Tell el-Amarna summary

Learn about the history of the ancient city of Tell el-Amarna and its archaeological findings

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Tell el-Amarna: noble's estate
Model of a noble's estate at Tell el-Amarna.

Tell el-Amarna, Ancient city, Egypt. Located midway between Thebes and Memphis on the Nile River, it was built in the 14th century bc by the Egyptian king (pharaoh) Akhenaton, who moved his subjects there in order to found a new monotheistic religion. Artifacts discovered there in the 19th century included hundreds of cuneiform tablets. Archaeological finds of the late 20th century included sculptures and paintings.

Egypt Summary

Egypt, country located in the northeastern corner of Africa. Egypt’s heartland, the Nile River valley and delta, was the home of one of the principal civilizations of the ancient Middle East and, like Mesopotamia farther east, was the site of one of the world’s earliest urban and literate

Africa Summary

Africa, the second largest continent (after Asia), covering about one-fifth of the total land surface of Earth. The continent is bounded on the west by the Atlantic Ocean, on the north by the Mediterranean Sea, on the east by the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean, and on the south by the mingling waters

Nefertiti Summary

Nefertiti was the queen of Egypt and wife of King Akhenaton (formerly Amenhotep IV; reigned c. 1353–36 bce), who played a prominent role in the cult of the sun god known as the Aton. Nefertiti’s parentage is unrecorded, but, as her name translates as “A Beautiful Woman Has Come,” early

Sir Flinders Petrie, detail of an oil painting by George Frederic Watts, 1900; in the National Portrait Gallery, London.

Sir Flinders Petrie Summary

Sir Flinders Petrie was a British archaeologist and Egyptologist who made valuable contributions to the techniques and methods of field excavation and invented a sequence dating method that made possible the reconstruction of history from the remains of ancient cultures. He was knighted in 1923.