whose fleeting lives built a utopia not their own.

Of course, some could and rightfully argue that the graves had been looted in antiquity, however, these young bodies upon further expection held an even darker secret. The bones of these young Amarnians had been strained to breaking point. Out of over 100 individuals studied in the first cohort, over 90% were estimated to be aged between 7 and 25, with the majority under the age of 15.

Despite the death of children being a tragically common occurance in the ancient world, at the North Tombs Cemetery in Amarna, something highly unusual was observed: children under the age of 7 were almost entirely absent. This was statistically and demographically very odd, as throughout history, even close to our modern age, before modern medicine, early childhood has always been the most vulnerable stage of life.

The reasoning for this being odd, is that it indicates that the cemetery wasn’t a general burial ground for families or communities. Instead, it appears to represent a specialised group, such as a workforce made up of adolescents and young adults, most likely labourers involved in the construction of Akhet-Aten (Amarna). Children younger than 7 may not have been considered physically capable of the strenuous labour needed, so they were either not brought to Amarna at all, were kept elsewhere, or simply not buried in this cemetery.

And so, the age of the youth within these graves, and the absent of the very young infants usually found in ancient cemeteries, gives us allbeit indirect but strong evidence that the individuals buried in these graves were not buried by families, nor were they a typical urban or village population, they were a labouring class, possibly conscripted or coerced, and certainly overworked. Such a notion explains why those buried were in such a poor state and without care, both in life and death.

Further study tells us that the bones of these Amarna youth, show chronic physical stress, which for children should be unimaginable. Such distress uncovered through analysis of the bones includes spinal fractures (vertebral compression and spondylolysis), which is evidence of repeated heavy lifting, often on immature, growing spines. Present even in the bones of the teenagers is osteoarthritis and joint degeneration, common in adults who perform repetitive hard labour, but very rare in children. Clavicular and rib fractures are also present, likely from falls or carrying heavy yokes across the shoulders. Then there is the stunted growth, with many of these young individuals showing signs of malnutrition or arrested development, with stature below an expected height for their age. And sadly, dental enamel hypoplasia is present, caused by childhood stress or starvation episodes.

All of this, paints a picture rather different to the serene and familial artwork the Amarna Period is famous for. Be it the stark mass burial plots of the children, and the remnants of their earthly remains, here we have a sullen reality of the ancient world of Akhetaten. Beyond the gilded gold shrines of the glistening New Kingdom age, and beyond the beautiful busts of a breathtaking queen, there is an undercurrent of darkness. Children who are as alive as you reading this now, had their lives dedicated (likely not by choice) to making the king’s revolutionary dream come true via endless heavy labour with inadequate care to sustain health, leading to early and anonymous death, with not even a tribute to their name, and not even a name to be remembered.

So who were these youths?

At present, there is no definitive evidence pinpointing the precise origin of the children and young adults buried at the North Tombs Cemetery. However, scholars have offered a number of possible, though speculative, theories based on burial context, skeletal analysis, and the social mechanisms of the time.

It is almost universally agreed that these were not the children of elites. Their burials lacked all the hallmarks of elite status: no grave goods, no coffins, no inscriptions, not even the most basic funerary provision such as ushabtis or amulets. This rules out any connection to court or noble families, including the children of the royal harem.

Although it is known that Ancient Egyptians used Prisoners of War or foreign captives to do labour, there is no skeletal or cultural evidence yet to support the idea that these children were foreigners or the offspring of prisoners of war. Although the burials are scarce, the pottery and burial practices that do exist among the graves, are consistent with local Egyptian customs, and the skeletal remains do not suggest any distinct ethnic origin. DNA analysis is ongoing in Egyptology, and may one day offer more clarity.

A prevailing theory is that these individuals were children conscripted into labour, potentially from ordinary Egyptian families, perhaps from Thebes, Hermopolis, or rural areas near the Nile valley. Corvée labour (state-imposed unpaid service) was common in Ancient Egypt, and it’s possible families were required to “contribute” a child to help build the new capital. If so, these children may have been sent away for seasonal or extended labour, with little hope of return.

Another possibility is that these were the children of workers who had settled in Amarna (perhaps families who followed the labour force as the city rapidly sprang up). But the lack of proper burial even from their own kin suggests they were isolated, exploited, and largely denied familial care, possibly housed communally and buried communally, without ceremony. Which leads to the possibility that these youths may have been orphaned or abandoned children, possibly drawn into the service of the state. Ancient Egypt had temple-run institutions where orphaned or surplus children might be raised and trained for service, though evidence of such systems at Amarna specifically is lacking.

What does this say about Akhenaten & Nefertiti?

Ever since the revelations surrounding the child labourers of Akhetaten came to light, no longer are Akhenaten and Nefertiti, the ethereal and perhaps eccentric pair of poetic heresy and radiant beauty. Now, an unsettling shadow seems to follow them through history’s corridors.

Nefertiti, once the paragon of divine elegance, begins to take on the chilling silhouette of a villainess worthy of myth or fairy tale; a beauty cloaked in ice, a red apple with a worm eaten core. Together, the ancient couple, tend to conjure the vampiric image of Anne Rice’s Akasha and Enkil; immortal, enthralling, regal in their aloof splendour, yet unnervingly indifferent to the suffering around them. Their personal world was one of divine light and splendour, but all around their self-proclaimation divinity, is now the silent lament of the young.

While it’s true that we must avoid the trap of anachronism (imposing modern values too crudely onto the past), that does not mean we should abandon empathy or abandon the ability to call out injustice when we see its imprint in the archaeological record. People were people, regardless of the age they lived in. They felt pain, love, ambition, and loss just as we do. Their bones do not lie, and when we see young skeletons riddled with stress fractures, malnourishment, and buried without dignity, it is perfectly reasonable (and indeed ethical) to recognise this as evidence of hardship and systemic disregard for their well-being.

Ancient societies may have had different frameworks for justice, duty, and divinity, but the idea that exploitation wasn’t recognised or didn’t matter because it was ancient is a misleading and overly romantic notion. Even in Ancient Egyptian texts, we find complaints about corrupt officials, lamentations over injustice, and reflections on human suffering. The “Dialogue of a Man with His Ba” from the Middle Kingdom and the “Admonitions of Ipuwer” show clear moral sensitivity to social inequality, grief, and personal despair.

To see evidence of 7–15-year-olds buried en masse, their bodies broken by labour, absent of care or tribute, is not a neutral fact. It reflects a social system that (at least for a time) allowed such suffering in the name of a spiritual experiment and royal ambition. Even if Akhenaten believed himself to be divinely led, that doesn’t mean the cost of his vision wasn’t deeply tragic for those tasked with building it.

So, where as, as history lovers we must take facts as face value and not impose our own world view on the past, we also do not need scholarship to know that crushed spines and early graves speak louder than words. And so, as lovers of history we have a moral imperative not only to study the past, but to witness it, and sometimes, to mourn it.

Akhenaten, much like cult leader, centred this new faith entirely around his personal, divine connection to the source of life, casting himself as the sole intermediary. The traditional temples were abandoned, and a new capital was founded; a spiritual commune of sorts, isolated from the political and religious elite of Thebes. Akhenaten’s theological and societal experiment bears a somewhat similar echoe of the utopian, yet often dystopian, micro-worlds crafted by charismatic ideologues in the 20th century, in particular the Swinging 60s. He was, in many ways, Ancient Egypt’s heretical mystic; the original architect of a short-lived spiritual revolution that lived and died with its leader.

And then the dream ended. The city was abandoned. The gods returned. But the bones remain.

Recommended Reading

1. Stevens, A. & Dabbs, G. The North Tombs Cemetery 2015: Excavations and Skeletal Analysis.
   A detailed report from the Amarna Project combining field excavation data with bioarchaeological insight. annahodgkinson.co.uk
   [Download freely on Academia.edu]
2. Stevens, A., Dabbs, G. R., Shepperson, M. & Wetzel, M. Tell el‑Amarna, 2015 (Journal of Egyptian Archaeology).
   A synthesis article summarising excavation and skeletal analysis from that season. academia.edu
   [Available via the Egypt Exploration Society]
3. Dabbs, G. R. & Rose, J. C. “Death and the City: The Cemeteries of Amarna in Their Urban Context” (Cambridge Archaeological Journal, 2018).
   Compares North and South Tombs—highlighting demographic and mortuary differences. annahodgkinson.co.uk
4. De Laet, V., van Loon, G. J. M., van der Perre, A., Deliever, I. & Willems, H. “Integrated Remote Sensing Investigations of Ancient Quarries and Road Systems in the Greater Dayr al‑Barsha Region, Middle Egypt: A Study of Logistics” (Journal of Archaeological Science 55, 2015).
   Explores the quarry landscapes and transport routes just north of Amarna, offering context to labour sourcing. researchgate.net
5. Van der Perre, A. “The Limestone Quarries of Dayr Abu Hinnis: Quarry Marks of the Amarna Period.” In Lingua Aegyptia, Studia Monographica 16 (2015).
   Catalogue of Amarna-period graffiti and marks from worker camps. researchgate.net
6. Stevens, A., Dabbs, G. R., Zabecki, M. & Rose, J. C. Life, Death and Beyond in Akhenaten’s Egypt: Excavating the South Tombs Cemetery at Amarna (Antiquity 87, 2013).
   Offers comparative analysis of worker cemeteries at Amarna. annahodgkinson.co.uk
7. Kemp, B. J. The City of Akhenaten and Nefertiti: Amarna and Its People (Thames & Hudson, 2012).
   A comprehensive account of Akhet‑Aten’s urban and religious history. arts.kuleuven.be
8. Kemp, B. J. Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a Civilization (Routledge, 2006).
   For wider historical context on Egypt’s religious and societal shifts. en.wikipedia.org