Tutankhamun and Ankhesenamun on the Golden Throne

This gilded throne backrest (c. 1323 BC) from Tutankhamun’s tomb depicts a rare intimate scene of the king seated while his queen, Ankhesenamun, applies perfume. Above them, the Aten, represented as a sun disk, sends down life-giving rays, reflecting the legacy of the Amarna period, when Akhenaten elevated the Aten above Egypt’s traditional gods. The scene shows how Amarna religious and artistic ideas persisted even after the restoration of traditional worship.