THE GREAT ATEN

Akhetaten

(Akhenaten's capital)

To a large extent, our knowledge of Akhenaten's life and times begins in Akhetaten, the city
he built for himself and his religion, not that the site is particularly well preserved.

In fact, it's not.

Later rulers antagonistic to Amarna culture, the social and religious institutions Akhenaten im-
posed on Egypt, intentionally demolished Akhetaten along with the records of his reign.

Ironically, however, that program of destruction saved the city and its founder's name for pos-
terity and, for the most part, its preservation depends on the fact that the city rose and fell
very quickly.

The reason for that stems from the enormous scope of change which Akhenaten attempted—
a dramatic shift in religious, political and social traditions—and that meant he had to have an
entirely new, fully functioning capital from which he could run the country without the weight
of tradition bearing down on him and holding him back. Revolutions often have to "seize the
day" and proceed quickly or else they do not get off the ground at all.

In order to build Akhenaten's city and shrines at such a breakneck speed, relatively small
blocks were used, stones which are now called 'talatat'—it's easier and faster to raise a struc-
ture by using many small pieces rather than a few large ones—and, to date, more than 45,000
talatat from Akhenaten's buildings have come to light. Indeed, so many have been recovered
that today talatat can be found in museums around the world and are a regular item sold on
the black market. But small-sized blocks are also easy to deconstruct. One of the reasons the
Great Pyramid still stands is the enormous size of the individual stones used to build it, and
for that reason it couldn't be rapidly demolished the way Amarna culture was.

It's often the case that what goes up fast comes down the same way.

Other factors played a role in the ready destruction—and preservation!—of Akhenaten's city.
The demolitionists who sought to obliterate any memory of Akhenaten by eradicating all traces
of Amarna culture used the talatat, the very sinew of Akhetaten, as fill in their own construction
projects.

But, by hiding the talatat within the body of other buildings, they inadvertently protected and
preserved them for modern archaeologists to find. Because of that, much of Akhenaten's capital,
its architecture and artwork can be reconstructed. So in this case, what goes down easily comes
back up the same way, too.