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Visual History of the World
(CONTENTS)
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First Empires
ca. 7000 B.C. - 200 A.D.
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The Middle East was the
cradle of mankind's first advanced civilizations. In Egypt and the
Fertile Crescent, which extends in an arc from the north of the
Arabian Peninsula east through Palestine to Mesopotamia, the first
state structures emerged in parallel with the further development of
animal husbandry, agriculture, trade, and writing. The first great
empires, such as those of the Egyptian pharaohs, the Babylonians,
the Assyrians, and the Persians, evolved at the beginning of the
third millennium B.C., out of small communities usually clustered
around a city. Similar development also occurred on the Indian
subcontinent and in China, where quite distinct early advanced
civilizations took shape as well.
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The golden mask of Tutankhamun, a jewel of ancient
Egyptian artwork,
showing the pharaoh in a ceremonial robe decorated with the heraldic
animals, the vulture and cobra, ca. 1340 B.C.
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see also:
The Art of the Ancient Kingdoms
Egyptian
religion
(Encyclopaedia Britannica)
Egyptian Goddess
(Encyclopaedia Britannica)
Illustration
from the Book of the Dead
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Ancient Egypt
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CA. 29OO-332 B.C.
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The New Kingdom II: The Amarna Period
1379-1320 â.ñ.
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Amenhotep IV introduced a form of monotheism and banned older cults. He
thereby incurred the wrath of the priests, who feared losing their
influence in Egypt.
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The veneration of the sun disk, the Aten, was already common at the
pharaoh's court under Amenhotep III. The new pharaoh, Amenhotep IV
(1379-1362 B.C.), banned all other cults. He took the name
3 Akhenaton ("He who is of service
to Aten") and founded a new capital city, Akhetnaton ("Horizon of the
Aten"), on the plains of Tell el-Amarna in central Egypt.
In doing this, he deprived Amun-Re priesthood in Thebes
of its power. Under Akhenaton, a
new,
more 4 naturalistic art style became
popular. In the twelfth year of his reign, however, his zeal for reform
let up.
2 Nefertiti, who until then
had appeared as his equal and "great royal wife," disappeared and was
replaced by the Mitanni princess Kiya. A reason for this could have been
the growing threat from the Hittites, which had caused Egypt
and Mitanni to ally.
Soon after Akhcnaton's death, the old cults were restored. Attempts were
made to annihilate memory of the "Heretic King."
Both of the succeeding pha-raohs married à 1 daughter of Akhenaton and Nefertiti to ensure dynastic continuity. The second of them, the young
Tutankh-aten, changed his name to Tutankhamun in the course of a return
to orthodoxy. He was otherwise politically insignificant. The generals
had steadily increased their power through continual clashes with the
Hittites. Follow
ing Tutankhamun's death, military leaders usurped the throne. One of
them, Ramses I. established a new dynasty about 1320 B.C.
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3 Portrait of Akhenaton, ca. 1355 B.C.
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Portrait of Akhenaton
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Akhenaten depicted as a sphinx at Amarna
(now in the Kestner Museum)
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Akhenaten
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1 Daughters of Nefertiti and
Akhenaton in front of Aten's sun disk, relief, ca. 1355 B.C.
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2 Nefertiti drives though
the capital, drawing, 20th century
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4
Relief of Tutankhamun and his wife Ankhesenpaaten
who ruled for eleven
years, here depicted on the back
of a king's throne, ca. 1340 B.C.
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From Akhenaton's Longer Hymn to Aton
"Thy dawning is beautiful in the horizon of heaven,
Î living Aton, Beginning of life!
When Thou risest in the eastern horizon of heaven,
Thou fittest every land with Thy beauty;...
For Thou art beautiful, great, glittering...
When Thou settest in the western horizon of heaven,
The world is in darkness like the dead___
Darkness reigns,
The world is in silence.
He that made them has gone to rest in His horizon.
Bright is the earth, when Thou risest in the horizon,
When Thou shinest as Aton by day.
The darkness is banished
When Thou sendest forth Thy rays..."
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Scene from the tomb of Egyptian
Pharaoh Tutankhamun
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Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankhamun and his Queen
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Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankhamun and his Queen
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Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankhamun and his Queen
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Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankhamun and his Queen
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Tomb of
Tutankhamun
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The Curse of King Tutankhamun
The discovery of the almost undamaged tomb of Tutankhamun in 1922 was
the greatest archaeological sensation of the 20th century. But soon many
of those involved in the excavation died under mysterious circumstances,
and the legend of the "curse of King Tutunkhamun" was born. Today it is
believed that the deaths were caused by rare bacteria, fungi, or viruses
that were conserved in the burial chamber.
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Mask of Tutankhamun's
mummy,
the popular icon for ancient Egypt at The Egyptian Museum
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Tutankhamun coffinette
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Golden statues of Egyptian
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King's throne
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Relief of Tutankhamun and his wife Ankhesenpaaten who ruled for eleven
years,
here depicted on the back of a king's throne, ca. 1340 B.C.
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Inlaid throne
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Pendant from Tutankhamun's tomb
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Tutenkhamun's Tomb at the Valley of the Kings near Luxor.
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Tomb of Tutankhamun in the Valley
of the Kings
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Howard Carter (May 9,
1874 - March 2, 1939) was an English archaeologist and
Egyptologist. He is most famous as the discoverer of KV62, the
tomb of Tutankhamun in the Valley of the Kings, Luxor, Egypt.
Howard Carter was born in 1874 in Kensington, London, the
youngest son of eight children. His father, Samuel Carter, was
an artist. His mother was Martha Joyce (Sands) Carter. Carter
grew up in Swaffham, in northern Norfolk, and had no formal
education. His father trained him in the fundamentals of drawing
and painting. Carter began work in 1891, at the age of 17,
copying inscriptions and paintings in Egypt. He worked on the
excavation of Beni Hasan, the gravesite of the princes of Middle
Egypt, c. 2000 BC. Later he came under the tutelage of William
Flinders Petrie.He is also famous for finding the remains of
Queen Hatshepsut tomb in Deir el Babri. In 1899, at the age of
25, Carter was offered a position working for the Egyptian
Antiquities Service, from which he resigned as a result of a
dispute between Egyptian site guards and a group of drunken
French tourists in 1905.
Howard Carter broke through
the second plaster block and made
one of the discoveries of the century, the tomb of King
Tutankhamun.
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