TT8 Project

Coordinator: Enrico Ferraris

Team: Sara Aicardi, Johannes Auenmüller, Paolo Del Vesco, Federica Facchetti, Cédric Gobeil, Paolo Marini, Tommaso Montonati, Giulia Pallottini, Federico Taverni, Martina Terzoli, Valentina Turina, Susanne Töpfer

Partner institutions: AUC (The American University in Cairo); BNF (Bibliothèque Nationale de France); CCR VENARIA (Centro Conservazione e Restauro La Venaria Reale); CNR-IPCF (National Research Council - Institute of Chemical-Physical Processes); CNR-ISPC (National Research Council - Institute of Cultural Heritage Sciences); CREF (Centro Enrico Fermi); E-RIHS (European Research Infrastructure for Heritage Science); EURAC Research (EURAC Research); IFAO (Institut français d’archéologie orientale du Caire); INFN (National Institute for Nuclear Physics); IPERION HS (Integrated Platform for the European Research Infrastructure on Heritage Science); MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology); Politecnico di Milano – ABC; SCITEC (Institute of Chemical Sciences and Technologies “Giulio Natta”); SMAArt (Scientific Methodologies applied to Archaeology and Art); UCLA (The University of California, Los Angeles); Università di Catania; Università di Firenze; Università di Kyoto (Japan); Università di Musashino (Japan); Università di Padova; Università di Perugia; Università di Pisa; Università di Roma 2; Università di Torino; Università di Zurigo (Switzerland); Università Statale di Milano; VCP (Vatican Coffin Project)

External collaborators: N. Nishimoto (Musashino University), V. Asensi Amoros (Xylodata), T. Hito (Kyoto University), B. Aston, C. Dupuis (University of Mons), D. Suleiman (Rijksmuseum van Oudheden Leiden), B. Haring (Leiden University), I. Bohme (Universität Leipzig), P. Romano, C. Caliri, C. Conti, D. Buti, F. Rosi (CNR-ISPC), R. Boano (Università di Torino), A. Paladin, A. Zink (EURAC), D. Laboury (Université de Liège), C. Oliva, M. Borla (Soprintendenza SABAP-TO)

State of the art and objectives: The TT8 Project is an international interdisciplinary research programme dedicated to the comprehensive study of the tomb of Kha and Merit (TT8), discovered in 1906 at Deir el-Medina and dating to the late 18th Dynasty (c. 1370 BCE). The project integrates archaeology, diagnostic analysis, and conservation science to analyse and document the archaeological context and funerary assemblage, and to prepare their first complete scientific publication. The project's primary aim is the first complete scientific publication of the tomb and the more than 460 objects that constitute its funerary assemblage, one of the best-dated and best-preserved funerary contexts of the New Kingdom. Arranged in eight volumes planned for publication between 2027 and 2031, the series fills a gap of a century: since the appearance of Ernesto Schiaparelli's excavation report in 1927, no comprehensive study of the context has existed.

The research integrates archaeological, archival, and scientific data to document systematically the archaeological context — the funerary chapel and the subterranean tomb — together with the materials, technologies, and craft practices that characterise the assemblage. Through this interdisciplinary approach, the project aims to reconstruct the productive ecosystem in which the objects were made, the ritual practices that guided their deposition, and the natural and cultural landscape in which the burial is situated.

A further objective is the organisation and publication of the large body of data generated by the research, making it accessible to the scholarly community in accordance with the principles of open science and integrating it into the museum's information systems.

The project forms part of the Museo Egizio's broader strategy to develop interdisciplinary research on its collections, to enhance the scientific data produced by its investigations, and to strengthen international research networks in the field of heritage science.

The project brings together an international interdisciplinary team that integrates archaeology, diagnostics and conservation.

The research is structured on three complementary levels: the study of the archaeological context of the tomb and the funerary chapel, the historical-archaeological analysis of the objects in the assemblage and the philological and textual investigation of the associated documentation. These lines of research are integrated by archaeometric investigations on materials, production techniques and the state of conservation of the artifacts.

The first phase of the project (2017–2025) was dedicated to the collection, systematization and analysis of data through non-invasive and micro-invasive diagnostic techniques applied to the objects of the funerary assemblage.

At the same time, a complete photogrammetric survey of the funerary chapel and the hypogeal tomb was initiated, aimed at producing high-resolution three-dimensional models of the archaeological context. This documentation makes it possible to integrate the analysis of the objects with the spatial and architectural reconstruction of the original context of deposition.

The second phase of the project (2026–2031) is devoted to the scientific publication of the results and their dissemination through open-access digital platforms, making the full body of documentation produced by the project freely available to the scholarly community.

The main outcomes comprise the complete publication of the funerary assemblage and archaeological context of tomb TT8 in a series of eight scientific volumes, appearing at two-year intervals from 2027. The project also envisages the ongoing production of articles in international peer-reviewed journals, through which the results of the archaeological and archaeometric research will be progressively disseminated. Finally, a digital research platform is planned, providing open access to the data, images, three-dimensional models, and scientific documentation produced by the project, in keeping with the principles of open science.

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