“I thought it was well-established that the Egyptians used slaves.”
True, but the Amarna period gets this weird pass as some brilliant, idealistic, humanitarian age of enlightenment by moderns. It always struck me as a period with a bit of interesting artistic creativity, but marred by decadence, weakness and an embrace of the sickly. Sort of like the post WWII West. A veneer over the same old grind though, as proven here. There is nothing new under the sun.
For some interesting modern impressions derived from this period see:
‘The Egyptian’, by Mika Waltari (historical novel)
and
‘Akhnaten’, by Philip Glass (modern opera)
Both moving, and these grim finds make the works even more poignant in the folly of that reign.
“There is nothing new under the sun.”
Verily.