Why Akhenaten became a Heretic?

I love the once-upon-a-time beginnings. They make dystopias appear utopian, so…

Once upon a time, there was a young prince, who co-ruled Egypt with his father. The young prince then became Pharaoh. However, this Pharaoh was unlike any other previous pharaoh. While his predecessors had accepted the supremacy of the priesthood of Amun, he decided to defy them.

His defiance was unique. He did something that had probably never crossed the mind of anyone until then.

Tutankhamun, Ay, and the Spinner of Dreams.

The heretic king Akhenaten and his beautiful wife Nefertiti had many daughters but no son, and while a daughter was the vessel that carried the royal blood, she couldn’t be the ruler of Egypt. Though, in past, some walls were etched with the stories of Queen Hatshepsut, the woman-king who wore a false beard and ruled, everyone knew that by strapping that false beard to her chin, she had committed a crime against the gods, and Akhenaten was sure that his new and only god Aten wouldn’t be happy if one of his daughters had to wear the double crown upon her brow.

So when one of the lesser wives of Akhenaten finally gave birth to a son, everyone rejoiced, but their joy was pathetically short-lived, as they soon realized that the young prince was born with deformities that wouldn’t let him live a full life, let alone a long one.

Yonder Worlds?

Yonder worlds are worlds that are far away – apparently beyond our reach. Buried beneath the sands of time, hidden behind the veil of mystery, these worlds reveal themselves to us through our imagination.

Yonder Worlds are worlds that call me. They torture my imagination and demand that I etch them on paper. These are worlds that are ancient, future, or imaginary.

Through this blog, I hope to share my glimpses of these worlds. I cannot say which worlds would beckon me in future, but for now Ancient Egypt has me in its thralls.

Who am I? 

I am just a storyteller on a journey of imagination.

Image Credits:
Nefertiti’s Bust in Berlin Museum.
By Rüdiger Stehn from Kiel, Deutschland [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons)