Skip to main content
Glite Dictionary
🏺 Ancient city site 📜 Egyptian history era 🎨 Egyptian art period
Amarna

Amarna

1 9.9
The time in ancient Egypt when Pharaoh Akhenaten ruled and changed religion and art
  • proper noun
: período amarnense
  • During the Amarna period, Akhenaten introduced new forms of worship focused on the sun disc.
  • Amarna period

Examples

  • Archaeologists study the Amarna period to understand the cultural shifts of ancient Egyptian society.

  • His finds offer a more complex reading of the controversial Amarna period.

    Academic text (2006)

  • And while other Amarna-period tombs typically include reliefs of everyday life done in a more naturalistic style, the scribe's tomb has far more traditional scenes of funerary rites.

    Academic text (2006)

  • They were led in part by the Amarna style of Egypt, which may be credited with awakening a naturalistic tendency in Babylonian art during the Kassite dynasty when there was a regular correspondence between the courts of Babylonia and Egypt.

    Academic text (1993)

  • The Amarna period is known for its revolutionary changes in religion and art in ancient Egypt.

Surface Forms

Amarna main

Etymology

Amarna for the period comes from the name of Akhenaten's city Akhetaten, meaning 'Horizon of the Aten' or the sun, because Akhenaten moved the capital there and promoted sun worship. So the 'Amarna' period means the years of his rule, known for its new religion and very different art.