This block of crystalline limestone once graced the railing of a stairway in a temple of the god Aten. It is in the form of a double cartouche, which usually enclosed the name of the king. Here, instead, it contains the names of the sun disk Aten, the one god of king Akhenaten: “Ra-Harakhty rising in the Horizon” “in his name as the light which is in the Aten”. The name of the king is carved on the sides. The object thus links the god to his only intermediary on earth, the pharaoh.
