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The failed reforms of Akhenaten and Muwatalli

"In his fifth regnal year Akhenaten founded his new capital Akhet-Aten in Middle Egypt, thereby crowning his religious reform intended to promote the cult of Aten to the exclusion of the rest of the Egyptian pantheon. Half a century later Muwatalli founded his new capital at Tarhuntassa in the Lower Land, as the apex of a religious reform promoting the cult of the Storm-god of Lightning at the expense of other major deities of the Hittites. Both reforms collapsed shortly after the death of the ''heretic'' kings, but Tarhuntassa continued to exist as the seat of a competing Great King. The similarities and the differences between these major religious reforms of the Late Bronze Age will be examined in the light of the contemporary sources and some historical analogies."

Author(s):  Singer, Itamar
Format:  Article
Publisher:  British Museum
Publication City:  London
Source:  British Museum Studies in Ancient Egypt and Sudan (BMSAES)
Volume Info:  Oct-06
Volume:  6
Conference:  British Museum Department of Ancient Egypt and Sudan's 2005 International Colloquium 'Egypt and the Hittites'