TELL el-AMARNA

Tell el-Amarna, site of the ancient Egyptian city Akhetaton, on the Nile River, north of the modern city of Asyût. Akhetaton was built during the reign of Amenhotep IV, better known as Akhenaton, sometime between 1350 and 1334 BC; the city served as the Egyptian capital until Akhenaton's death. The period during which Akhetaton was important is known in Egyptian history as the Amarna period.
In 1887, a peasant at Tell el-Amarna found about 400 tablets inscribed in Akkadian cuneiform. The tablets formed part of the correspondence, later known as the Amarna letters, of Akhenaton and his predecessor, Amenhotep III, with the governors in Palestine and Syria and the kings of Babylonia, Assyria, and Mitanni. These tablets and other archaeological remains serve as valuable sources of information about the Amarna period.

SUGGESTED READING: AKHENATEN - KING OF EGYPT ; by Cyril Aldred. Thames & Hudson (1991).