#mummy!roman

[lionofchaeronea]

Mummy portrait (wax encaustic on sycamore wood) of a girl, from the Fayum region of Egypt. Artist unknown; ca. 120-150 CE (reign of Hadrian or Antoninus Pius). Now in the Liebieghaus, Frankfurt am Main, Germany. Photo credit: Carole Raddato.

[theancientwayoflife]

~ Mummified Dog.

Culture: Egyptian

Period: Roman Period

Date: ca. 30 B.C.–A.D. 395

Medium: Linen, pigment, and organic remains.

[romans-art]

decided that my chronurgy wizard for a curse of strahd game was just going to be Evelyn from the Mummy but make her wear a sunhat in Barovia instead

[sixteenseveredhands]

2,000-Year-Old Fayum Portraits from Roman Egypt: also known as "mummy portraits," these funerary paintings were often fastened to the coffins of the people they depicted

Above: Fayum portrait of a woman from Roman-occupied Egypt, c.100-110 CE

Fayum portraiture was a popular funerary practice among the upper-class families of Roman Egypt from about 50 CE to 250 CE. Given the high mortality rates for children during this period, many of these portraits depict children and youths, but adults were often featured, too.

Above: portrait of a youth wearing a golden wreath, c.130-150 CE; the wreath and the background of the portrait are both gilded

The population of the Faiyum Delta, where most of these portraits were found, largely contained individuals with both native Egyptian/North African and Greek heritage. The Greek lineages can be traced back to the Ptolemaic period, when the Greeks gained control of Egypt and began to establish settlements throughout the region, gradually leading to a cultural diffusion between the Greek and Egyptian populations. The Romans eventually took control of Egypt in 31 CE, absorbing it into the Roman Empire and colonizing much of North Africa, but the demographics of the Faiyum Delta remained largely unchanged.

Above: portrait of a man with a mole on his nose, c.130-150 CE

Many of these Fayum portraits reflect the same blend of ethnic and cultural roots, depicting individuals with both Greek and native Egyptian heritage (a claim that is supported by both archaeological and genetic evidence). Some portraits may also depict native Egyptians who did not have any European ancestry, but had been integrated into Greco-Roman society.

Above: portrait of a bearded man, c.170-180 CE

These representations of native Egyptians provide us with unique insights into the actual demographics of Roman-occupied Egypt (and the ancient world at large). Non-European peoples are rarely included in depictions of the classical world; it's also interesting to see the blend of cultural elements that these portraits represent.

Above: portrait of a priest of Serapis, c.140-160 CE; the man in this portrait is shown wearing a fillet/crown that bears the seven-pointed star of the Greco-Egyptian god, Serapis

As this article explains:

In the 1800s and early 1900s, Western art historians didn’t know what to make of these portraits. Scholars of Roman history labeled them Egyptian. Scholars of Egyptian history labeled them Greco-Roman. These binary academic classifications failed to capture the true complexity of the ancient (or, indeed, modern) Mediterranean. In reality, Fayum portraits are a syncretic form, merging Egyptian and Greco-Roman art and funerary practices. They reflect the cosmopolitanism of both Roman and Egyptian history.

Above: portrait of a man, c.80-100 CE (left); portrait of a bearded officer, sometimes referred to as "Perseus," c.130-175 CE (right)

Above: portrait of a young woman in red, c.90-120 CE

Nearly 1,000 of these portraits are currently known to exist.

Above: portrait of a man wearing a gilded ivy wreath, c.100-150 CE

Above: portrait of a bearded man, c.150-170 CE

Sources & More Info:

Curationist: Fayum Portraits

Harvard Art Museums: Giving the Dead their Due: an Exhibition Re-Examines Funerary Portraits from Roman Egypt

Getty Museum: APPEAR Project

Getty Museum: Faces of Roman Egypt

National Geographic: Ancient Egypt's Stunning, Lifelike Mummy Portraits

The Athens Centre: The Myth of Whiteness in Classical Sculpture

Forbes: Whitewashing Ancient Statues: Whiteness, Racism and Color in the Ancient World

[johnny-dynamo]

Artist Spotlight: Roman Novikov

[romegreeceart]

Mask of a female mummy

Fayum

2nd century CE

Egyptian Museum, Turin

Turin, June 2023

[wandering-cemeteries]

Funerary portrait of Aline

From wikipedia "Mummy portrait of Lady Aline, from Hawara, Egypt, painted directly onto the canvas of the mummy wrapping. The Tomb of Aline is an ancient Egyptian grave from the time of Tiberius or Hadrian, excavated at Hawara in 1892, Neues Museum, Berlin"

Neues Museum, Berlin

Feb. 2023

[gwydpolls]

Time Travel Question 35: Ancient History XVI and Earlier

These Questions are the result of suggestions from the previous iteration.

This category may include suggestions made too late to fall into the correct earlier time grouping. Basically, I'd already moved on to human history, but I'd periodically get a pre-homin suggestion, hence the occasional random item waaay out of it's time period, rather than reopen the category.

In some cases a culture lasted a really long time and I grouped them by whether it was likely the later or earlier grouping made the most sense with the information I had. (Invention ofs tend to fall in an earlier grouping if it's still open. Ones that imply height of or just before something tend to get grouped later, but not always. Sometimes I'll split two different things from the same culture into different polls because they involve separate research goals or the like).

Please add new suggestions below if you have them for future consideration. All cultures and time periods welcome.

[blueiscoool]

Egyptian Stucco Mummy Mask of a Woman Roman Period, circa 2nd Century A.D.

[uncleclaudius]

I wonder what Tiberius would have thought of the fact that even after 2000 years the British Museum has his mother right next to him (and in fact slightly to the front), and not with Augustus.

[dwellerinthelibrary]

Beautiful shot of the mummy mask of an unnamed lady. Colourful gods parade across the yellow mask, bringing offerings: on this, the left side, we have Seshat, Hathor (wearing an elaborate headdress with a vulture wearing the red crown), Tefnut, and Anubis wearing the double crown.

(This is the same as this.)

When: Roman Egypt

Where: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

[lionofchaeronea]

Ancient Egyptian mummy portrait (encaustic on wood) of a boy identified by an inscription as Eutyches. Artist unknown; 2nd cent. CE (Roman period). Now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

[romulussy]

kendall loganification experts what do you have to say about all this

[shewhoworshipscarlin]

Mummy portrait of a woman, 130-140, Roman Egypt.

[imjustheretoseetheprivateblogs]

If you like Pirates of the Caribbean or the Brendan Fraiser mummy movies, this poll is for you

[egypt-museum]

Mummy of an adult man

Roman Period, ca. 30 BC-395 CE. British Museum. EA6704

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