Ancient Egypt in Italy

ppoli61

@ppoli611674629039 · 07 Nov 2020

Ancient Egypt in Italy

#history

"You ripped open the mystical veil

which he hid from the Nile on the shore

of knowing the living light "

(Angelica Palli)

In the nineteenth century Livorno was the stop-over for archaeologists from Egypt. In the warehouses of San Marco, objects from collections destined to enrich Italian and European museums were collected and parked, waiting for buyers. In particular, we remember the Drovetti, Salt, Nizzoli and Anastasy collections.

The Drovetti collection, brought to Italy by the French consul, arrived in Livorno in 1818 and remained in storage in the two warehouses of the Jew Morpurgo. It was purchased in 1924 by the king of Sardinia and forms the basis of the Egyptian Museum of Turin. Vivoli, the founder of the Labronica Academy, went to customs to examine its contents. Apparently it also included wooden models of Egyptian buildings.

Some artifacts, at times, lay forgotten for a long time, as was the case in the granite sarcophagus of Amenemhat Seneb, donated to Grand Duke Leopold II by the consul of Sweden in Egypt. Despite numerous solicitations, the sarcophagus remained to lie in the Fernandez warehouses until it was finally brought to Florence.

Visiting the antiquities amassed in the warehouses became a fashionable leisure. It seems that Angelica Palli, after one of these visits, dreamed of mummies all night.

Jean Francois Champollion (1790 - 1832), the founder of Egyptology, first to decipher hieroglyphs in 1822, came in person to Livorno to negotiate the purchase of the Salt collection, brought to Italy by the English consul (brother-in-law of a Livorno banker) comprising 4000 objects, including a beautiful carved head.

Champollion negotiated the purchase of the artifacts for the Louvre. Thanks to the involvement of the Accademia Labronica, of which Champollion became "corresponding partner", Angelica Palli met the famous Egyptologist and even dedicated a poem to him. In return, Champollion renamed her "Zelmire". The two remained in correspondence and their letters are kept in the Labronica Academy.

In Livorno Champollion met the Pisan Ippolito Rosellini (1800 - 1843), unanimously considered the father of Italian Egyptology. The two then set off together on a famous expedition.

Rosellini, in turn, bought many pieces on the Alexandria market. On December 22, 1828, on the ship "Cleopatra" (and there could not be a more suitable name), seventy-six crates full of antiquities purchased or excavated in Egypt arrived in Livorno, which enriched the Grand Ducal collection of Florence, so that the Egyptian Museum of Florence is now second only to that of Turin.

References

Edda Bresciani, "The call of the pyramid" in "The pyramid and the Tower", Pacini Editore