Le «tombe-palazzo» di al-ʿAssāsīf, Tebe, della XXV e XXVI dinastia (747-525 a.C.), tra «archivio culturale» e luogo di culto

The aim of my Ph.D. research is to reconstruct the decorative programmes of the late monumental tombs of the 25th and 26th Dynasties of the al-ʿAssāsīf plain, Thebes, the reciprocal influences and the main models that underlie the elaboration of these iconographic and textual selections. These monumental tombs are, in fact, characterized by their decorative programmes that draw formulas and pieces chosen by the main Egyptian funerary corpora. These texts and iconographic motifs allude in a renewed key to different traditional elements of the Pharaonic cultural and religious knowledge. The analysis of religious corpora and iconographic themes of the monumental tombs of al-Assāsīf, considered according to their architectural and cultural context, can help to better understand the process of transmission and edition of these compositions, as well as the role played by the Theban priestly class in these processes between the Third Intermediate Period and the Late Period. Analysing the decorative programmes of the monumental tombs of al- ʿAssāsīf, I considered the function of the tombs as possible “archives” and the concept of identity and memory connected to it, the link of this hypothesis to the process of direct copying and the problem of monuments accessibility. The analysis of the models is based on a comparison with the main contemporary necropolises and major monuments that influenced the decorative selection of the monumental tombs. Analysing these tombs and their decorative programmes (texts and iconographic motifs) as a unitary corpus of material, and systematically comparing the similarities and divergences between the monuments and in their more general context, the analysis was put into a broader framework, questioning the antithetical concepts of “copy” and “innovation”, so characteristic of the artistic and religious production of the 25th and 26th Dynasties.