The amarna letters essay the metropolitan museum of art. All this opinion is now changed, primarily by the information contained in the tell elamarna letters and secondarily by incidental hints from egyptian and babylonian inscriptions now seen to support the high stage of civilization revealed in the tell elamarna letters see archaeology and criticism. The tell elamarna letters furnish an amount of historical material about equal in bulk to onehalf of the pentateuch. Among them were letters written in babylonian cuneiform script to these pharaohs of egypt by various kings dwelling. The amarna letters are an archive, written on clay tablets, primarily consisting of diplomatic. The elamarna letters and the ancient records of assyria and babylonia albert w. The amarna letters are a group of several hundred clay tablets inscribed with cuneiform wedgeshaped writing that date to the fourteenth century b. Download full book in pdf, epub, mobi and all ebook format. During the age of the decline of egyptian power in syria,when the great conquests of tahutmes i. This site, located 200 miles south of cairo, was later named elamarna, and the tablets became known as the amarna tablets or amarna letters. A new edition of the cuneiform letters from the site of elamarna based on collations of all extant tablets.
The name is a misnomer formed by combining a village name, eltill, with elamarna, one of the names of an arab tribe that had settled in the area. In 1887 a bedouin woman searching among ancient ruins near the nile river discovered some inscribed clay tablets. The amarna letters consist of diplomatic correspondence of canaanite and other rulers with the egyptian pharaoh. The amarna letters, as is well known, are thus named after the site tell elamarna in egypt in which they were discovered. This site is like a library, use search box in the widget to get ebook that you want. The amarna tablets are named after the site tell elamarna in middle egypt where. Scholars have determined that these amarna letters came from the royal archive of pharaoh akhenaten 5337 b. Enter your mobile number or email address below and well send you a link to download the free kindle app. The first letters were found in 1887 ce and date back to the 14th century bce.
Full text of selections from the tell elamarna letters. These letters were sent to the egyptian pharaohs amenophis ill and his son akhenaten around the middle of the 14th century b. Israel exploration society and the hebrew university of jerusalem. Whereas tell means hill in arabic and often refers to stratified cultures embedded in the earth, that is not its meaning here. Moranthe johns hopkins university press baltimore and london. Accessible book, ancient history, tell elamarna tablets, history. Tell elamarna encyclopedia of the bible bible gateway. The ancient egyptian city of tell elamarna or simply amarna was the shortlived capital built by the heretic pharaoh akhenaten and abandoned shortly after his death c. If the inline pdf is not rendering correctly, you can download the pdf file here.
Pdf the representatives of power in the amarna letters. Some more specific knowledge is also supplied by the tell elamarna letters concerning the amorite language through the many amorite names and the occasional explanations given in amorite words compare especially the 50 letters of ribadda, and some knowledge of hittite letter of tarkhundara. The amarna letters, dossiers of correspondence between pharaohs of the late. On a virgin site on the east bank of the nile river, akhenaton amenhotep iv built the city about 48 bce as the new capital of his kingdom when he. Open library is an open, editable library catalog, building towards a web page for every book ever published. The elamarna correspondence offers a completely new edition of the amarna letters based on personal inspection and reading of all the extant tablets. The letters were found in upper egypt at amarna, the modern name for the egyptian capital of akhetaten elamarna, founded by pharaoh akhenaten 50s 30s bc during the eighteenth dynasty of egypt.
Amarna, a plain on the east bank of the nile about 190 mi. Pdf petrographic investigation of the amarna tablets. Also, you can read online full book search results for theamarnaletters free ebooks pdf. His enemies, however, were closing around him, and one of the tablets shows that the city was eventually captured and its king slain. The representatives of power in the amarna letters 557 2 in a form of the divine blessings 2. It was here that he pursued his vision of a society dedicated to the cult of one god, the power of the sun the aten.
The amarna letters from canaan have proved to be the most important. While much of this bears more particularly upon general history of the ancient orient, there is scarcely any part of it which does not directly or indirectly supply information which parallels some phase of biblical history. The elamarna letters comprise a collection of cuneiform tablets named after al. The tell elamarna tablets are a collection of some 350 clay tablets found in 1887 amid the ruins of the ancient egyptian city of akhetaton modern tell elamarna about midway between memphis and thebes. The amarna letters provide invaluable insight into the nature of diplomatic relations among the great nations and petty states of the 14th century bce, as well as an incomplete and tantalizing hint of the strategic maneuvering that. In 1988 there were about 400 cuneiform tablets discovered at this site which were part of the royal archives of amenhotep iii and amenhotep iv akhenaten who reigned about 1400 bc.
Amarna letters, cache of clay tablets discovered at tell elamarna in egypt and dating to the reigns of kings amenhotep iii and akhenaton of the 18th dynasty. The amarna letters are unusual in egyptological research, because they are mostly written in akkadian cuneiform, the writing system of. Discovered there, circa 1887, were nearly four hundred cuneiform tablets containing correspondence of the egyptian court with rulers of neighboring states in. The name is a misnomer formed by combining a village name, eltill, with elamarna, one of the names of. This edition includes new transcriptions and a translation along with an extensive introduction and glossary of the amarna letters.
The name amarna letters derives from the place where the tablets were found. Theamarna letters edited and translated by william l. Bedouin excavated more than 300 of the cuneiform tablets from the site but could not interest scholars in purchasing them. This public document was automatically mirrored from pdfy. Discovered there, circa 1887, were nearly four hundred cuneiform tablets containing correspondence of the egyptian court with rulers of neighboring states in the midfourteenth century b. In the tell elamarna letters 1400 bc jerusalem is still known as urusalim, and its king bears a hittite name, implying that it was at the time in the possession of the hittites. Amarna tablets archives biblical archaeology society. For the main article of the 50 to 35 bc text corpus see.