Head from a Shabti of Akhenaten

In the sixth year of his reign, Akhenaten enforced drastic changes to the religion that had been practiced for centuries in ancient Egypt. He changed the worship of many gods and goddesses to the worship of a single sun god named Aten, and he required all Egyptians to practice this new religion. Akhenaten furnished his tomb at el-Amarna in the traditional way, simply and without any references to Osiris and other funerary deities. At least 200 shabtis were prepared for his burial, but none of them have been found completely intact. After Akhenaten’s reign, King Tut changed the religion of Egypt back to the traditional worship of many deities. Those who ruled Egypt after Akhenaten had his monuments taken down, to reuse the building materials and to erase his memory. Reliefs of Akhenaten and inscriptions that honored him were also destroyed.