The Ghost of Akhenaten

INTRODUCTIONThe Pharaoh Akhenaten reigned in Egypt from c.1353-1335 BC. He was the son of the powerful Pharaoh Amenhotep III, and succeeded his father as Amenhotep IV. However, early in his reign he changed his name to Akhenaten, indicating that he revered the god Aten instead of Amun. Within a few years he had virtually dismantled the elaborate religious system of ancient Egypt, abolishing the worship of its many gods, demolishing their temples, and dispossessing their priesthoods. He declared the Aten, represented by the Sun’s Disk, the only true god, and himself and his wife, Nefertiti, the sole channels for its influence on earth. No one knows how he died, but after his sudden death his successors declared his name anathema and everything he had put in place was destroyed. The temples of the other gods were rebuilt and the power of their priesthoods reinstated. His name was removed from the King Lists and it was as though he had never been. It is only in recent years that the persistent curiosity of archaeologists has uncovered his story. The city he built to the glory of his One God was excavated and an archive found that tells us much about his life. There has been much speculation as to whether he was assassinated by the powerful priests of Amun who had suf-fered so much during his reign, and more than one source mentions a curse that doomed him to wander as a ghost for the rest of Time as punishment for his heretical deeds. While I was writing the novel Akhenaten: The Son of the Sun many strange and extraordinary experiences in dreams and through mediums led me to believe in this curse, and after the book was published I came upon someone who claimed to have personally encountered the ghost of Akhenaten in the Egyptian desert. A friend lent me Tombs, Temples and Ancient Art by Joseph and Corrina Lindon Smith, who describe a mysterious encounter they themselves had with the priests of Amun when they tried to set Akhenaten’s soul free from the curse in 1909. The archaeologist Arthur Weidgal who witnessed it also reported the incident. In response to my novel about Akhenaten I received many letters from around the world claiming to be from reincarnations of Akhenaten or of members of his family. I also received reports of channelled messages from Akhenaten. It seems that whatever happened at his death, and in spite of all the efforts to wipe his name from history, Akhenaten is very much an active force in the world today. The books about him run into many hundreds — from cautious archaeology to wild speculation. In this novel I hope to tread a path between the two extremes, never losing sight of the fact that there are many different realities.