The key for a lot of this is that any type of historical activity is written by people, and those people tend to be somewhat messy and subjective. That's why so often things get spun to the values and beliefs of the writer or writers.
It's been a serious effort to pry the cold dead but not embalmed hands of the Victorian English and the Berlin School off the throat and genitals of ancient Egypt. Modern scholars are writing now about how the culture was less class differentiated, and how the king or other ruler (until Hapsetsut the term Pharoah was used for the house, not the individual, and many modern writers and lecturers don't use it as a person) was a lot more present day to day in the lives of his or her people. That structured and stratified culture better fits the 19th century writers' and scholars' culture than it did dynastic Egypt.
And it mystifies me every time I run into one of these folks who has a huge thing for Akenaten. I totally don't get it at all. I think Nefertiti did as much as she could to temper his excesses and craziness while he was alive, and after his passing I think she pushed things a long way back to something the people and priesthood could accept, but he does nothing for me. And that's back to that sun god thing again. I'm not going to dismiss the sun god thing completely, because Ra is, in my experience, incredible, everything a father god should be without the rapaciousness of Zeus or the shadiness of Odin.
no subject
It's been a serious effort to pry the cold dead but not embalmed hands of the Victorian English and the Berlin School off the throat and genitals of ancient Egypt. Modern scholars are writing now about how the culture was less class differentiated, and how the king or other ruler (until Hapsetsut the term Pharoah was used for the house, not the individual, and many modern writers and lecturers don't use it as a person) was a lot more present day to day in the lives of his or her people. That structured and stratified culture better fits the 19th century writers' and scholars' culture than it did dynastic Egypt.
And it mystifies me every time I run into one of these folks who has a huge thing for Akenaten. I totally don't get it at all. I think Nefertiti did as much as she could to temper his excesses and craziness while he was alive, and after his passing I think she pushed things a long way back to something the people and priesthood could accept, but he does nothing for me. And that's back to that sun god thing again. I'm not going to dismiss the sun god thing completely, because Ra is, in my experience, incredible, everything a father god should be without the rapaciousness of Zeus or the shadiness of Odin.