Faiyum

Faiyum Portrait Mummy of a Young Child

This mummy from Hawara, dates from the 1st-2nd Century A.D., and is of a young child aged 2-3 years of age. Barbara Borg FSA (Professor of Classical Archaeology at the Scuola Normale Superiore) and German Egyptologist and Curator Dr. Cäcilia Fluck proposed that the idea of the mummy being a male was incorrect, based upon...

Faiyum portrait of a woman

Faiyum portrait of a woman

This Faiyum portrait of a young woman dates from around 100-200 A.D., and depicts an Egyptian woman with hair tied back in a bun and styled in ringlets, wearing a dusty pink and rust tunic, with thick eyebrows, and baretta earrings. She has a slight Mona-Lisa smile as she gazes ahead. These portraits, known as...

Portrait of a woman, from Faiyum

Portrait of a woman, from Faiyum

The portrait was found by the archaeologist Albert Gayet during the excavation campaign of 1904 or 1905 at the necropolis of Antinoopolis in Middle Egypt. It entered the Louvre’s collections in 1905. A fragment of the right side of the board has been reglued. The paint has worn away on the nose, leaving a dark...

Statue of Lady Kemtet

Lady Kemtet

This painted wooden statuette is of a woman named Lady Kemtet. It dates from around 1900-1802 B.C., making it a Middle Kingdom piece from around the middle of the 12th Dynasty. The statuette was discovered at the Faiyum Entrance Area of Cemetery B, Tomb 262, in Harageh, Egypt. The inscription upon the base writes as...

First Full-Color Portraits of Egyptian Mummies

First Full-Color Portraits of Egyptian Mummies

Archaeologists have unearthed the first full-color portraits of Egyptian mummies in more than a century. The excavation at Gerzeh archaeological site in Faiyum revealed a huge funerary building, also turned up papyri, pottery, and coffins from the Ptolemaic and Roman periods Egyptian archaeologists completing their 10th season of excavations at Gerzeh, 75 miles southwest of...