Amarna Houses. Though Egyptian houses changed over time, the best-understood houses were studied by German Egyptologist Herbert Ricke in the 1920s and 1930s at Tell el Amarna. Ricke described a public, private, and semiprivate section of each house. The public area was open to guests from outside the household. The semiprivate section was open to the family and special guests. The private area consisted of bedrooms and baths and would only been seen by members of the household.

Smaller Version. The smaller home was approximately two hundred square feet in size. It consisted of either three or four rooms and a forecourt, which was used to receive guests, grind grain, and feed animals. An entrance from the forecourt led to a square room called "the place of sitting." Here guests could sit on low benches...