Near Threshold Photoproduction ofηMesons off the Proton

We have measured precise total and differential cross sections for the reaction $\gamma p\to p\eta$ from threshold to 790 MeV at the MAMI accelerator in Mainz with the neutral meson spectrometer TAPS. Resonance parameters of the $S_{11}$(1535) resonance and the electromagnetic coupling $\gamma p\to S_{11}$ have been extracted from the data. Contributions from the $D_{13}$(1520) resonance to $\eta$ photoproduction in the threshold region have been identified for the first time via interference terms in the angular distributions.