The Life and Times of Akhnaton, Pharaoh of Egypt

by Arthur E. P. Brome Weigall

5. THE ACCESSION OF AKHNATON.

On coming to the throne the young king fixed his titulary in the following manner:—

Mighty Bull, Lofty of Plumes; Favourite of the Two Goddesses, Great in Kingship in Karnak; Golden Hawk, Wearer of Diadems in the Southern Heliopolis; King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Beautiful-is-the-Being-of-Ra, the Only-One-of-Ra; Son of the Sun, Peace-of-Amon (Amonhotep), Divine Ruler of Thebes; Great in Duration, Living for Ever and Ever, Beloved of Amon-Ra, Lord of Heaven.

These titles were drawn up on more or less prescribed lines, and conformed to the old custom of the Pharaohs. Like his ancestors, he was called “Beloved of Amon-Ra,” although, as we have seen, the power of that god was already much undermined. To counterbalance this reference to the god of Thebes, however, one finds the surprising title—

High Priest of Ra-Horakhti, rejoicing in the horizon in his name, “Heat-which-is-in-Aton.”

Let the boy be said to be beloved of Amon-Ra till the walls of Thebes reverberate with the cry; let Amon-Ra be called Lord of Heaven till the priestly heralds can shout no more: the doom of the god of Thebes cannot now be averted, for the reigning Pharaoh is dedicated to another god.

Akhnaton.

It is obvious that a boy of eleven years of age could not himself have claimed the office of the High Priest of Ra-Horakhti. Queen Tiy and her advisers must have deliberately endowed the youthful king with this office, largely in order to set the seal upon the fate of Amon. There were, perhaps, other reasons why this remarkable step was decided upon. It may be, as has been said, that the queen, before the birth of her son, had vowed him to Ra-Horakhti. Again, the boy was epileptic, was subject to hallucinations; and it may be that while in this condition he had seen visions or uttered words which led his mother to believe him to be the chosen one of the Heliopolitan god, whose name the prince must have been constantly hearing. In a palace where the mystical “Heat-which-is-in-Aton,” which was the new elaboration of the god’s name, was being daily invoked, and where the youthful master of Egypt was constantly falling into what appeared to be holy frenzy, it is not unlikely that the rising deity would be connected with the eccentricities of the young Pharaoh. The High Priest of Ra-Horakhti was always called “The Great of Visions,” and was thus essentially a visionary prophet either by nature or by circumstance; and the unfortunate boy’s physical condition may have been turned, thus, to account in the struggle against Amon-Ra.

One may now imagine the Pharaoh as a pale, sickly youth. His head seemed too large for his body; his eyelids were heavy; his eyes as one imagines them were wells of dream. His features were delicately moulded, and his mouth, in spite of a somewhat protruding lower jaw, is reminiscent of the best of the art of Rossetti. He seems to have been a quiet, studious boy, whose thoughts wandered in fair places, searching for that happiness which his physical condition had denied to him. His nature was gentle; his young heart overflowed with love. He delighted, it would seem, to walk in the gardens of the palace, to hear the birds singing, to watch the fish in the lake, to smell the flowers, to follow the butterflies, to warm his small bones in the sunshine. There was a grave dignity in his gait, or the artists have lied; and his words were already fraught with wisdom. The great crown of the Pharaohs sat easily upon his head, for his every movement was royal. He accepted as his due the homage of the court; yet he does not seem to have acted with arrogance, and was ever a tender-hearted, impulsive child. Already he was sometimes called “Lord of the Breath of Sweetness”;[24] and already he was so much beloved by his subjects that their adherence to him through the rough places of his future life was assured. For the first years of his reign he was, of course, entirely under the regency of his mother. Dushratta, the King of Mitanni, writing to congratulate the boy on his accession, addressed himself to Queen Tiy, as though he thought the king would hardly yet be able to understand a letter; and in a later communication he asks the Pharaoh to inquire of his mother as to certain matters of international policy. But although so young, the king was wise beyond his years, as the reader will presently see.