The Fayum Mummy Portrait that Looks So Familiar

I remember discovering the Fayum mummy portraits (as a reader, rather than the Jesuit priest who did uncover some of them back in 1615) and have returned to them time and time again.  It is fascinating that realistic images of the faces of people who died so long ago can still be seen by us today. Dating from around the 1st to the 3rd centuries AD, roughly c. 30 BC to AD 300, they were produced in the Fayum area of Roman Egypt, mainly during the early Roman Imperial period, and were attached to mummies as realistic painted likenesses of the deceased.

In this video, Alexandra Olsman, one of Sotheby’s specialists in ancient sculpture and works of art takes a look at one in particular (and I guess it’s up for sale, this video being by an art broker). Unlike many of the portraits, this particular chap is obviously middle-aged (the majority are of young adults and children).  It’s an honest “warts and all” picture but what Olsman does is answer a question that has intrigued many.  Were these portraits drawn before or after the death of the “sitter”?  The answer is a little more complex than you might expect – and, of course, based on a certain amount of guess work as we do not know who these people were, let alone how or when they died.

Watch this fascinating video below: