1.     Joseph gathered all the food and stored it in the cities in very large quantities, "like the sands of the sea". (Gen 41:48-49)

1.     Akhenaten instituted "cultic acts" which consisted primarily of "food offerings":

1.     The Cambridge Ancient History says that the Aten’s "daily ritual was of the simplest kind and centered around the presentation of lavish offerings." (57-58)

2.     Redford says that Akhenaten practiced "no cultic acts but the rudimentary offering". (169)

3.     Aldred says, "The immense extent of the temple with its forest of offering-tables… heaped with consecrated food… is an indication of its importance to the cult." (247)

4.     Redford says,

"The divine service offered to the Sun-disc is a drastic reduction of traditional practice, now that the new belief had forced the purging of all mythological symbolism. The only act retained is the essential food offering, and this is repeated ad nauseam in the reliefs. The most common term for offering is sm3^c ^c3bt, ‘making the great oblation,’ specified in one text as consisting of ‘oxen, shorthorns, wine, incense, all things fine and pure and all vegetables.’ The scene of driving, throwing, and slaughtering cattle runs in a long band along the bottom of jubilee reliefs in Gm.(t)-p^3-itn; everywhere servants carry bread, sweetmeats, haunches of beef, wine jars, etc.

"In all such scenes one theme is stressed: the bounty of the king and of his father the sun. The plenty of the land of Egypt depends upon them alone." (180)

5.     Redford says,

"Amenophis IV was… careful to record the instructions that were to govern the operation of his new shrines. On steles or on the wall itself, near the entrance to his temples, the official prescriptions for the daily offerings to the sun god were inscribed for all to see. … A representative text reads as follows (TS 256): ‘[The god’s offering which His Majesty laid down for his father] (the Sun-disc) as an offering menu for every day…: bit-bread, at a baker’s ratio of forty, [x] loaves; pisn-loaves, at a baker’s ratio of forty, eighty-seven loaves; [jugs of beer, at a brewing ration of twenty, thirty-three jugs; … to]tal of the various (types of) bread of the god’s offering, 265; pigeons, two; incense, [one] hin-jar; vegetables, one bundle; vegetables, four bunches; milk, [x] jugs…’ and so forth. Much larger quantities are indicated in surviving offering-lists for the daily menu of the solar temple at Memphis. …

"Offering prescriptions for other shrines are preserved as well. …"

"But a new and more complete text recovered by the CFE, and shortly to be published by M. Claude Traunecker, lists in remarkable detail the benevolences expected form the dignitaries and townships all over Egypt, listed in geographical order. Probably specifically for the sd-festival, commodites [sic] were expected to be contributed by the middle and lower ranks of the bureaucracy." (134-135)

6.     Redford says, "One text (TS 8842) alludes to the ‘[bread and beer] comprising the impost quotas of every year destined for the House of the Sun-disc’ and goes on in a broken context to imply that the high priest of the sun was somehow responsible for it. (135)

7.     Aldred sees in the Amarna tomb scenes "a fervency evident in the sacrifices which the royal pair offered up before a heaped altar under a radiant sun." (18)

8.     Aldred includes in the petitions found in the Amarna tombs requests such as "Grant me pure food which has been placed before thee from the surplus of thy Father Aten every day", and one for "a gift of loaves in the temple of the Aten". (246-247)

2.     Food offerings were shown often:

1.     Redford uses the offering scene as an example of the type of scenes that "tend to be stereotyped, and repeat themselves ad nauseam." (70)

2.     Aldred says that the most frequently occurring scenes in the Amarna tombs "are the royal family making offerings before heaped altars under the rayed disk of the Aten…". (23)

3.     Aldred says: that the Amarna tombs show scenes of the "Great Temple with its many altars loaded with offerings" (25-26); that the burial hall in the Royal Tomb shows scenes of the royal family officiating at "the usual offering ceremonies to the Aten" (29); that "Great quantities of food, drink and flowers were shown heaped upon the altars of the Aten" (29); and, that Chamber alpha in the Royal Tomb show the royal family making offerings (30).

4.     Aldred says the royal family were shown making offerings before altars heaped with food: on the boundary stelae (48); on the stelae from the sanctuary of the Great Temple (55); in niches in private residences (67); as statues in the temple precincts (175); and, on a huge stela found at Heliopolis (275).

5.     Redford shows Nefertiti offering in the "Nefertity Colonnade" in the Hwt-bnbn (Figure 6-7, 75-77); and, in other talatat from Karnak (Plates 4.10 - 4.15, 80-81)

6.     Redford quotes the boundary stelae as telling of Akhenaten making an offering "to his father (the Sun-disc) of bread, beer, long- and shorthorned cattle, wild game, fowl, wine, fruit, incense, libations, and all fine vegetables". (144)

7.     Aldred says that the royal family can be seen making floral offerings in Room 4 of the Royal Tomb. (Plate 8) [Did the Egyptians consider this type of flower to be food?]

3.     Assuming that what is known about Akhenaten’s temples in Karnak can be applied to his temples in other towns, then he collected, processed, and stored, very large quantities of food:

1.     [See above: food storage]

2.     Redford says that "large quantities of offerings were being diverted to the disc at the expense of other temples". He quotes Parennefer’s tomb as saying "the corn-imposts of every other god are measured (merely) by oipe, but for the Disc they are measured in superabundance!" (60)

3.     Redford, describing talatat that list the assets of the House of Aten, says, "Elsewhere the totals seem staggering: 400,000 of an unspecified commodity, 22,000 great white loaves, 260 plus storage jars (of wine), and so forth." He goes on to refer to "the sheer mass of foodstuffs brought together". (136)

4.     Aldred says that the talatat from Karnak shows "an immense display of viands heaped on altars". He refers to food as "the bounty of the Aten" and says that what they collected "amounted to an immense quantity of bread[,] beer, flesh, fowl, cattle, vegetables, cloth, oils, honey and commodities of all kinds". Aldred says that the food was used to feed the local populace on feast days, implying that the amounts stored were more than the normal amount required to maintain the temples. (265)

5.     [See food at Karnak: Redford, Plate 7.11, 118; Fig. 15, 121; and, Fig. 16, 124)]

4.     Akhenaten built Akhetaten in the center of the land. He dedicated massive amounts of its territory to storing food that had been shipped there:

1.     Aldred says the boundary markers at Akhetaten dedicated the site to the Aten "together with its produce". (271) The Cambridge Ancient History says the site was dedicated "together with all its produce including its human inhabitants." (57)

2.     Texts from the Amarna Period in Egypt quotes the boundary stelae, "Behold, [fill] Akhet-Aten with provisions – a storehouse for everything!" (75)

3.     Aldred says that the Akhetaten’s central city was referred to as the "Island Exalted in Jubilees" on the boundary stelae. (65)

4.     Aldred says that the House of the Aten at Akhetaten was "an enormous structure, ¾ kilometre long by over ¼ kilometre wide." He includes in its list of main features the "forest of brick altars". (54) He later refers to "the immense extent of the temple with its forest of offering tables". (247) Aldred also provides additional details on this temple. (273)

5.     Redford says of the temple at Akhetaten, "Offering tables groaning beneath the bounty bestowed by the sun were everywhere". (146)

6.     The Cambridge Ancient History refers to "the erection of a dense mass of altars in a vast area lying to the south of the ‘House of Rejoicing’." (57-58)

7.     Redford says that at Akhetaten, although they did not show the jubilee being celebrated, the "artists still delight in carving quantities of foodstuffs everywhere—on altars, tables, and in storerooms." (147-148)

8.     Aldred says of the royal tomb scenes, "Great quantities of food, drink and flowers were shown heaped upon the altars of the Aten." (29)

9.     Aldred says, "The considerable bounty of the Aten in the form of meat, pond-fowl, vegetables, loaves, wine, beer, incense and flower-offerings heaped on these altars, fed not only the officiating priests and temple staff but the local populace." (275)

10.                        The Cambridge Ancient History says that the chief quays of the city seem to have been located in the North Suburb and that they "received the produce brought over daily from the cultivation on the west bank and from elsewhere." (58) [See the ships arriving and the captains presenting their cargo: The Rock Tombs of El Amarna, Part I – The Tomb of Meryra, Plate XXIX, "Outside the Gates"]

11.                        Aldred says that some of the buildings in the North Suburbs "had an exceptional number of corn-bins and magazines, suggesting that this was a merchants’ quarter where commodities brought by river to nearby quays north of the Great Palace could be stored and officially inspected." (63)

12.                        Aldred describes the area of storehouses between the House of the Aten and the King’s House as containing "extensive magazines". (54)

13.                        Aldred says that a novel feature of the North Palace was its courtyard for cattle, ibex and gazelle. (64) Redford says that the North Palace contained, among other things, "storage rooms and stalls for cattle". (149)

14.                        Aldred says, "The Northern Administrative Building straddled the roadway and probably constituted a massive ornamental gatehouse to regulate entry into Akhetaten, forming a kind of khan and customs house for the reception of traders and their goods." (64)

15.                        [See the relative percentages of the city devoted to storehouses: Aldred, Fig. 7, 53; Fig. 8, 58]

16.                        [See the altars at Akhetaten "heaped with food": Aldred, Plates 65, 66]

17.                        [See an artists conception of all of the tables at the great temple: Descroches-Noblecourt, Fig. 80, 143]

18.                        [See the quantities of food stored in the temple buildings, temple courtyard, palace, other storehouses, granaries, stockyards, and arriving by boat: The Rock Tombs of El Amarna, Part I – The Tomb of Meryra, Plate XXV, The Royal Visit to the Temple and the Investiture of Meryra]

19.                        [See details of the flat breads stored in the temple courtyard: The Rock Tombs of El Amarna, Part IV, Plate VI, The Court of the Temple]

20.                        [See the many rows of tables shown on the plan of the existing remains of the great temple: The City of Akhenaten, Part III, Plate III]

21.                        [See the food stored in the palace with each room having its own Aten: Desroches-Noblecourt, Fig. 81, 144]

5.     I think that it is easy to see the Houses of the Aten as having a dual role. Not only could they have served the purpose of storing food, but it does not seem unlikely to me that they also had a role in attracting and receiving the food in the first place. Being in these "temples" could have been quite an incentive in itself, perhaps something like today’s World’s Fairs, or Theme Parks. Bringing some of your excess produce seems like a low cost of admission for a day of touring these massive new complexes, seeing the mammoth statues, making your offerings, and touring, year after year, the ever growing forest of offering stands to see how much food had already been collected. When you consider the free food and quality entertainment that came along with it, wouldn’t the average Egyptian have wanted to return time and time again?