|
|
|
| Zobacz też: |
The site of Amarna (commonly known as el-Amarna or incorrectly as Tel el-Amarna; see below) (Arabic: العمارنة al-‘amārnä) is located on the east bank of the Nile River in the modern Egyptian province of Minya, some 58 km (38 miles) south of the city of al-Minya, 312 km (194 miles) south of the Egyptian capital Cairo and 402 km (250 miles) north of Luxor. The site of Amarna includes several modern villages, chief of which are el-Till in the north and el-Hagg Qandil in the south.
The area contains an extensive Egyptian archaeological site that represents the remains of the capital city newly–established and built by the Pharaoh Akhenaten of the late Eighteenth Dynasty (c. 1353 BC). The name for the city employed by the ancient Egyptians is written as Akhetaten (or Akhetaton – transliterations vary) in English transliteration. Akhetaten means "Horizon of the Aten."[1]
The area was also occupied during later Roman and early Christian times, excavations to the south of the city have found several structures from this period.[2]
Contents |
The frequent designation "Tel el-Amarna" for the city is inaccurate: nowhere do the ancient remains constitute a mound of eroded architecture that would warrant the description of a "Tell" (Arabic: "city mound"), so common elsewhere in the region. Cyril Aldred notes that the name "Tel el-Amarna" is a misunderstanding of the name for one of the modern villages near the ruins, Et Til el Amarna. The name "Amarna" itself comes from the name of a tribe of nomads, the Beni Amran, who left the Eastern Desert in the 18th century to settle on the banks of the Nile along this stretch.
The area of the city was effectively a virgin–site, and it was in this city that the Akhetaten described as the Aten's
"..the seat of the First Occasion, which he had made for himself that he might rest in it."
It may be that the Royal Wadi's resemblance to the hieroglyph for horizon showed that this was the place to found the city.
The city was built as the new capital of the Pharaoh Akhenaten, dedicated to his new religion of worship to the Aten. Construction started in or around Year 5 of his reign (1346 BC) and was probably completed by Year 9 (1341 BC), although it became the capital city two years earlier.
It is the only ancient Egyptian city for which we have great details of its internal plan, in large part because the city was abandoned after the death of Akhenaten. The city seems to have remained active for a decade or so after his death, and a shrine to Horemheb indicates that it was at least partially occupied at the beginning of his reign,[3] if only as a source for building material elsewhere. Once it was abandoned it remained uninhabited until Roman settlement[2] began along the edge of the Nile. However, due to the unique circumstances of its creation and abandonment, it is questionable how representative of ancient Egyptian cities it actually is. Akhetaten was hastily constructed and covered an area of approximately 8 miles of territory on the east bank of the Nile River; on the west bank, land was set aside to provide crops for the city's population.[4] The entire city was encircled with a total of 14 boundary stelae detailing Akhenaten's conditions for the establishment of this new capital city of Egypt.[5]
The earliest dated stelae from Akhenaten's new city is known to be Boundary stelae K which is dated to Year 5, IV Peret (or month 8), day 13 of Akhenaten's reign.[6] It preserves an account of Akhenaten's foundation of this city. The document records the pharaoh's wish to have several temples of the Aten to be erected here, for several royal tombs to be created in the eastern hills of Akhetaten for himself, his chief wife Nefertiti and his eldest daughter Meritaten as well as his explicit command that when he was dead, he would be brought back to Akhetaten for burial.[7] Boundary stela K introduces a description of the events that were being celebrated at Akhetaten:
| “ | His Majesty mounted a great chariot of electrum, like the Aten when He rises on the horizon and fills the land with His love, and took a goodly road to Akhetaten, the place of origin, which [the Aten] had created for Himself that he might be happy therein. It was His son Wa'enre (ie. Akhenaten) who founded it for Him as His monument when His Father commanded him to make it. Heaven was joyful, the earth was glad every heart was filled with delight when they beheld him.[8] | ” |
This text then goes on to state that Akhenaten made a great oblation to the god Aten "and this is the theme [of the occasion] which is illustrated in the lunettes of the stelae where he stands with his queen and eldest daughter before an altar heaped with offerings under the Aten, while it shines upon him rejuvenating his body with its rays."[9]
The city as a whole is divided into a number of wide-flung components, which include:
Famous landmarks within the city itself include:
The Amarna art-style is unique among the Egyptian world for its more realistic depiction of its subjects, instead of the strict idealistic formalism universal in Egyptian art up until that point, as well as for depicting many informal scenes such as the royal family playing with their children. Although the worship of Aten (often referred to as the Amarna heresy) was completely suppressed, the artistic legacy had a more lasting impact. The art broke with a number of important long-established Egyptian conventions. These included intimate portrayals of affection within the royal family, and the abandonment of portraying women as lighter coloured than men. The art also has a realism that sometimes borders on caricature.
In 1887 a local woman digging for sebakh uncovered a cache of over 300 cuneiform tablets (now commonly known as the Amarna Letters). These tablets recorded select diplomatic correspondence of the Pharaoh and were predominantly written in Akkadian, the lingua franca commonly used during the Late Bronze Age of the Ancient Near East for such communication.
Archaeological excavation has been conducted at Amarna by a series of British and German excavation teams since 1891. These efforts were preceded in the mid-19th century by the survey work of Karl Richard Lepsius and his team of epigraphers, who copied wall illustrations, transcribed inscriptions and took paper squeezes of reliefs. The 19th century records made by these teams are of immense importance since many of these remains were later vandalized by the locals in anger against the Egyptian Antiquities Service.
The current investigations have been in annual operation since the late 1970s, directed by Dr Barry Kemp (Reader in Egyptology, University of Cambridge, England) under the auspices of the Egypt Exploration Society (EES).
1714 – Claude Sicard, a French Jesuit priest travelling through the Nile Valley, describes the first known boundary stela from Amarna.
1798–1799 – Napoleon's corps de savants prepare the first map of Amarna, subsequently published in Description de l'Égypte between 1821 and 1830.
1824 – Sir John Gardiner Wilkinson explores and maps the city remains.
1833 – The copyist Robert Hay and his surveyor G. Laver visit the locality and uncover several of the Southern Tombs from sand drifts, recording the reliefs. (The copies made by Hay and Laver languish largely unpublished in the British Library).
1843 and 1845 – The Prussian expedition led by Richard Lepsius records the visible monuments and topography of Amarna in two separate visits over a total of twelve days, employing drawings and paper squeezes. The results are ultimately published in Denkmäler aus Ægypten und Æthiopien between 1849 to 1913. Despite being somewhat limited in accuracy, the engraved Denkmäler plates nonetheless form the basis for scholastic knowledge and interpretation of many of the scenes and inscriptions in the private tombs and some of the Boundary Stelae for the remainder of the 19th century.
1887 – A cache of nearly 400 clay tablets inscribed in cuneiform are discovered by an Amarna woman, which are now known as the Amarna Letters.
1891–1892 – Alessandro Barsanti cleared the king's tomb.
1891–1892 – Sir Flinders Petrie works for one season at Amarna, working independently of the Egypt Exploration Fund (EEF). Excavating primarily in the Central City, Petrie investigates the Great Temple of the Aten, the Great Official Palace, the King's House, the Records Office (Bureau of Correspondence of Pharaoh) and several private houses. Although frequently amounting to little more than a sondage, Petrie's excavations reveal additional cuneiform tablets, the remains of glass factories, and a great quantity of discarded faience, glass and ceramic in sifting the palace rubbish heaps (including Mycenaean sherds). Publishing his results and reconstructions rapidly, Petrie is able to stimulate great interest in the site's potential.
1903–1908 – Norman de Garis Davies publishes drawn and photographic descriptions of private tombs and boundary stelae from Amarna.
1907–1914 – Led by Ludwig Borchardt, the Deutsche Orientgesellschaft excavates the North and South suburbs of the city. The famous bust of Nefertiti – now in Berlin's Ägyptisches Museum – is discovered amongst other sculptural arteftacts in the workshop of the sculptor Thutmose. The outbreak of the First World War in August 1914 terminates the German excavations.
1921–1936 – The Egypt Exploration Society (EES) returns to excavation at Amarna under the direction of T.E. Peet, Sir Leonard Woolley, Henri Frankfort and John Pendlebury. The renewed investigations focus on religious and royal structures.
1960s – The Egyptian Antiquities Organization (now the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities) undertakes a number of excavations at Amarna.
1977 – present – The EES returns once more to excavation at Amarna, now under the direction of Barry Kemp.[3]
1980 – A second, shorter expedition led by Geoffrey Martin describes and copies the reliefs from the Royal Tomb, later publishing its findings together with objects thought to have come from the tomb.
| Preceded by Thebes |
Capital of Egypt (Akhetaten) c. 1353 BC - c. 1332 BC |
Succeeded by Thebes |
|
|||||||
