This paper aims to disambiguate the proper name “Seth” and its cognates or homonyms – perfect or imperfect – in texts from ancient Egypt, the Near East and the Mediterranean. It considers: (1) the Suteans, West Semitic Amorite/Aramean nomads who feature negatively in Mesopotamian records; (2) S(h)eth in the Hebrew bible, in which a dispara…[Read more]

The Late Bronze Age is renowned for heightened interregional interaction in the entire Near East and Eastern Mediterranean as wealthy states like Egypt and Hatti jostled with each other in the pursuit of valuable commodities, technologies and materials. This increased political and economic interaction is credited in relatively recent scholarship…[Read more]

Text to a presentation on the misrepresentation of ancient Egyptian psychoactive consumption in academic publications and public media that was given by me at the Alternative Egyptology Symposium, hosted by the Allard Pierson Museum, Amsterdam, 14-04-2021. There is an academic paper in preparation.

The paper proposes that the Egyptian-style design on a 5-6th century CE magical amulet discovered at Nea Paphos in Cyprus (Inv. no. PAP/FR 44/2011) draws upon an apotropaic design against the Evil Eye known as the “All-Suffering Eye,” which dates back to the time of the early Roman Empire and is common on Byzantine “Holy Rider” medallions. [No…[Read more]

During the 2nd and 1st millennia BCE, the Nile’s Eastern Delta was supposedly the locale of truculent “shepherds” who were inimical to Egypt. These problematic herdsmen seem largely to have been refractions of foreign powers generated by independent etymological confusions, behind which lie the Hyksos and the Assyrians; however, the caric…[Read more]

Late Halaf female figurines of clay/pottery from northeastern Syria (Type LH.1A; 6th millennium BCE) have close parallels in predynastic Egyptian figurines (4th millennium BCE) in the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology. The lack of provenance for the Egyptian statuettes – all of which were purchased – has long inhibited any comparison with the…[Read more]

A didactic poster (written for schools) presented on the occasion of the conference “La città com’era, com’è, e come la vorremmo”, organized within the project “Pavia 100 Torri – Osservatorio Permanente sull’Antico”, held at the UNIPV on February 8th, 2013.

Poster presented at the 5th Annual Birmingham Egyptology Symposium: “Conflict in Ancient Culture”, 11th May 2018, University of Birmingham.

Review of: I. von Bredow 2017, Kontaktzone Vorderer Orient und Ägypten. Orte, Situationen und Bedingungen für primäre griechisch-orientalische Kontakte vom 10. bis zum 6. Jahrhundert v. Chr.”, Stuttgart

The paper aims at providing a historical presentation and a brief description of the quite unknown manufacts kept in the Egyptian collection of the Archaeological Museum of the University of Pavia. The materials, most of them gifts given by scholars, travellers and scientists, in the fist mid of the 19th century, are a good evidence both of the…[Read more]

The present paper analyses the mutual influences between Egypt and the city of Karkemish (present Jarabulus) during both the 2nd and the 1st Millennium BC. This Syrian city was indeed an important site located on the Euphrates river, along the border between modern Turkey and Syria and is surely better known for its strong relationship with the…[Read more]

A brief reflection on the concept of pre-classical antiquity square, analyzing some archaeological and textual sources.

Some historical and scientific information about Giuseppe Botti “the Second”, especially about his contacts with the Università degli Studi di Pavia, regarding an unpublished papyrus of Amduat (12th hour) (Italy).

‘Conception of Horus’ scenes in Egyptian temples date at least from Ramesside to Greco-Roman times. This article seeks to establish whether any changes to their composition or interpretation occurred over this long time-span. The main differences noted centre upon the identity of the bird above Osiris’s phallus, as follows. In the iconic ‘conc…[Read more]

The iconography of the Horus cippus, an amulet popular in Egypt from the late Third Intermediate Period to Roman times (8th century BCE – 2nd century CE), is unexpectedly recapitulated in bronze “goddess plaques” of the 7-8th centuries CE made by Permian peoples – Finno-Ugric groups from the Ural region of northern Eurasia. The likely expla…[Read more]

This paper is a new examination of the original find context of the Saqqara lion tables (CG 1321–2) in ‘Gallery C’, an underground structure in the Step Pyramid complex. The substructure may date to the 1st millennium BCE, and this structure was likely part of an embalming complex for the Apis or other sacred animals. The adjacent Western Galle…[Read more]

The Egypt Exploration Society archive contains unpublished pencil drawings by A. Klasens of seal impressions found in the Step Pyramid complex of Saqqara. Digitally inked versions of these drawings are published here for the first time. The seal impressions can be sourced to the Northern Galleries of the complex. The impressions were sealed on…[Read more]

This report describes for the first time the surviving (upper) portions of three 26th-Dynasty shabtis made for Wedjat-Hor, son of Ashsedjemes. Shabtis A and C are clearly from the same mould and inscribed by the same scribe; shabti B is the product of a different mould and scribe. Some orthographic idiosyncrasies are shared, whereas others are…[Read more]

Section 1 of this paper describes a pottery shabti of the Third Intermediate Period and recounts the early stages of the project to understand the name of its owner. Sections 2-7 describe the outcome of the analysis. This covers both the name itself (its variants, orthographies and possible meanings) and a survey of those individuals who bore it…[Read more]

The relationship between the ‘Two Brothers’ Nakhtankh and Khnumnakht has been heavily debated since the discovery of their mummies in 1907. Re-examining the coffin inscriptions of these two individuals reveals that Nakhtankh and Khnumnakht were likely uncle and nephew.