November 2, 2023
Patrizia Piacentini, University of Milan “La Statale”
In recent years more than four hundred ancient tombs, dating from the 6th century BCE to the 3rd century CE, have been discovered on the West Bank at Aswan, Egypt, near the Aga Khan mausoleum. A multidisciplinary team, including the Egyptian-Italian Mission, has found more than a hundred individuals along with their funerary equipment. Piacentini will share the first results of this archaeological research, highlighting the multicultural environment of the necropolis and possible diverse geographical origins of the people buried there. About the Speaker: Patrizia Piacentini, is a member of the Academy of the Lyncean (Rome), the Ambrosiana Academy (Milan), and a corresponding member of the Advisory Committee of the Shanghai Archaeology Forum, the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. She is also professor of Egyptology and Egyptian Archaeology at the University of Milan (since 1993). In 2022, the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres (Paris) awarded her the Gaston Maspero Lifetime Achievement Award. At the University of Milan, Piacentini sits in different committees. She has been coordinator of the PhD Program in Literature, Arts and Environmental Heritage (2018–2021). Since 1999, she has managed the scientific and organizational direction of the Egyptological Library and Archives which she founded at the same university. She is director of EIMAWA, the Egyptian-Italian Mission at West Aswan which excavates and studies a large necropolis used from the 6th century BC to the 3rd century AD She serves on scientific and presidential committees of Egyptological foundations and associations, including the Fondation Michela Schiff-Giorgini (Lausanne), and has been the representative for Italy of the International Association of Egyptologists (2015–2023). She has also been invited as Gale Visiting Fellow of The Australian Centre for Egyptology at Macquarie University, for lectures at Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, and Perth (2019). Author of numerous monographs and scientific articles, she has organized Egyptology-themed exhibitions in various countries around the world and numerous conferences. She is also founder and editor of the journal EDAL, Egyptian and Egyptological Documents Archives Libraries (Milan), and serves on the scientific or editorial boards of several journals, including Aegyptus (Milan).