Portrait Mask of a Mummified Young Man

Place of OriginEgypt

DateRoman Period (1st to 4th century CE)

Dimensions10 1/2 in. (26.7 cm)

Mediumpainted stucco plaster

ClassificationSculpture

Credit LineGift of Florence Scott Libbey

Object number

1925.652

On View

Toledo Museum of Art (2445 Monroe Street), Gallery, 02, Classic

Label TextWhen Egypt was a province of the Roman Empire, masks of painted plaster continued the ancient Egyptian tradition of funerary masks for mummies (see the earlier mask in this case). The masks were attached to the lid of a coffin so that the deceased looked as if they were reclining on a banquet couch. Many of these plaster portraits look like individual likenesses, but most probably represent types: child, old man, young soldier. This mask represents a young man whose curly hair and short beard suggest that he died around 125–150 CE, when the Roman Emperor Hadrian made beards fashionable for the first time in hundreds of years.Published References

Luckner, Kurt T., "The Art of Egypt, Part 2," Toledo Museum of Art Museum News, new series, vol. 14, no.3, Fall 1971, p. 77, 78, repr. fig. 21, p. 80.

Exhibition History

Toledo Museum of Art, The Egypt Experience: Secrets of the Tomb, October 29, 2010-January 8, 2012.

Toledo Museum of Art, The Mummies: From Egypt to Toledo, February 3- May 6, 2018.

Comparative ReferencesSee also Ägyptesche Altertümer aus der Skulptursammlung Dresden, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, Ausstellung im Albertinum, 1977, p. 41, no. 57, (col.) pl. 81.