Fabrizio Sergio Donadoni (13 October 1914 – 31 October 2015) was an Italian archaeologist who worked by within the disciple of

Egyptology Egyptology (from ''Egypt'' and Greek , '' -logia''; ar, علم المصريات) is the study of ancient Egyptian history, language, literature, religion, architecture and art from the 5th millennium BC until the end of its native religious ...

Biography

Born in 1914 in

Palermo Palermo ( , ; scn, Palermu , locally also or ) is a city in southern Italy, the capital (political), capital of both the autonomous area, autonomous region of Sicily and the Metropolitan City of Palermo, the city's surrounding metropolitan ...

, he was fascinated by the ancient Egypt since childhood, with a particular interest on the

Greco-Roman period The Greco-Roman civilization (; also Greco-Roman culture; spelled Graeco-Roman in the Commonwealth), as understood by modern scholars and writers, includes the geographical regions and countries that culturally—and so historically—were dir ...

. In 1931 he enrolled the

Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa The Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa (commonly known in Italy as "la Normale") is a public university in Pisa and Florence, Tuscany, Italy, currently attended by about 600 undergraduate and postgraduate (PhD) students. It was founded in 1810 wi ...

and later he moved to

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

and studied under

Gustave Lefebvre Gustave Lefebvre (17 July 1879 – 1 November 1957) was a French Egyptologist. As inspector for Middle Egypt for the Egyptian Antiquities Service headed by Gaston Maspero, he managed the partage of Ludwig Borchardt's excavations at el- Amarna, ...

Alexandre Moret Alexandre Moret (; 19 September 1868, Aix-les-Bains – 2 February 1938, Paris) was a French Egyptologist. Life From 1906 to 1923 Moret was curator of the Musée Guimet. In 1918 Moret succeeded Émile Amélineau as Director of Studies for the Reli ...

and Étienne Drioton. Donadoni then moved to Egypt, and since 1935 he participated to an excavation campaign at Antinoopolis led by his teacher, the

archaeologist Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...

Evaristo Breccia. In 1938 he was a student of

Hermann Junker Hermann Junker (29 November 1877 in Bendorf – 9 January 1962 in Vienna) was a German archaeologist best known for his discovery of the Merimde-Benisalam site in the West Nile Delta in Lower Egypt in 1928. Early life Junker was born in 1877 in ...

Cairo Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the largest urban agglomeration in Africa, the Arab world and the Middle East: The Greater Cairo metro ...

. During the war, from 1938 to 1940, he joined the excavation of the Middle Kingdom temple of Medinet Madi led by Achille Vogliano. At the end of the 1940s he returned to Italy and started teaching at the

University of Pisa The University of Pisa ( it, Università di Pisa, UniPi), officially founded in 1343, is one of the oldest universities in Europe. History The Origins The University of Pisa was officially founded in 1343, although various scholars place ...

, and later at the

Sapienza University of Rome The Sapienza University of Rome ( it, Sapienza – Università di Roma), also called simply Sapienza or the University of Rome, and formally the Università degli Studi di Roma "La Sapienza", is a Public university, public research university l ...

.
In the late 1950s Donadoni was invited to join the team of archaeologists that operated the relocation of the

Abu Simbel temples Abu Simbel is a historic site comprising two massive rock-cut temples in the village of Abu Simbel ( ar, أبو سمبل), Aswan Governorate, Upper Egypt, near the border with Sudan. It is situated on the western bank of Lake Nasser, about sou ...

Nubia Nubia () (Nobiin: Nobīn, ) is a region along the Nile river encompassing the area between the first cataract of the Nile (just south of Aswan in southern Egypt) and the confluence of the Blue and White Niles (in Khartoum in central Sudan), or ...

due to the construction of the

Aswan High Dam The Aswan Dam, or more specifically since the 1960s, the Aswan High Dam, is one of the world's largest embankment dams, which was built across the Nile in Aswan, Egypt, between 1960 and 1970. Its significance largely eclipsed the previous Aswan Lo ...

and the subsequent formation of

Lake Nasser Lake Nasser ( ar, بحيرة ناصر ', ) is a vast reservoir in Southern Egypt and northern Sudan. It is one of the largest man-made lakes in the world. Before construction, Sudan was against the building of Lake Nasser because it would encro ...

. Among his students at this time, notable were

Edda Bresciani Edda Bresciani (23 September 1930 – 29 November 2020) was an Italian Egyptology, Egyptologist. Life Bresciani was born in Lucca, and graduated in 1955 from the University of Pisa. She excavated at several places in Egypt and is mainly known fo ...

, and Anna Maria Roveri who later became his wife. His later, several excavations and studies are mostly concentrated in Nubia; among the others, since 1973 he excavated at

Jebel Barkal Jebel Barkal or Gebel Barkal ( ar, جبل بركل) is a mesa or large rock outcrop located 400 km north of Khartoum, next to Karima in Northern State in Sudan, on the Nile River, in the region that is sometimes called Nubia. The jebel is 10 ...

. He also excavated the

26th Dynasty The Twenty-sixth Dynasty of Egypt (notated Dynasty XXVI, alternatively 26th Dynasty or Dynasty 26) dynasty was the last native dynasty to rule Egypt before the Persian conquest in 525 BC (although others followed). The dynasty's reign (664–525 ...

tomb

TT27 The Theban Tomb TT27 is located in El-Assasif. It forms part of the Theban Necropolis, situated on the west bank of the Nile opposite Luxor. The tomb is the burial place of the ancient Egyptian official, Sheshonk. Sheshonk was the chief stewa ...

at Thebes which belonged to Shoshenq, chief steward of the Divine Adoratrice

Ankhnesneferibre Ankhnesneferibre was an ancient Egyptian princess and priestess during the 26th Dynasty, daughter of pharaoh Psamtik II and his queen Takhuit. She held the positions of Divine Adoratrice of Amun and later God's Wife of Amun between 595 and 525 ...

.
A remarkable work by Sergio Donadoni is ''The Egyptians'', first published in English in 1997. Later in his life, Donadoni became Professor emeritus at the Sapienza University; he also was a member of the

Accademia dei Lincei The Accademia dei Lincei (; literally the "Academy of the Lynx-Eyed", but anglicised as the Lincean Academy) is one of the oldest and most prestigious European scientific institutions, located at the Palazzo Corsini on the Via della Lungara in Rom ...

. In 2000 he was awarded with the

Grand Cross Grand Cross is the highest class in many orders, and manifested in its insignia. Exceptionally, the highest class may be referred to as Grand Cordon or equivalent. In other cases, there may exist a rank even higher than Grand Cross, e.g. Grand ...

of the

Order of Merit of the Italian Republic The Order of Merit of the Italian Republic ( it, Ordine al Merito della Repubblica Italiana) is the senior Italian order of merit. It was established in 1951 by the second President of the Italian Republic, Luigi Einaudi. The highest-ranking ...

.Quirinale website
/ref> He died on 31 October 2015 in Rome.

Sources

1914 births Archaeologists from Palermo 2015 deaths Italian Egyptologists Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa alumni University of Pisa faculty Sapienza University of Rome faculty Members of the Lincean Academy Knights Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic Italian centenarians Men centenarians {{Italy-archaeologist-stub