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Amenhotep IV-better known as Akhenaten, the new name he took early on in his reign-ushered in a revolutionary period in Egyptian history. The Amarna Interlude, as it is often called, saw the removal of the seat of government to a short-lived new capital city, Akhetaten (modern el-Amarna), the introduction of a new art style, and the elevation of the cult of the sun disc, the Aten, to pre-eminent status in Egyptian religion. This last heresy in particular was to bring down on Akhenaten and his immediate successors the disdain of later kings.

Amenhotep IV, one of several sons of Amenhotep III and Queen Tiy , a non-royal, ruled with his father in the 18th Dynasty. He went along with his father in worshiping Amun, like much of Egypt, although his father attempted to lower the power of the order of Amun, and his son later obliterated it, at least for a time. He was crowned as co-ruler in the Amun temple at Karnack, and was married also to a non-royal, the renownedly beautiful Nefertiti. Philosophically, he came to worship Aten, sun god of more ancient times, and, after his father's death, changed his name to Akenhaten and raised the worship of Aten, to pre eminence in Egypt.