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Amarna letters
Sign in to saveAlso known as Amarna letters–phrases and quotations, Amarna correspondence, Amarna tablets, Tell el-Amarna tablets
archive, written on clay tablets, primarily consisting of diplomatic correspondence between the Egyptian administration and its representatives in Canaan and Amurru during the New Kingdom
The Amarna letters are a collection of ancient diplomatic messages written on clay tablets between Egypt's government and its officials in the Levant during the New Kingdom period. They matter because they provide direct historical evidence of how Egypt communicated with and governed its territories in the ancient Near East.
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Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- archaeological artefact
- Country
- Ancient Egypt
- Image
- Amarna Akkadian letter.png
Show 7 more facts
- Commons category
- Amarna letters
- topic's main category
- Category:Amarna letters
- language of work or name
- Akkadian
- writing system
- cuneiform
- start time
- 1350-00-00
- end time
- 1330-00-00
- P8168
- Alfa Romeo SZ
Sources (2)
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Encyclopedic overview
Five Amarna letters on display at the British Museum, London EA 161, letter by Aziru, leader of Amurru (stating his case to pharaoh), one of the Amarna letters in cuneiform writing on a clay tablet
The Amarna letters (/əˈmɑːrnə/; sometimes referred to as the Amarna correspondence or Amarna tablets, and cited with the abbreviation "EA", for "El Amarna") are an archive, written on clay tablets, primarily consisting of diplomatic correspondence between the Egyptian administration and its representatives in Canaan and Amurru, or neighboring kingdom leaders, during the New Kingdom, spanning a period of no more than thirty years in the middle of the 14th century BC. The letters were found in Upper Egypt at el-Amarna, the modern name for the ancient Egyptian capital of Akhetaten, founded by pharaoh Akhenaten (c. 1351–1334 BC) during the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Amarna letters” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.