Mummy Mask (3/4 from above)

The tradition of funerary portraiture in Roman Egypt (1st-3rd centuries AD), famous for its painted portrait panels, also included the production and use of plaster cast portraits. Placed over the faces of the mummies, these nearly-life-size portraits were incorporated into the wrappings before burial. This mask was originally attached to a flat plaster upper chest area and projected slightly upward from the mummy wrappings, giving a three-dimensional aspect to the entire mummy.



The portraits are mold-made, but because their religious function was to identify and represent the deceased, they were embellished with specific portrait features. Here, most of the visible original pigment has worn off, but at the time of burial it would have consisted of tinted flesh, pink lips and black hair (with some pigment still visible in the channels of plaster). The sculpted earrings would have been tipped in color and may once have been gilded. The striking eyes are original and made of films of mica set over black bitumen pupils. Above them arc sharply delineated symmetrical eyebrows. There is no exact comparanda for the hairstyle, severely drawn from a central part and gathered in a bun at the back of the head. However, as some parallels may be seen in the hairstyles of stucco masks from Antinoopolis dating to the second half of the second century AD, a similar date can be proposed for this mask.