Maya was a high ranking official, with titles such as, “Overseer of the Treasury“, who lived towards the end of the 18th Dynasty. With the collapse of the Amarna Period (Akhenaten and Nefertiti’s Aten experiment purposely dissolved), Maya was an important figure who held special status during the reigns of Tutankhamun (it is said Maya...
Egyptian-Alabaster Canopic jar of an 18th Dynasty queen, found within tomb KV55. New Kingdom, 18th Dynasty, Amarna Period, c. 1349–1330 B.C. One of four Canopic jars believed to have belonged to Akhenaten’s secondary wife, Queen Kiya. Despite being associated with Kiya, the image of the beautifully carved wig adorned royal upon the jar lids has...
The Amarna Period was not only a religious but also an artistic one. The art of this era is recognizable by its unmistakable sinuous shapes and the singular expressiveness of faces and gestures, which end up surviving, albeit in a less marked manner, in the following epoch. It lasted less than twenty years: with the...
This painted sandstone statue of king Akhenaten was found besides a slightly shorter statue of his beloved queen Nefertiti, and depicts them both in an “offering” stance. Although the forearm and hands are missing from this statue, it is evident from the pose and positioning of what remains of the arms, that this piece would...
On this block from a temple relief, Akhenaten, recognizable by his elongated features, holds a duck toward the Aten. With one hand he wrings the bird’s neck before offering it to the god. In this relief, the artist has cut the outlines of the figures into the surface in a technique called sunk relief. Sunk...
A colossal statue that represents Akhenaten standing with his arms folded, holding the flail and heka scepters. He is depicted with his particular realistic features; long face, narrow eyes, the long protruding chin, and the fleshy lips. The king is shown naked, without any distinctive sexual organ, which is thought, by some Egyptologists to represent...
Amulet in the shape of a cartouche. The glaze is a deep cobalt blue. Two holes at either end enter on the edge and exit on the back of the amulet near the edge. The cartouche is one of the two cartouches used for the Aten and is translated: Ra-Horakhty lives, rejoicing in the horizon....
This gold ring of Akhenaten and Nefertiti was found at Tell el-Amarna. The hieroglyphs may be read as an ideogram. The two seated figures are probably Akhenaten (left) and Nefertiti (right) as the deities Shu (air as indicated by the feather he holds) and Tefnut (moisture). They were father and mother of the earth and...
This relief portrait of Queen Nefertiti comes from a short end of a talatat, a limestone block of standardized size used during the Amarna Period in the building of the Aten temples at Karnak and Akhetaten. The standardized size and their small weight made construction more efficient. The term talatat is most likely derived from...
In this stele, Akhenaten is slouched on a low-backed, cushioned chair with side struts in the form of the ancient royal symbol for the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt, which is partly obscured by the long sash of his pleated kilt. The Aten disk was above him, in the center of the stele. The...
