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Material : Painted Wood
Height : 37
Found in : Fayum ()
Period : Roman Period
Found in Fayum , this portrait of a young boy dates back to the Roman Period (1st century AD) . A great corpus of portraits painted on wood known as the "Fayum portraits" and plaster masks was made during the Roman imperial era . The Roman taste had a particular interest in making portraits that stand for iconographic realism . Such a tendency became the most successful expression of the reciprocal penetration of Egyptian and Roman cultures that were far more integrated in death than in life . While plaster masks were placed on the mummy over the area of the face , portraits were either placed among the bandages wrapping the deceased's mummy or on the linen shrouds .
This panel , masterly painted on wood , is one of the masterpieces of the Fayoum portraits in which every single detail tells it all . The perfectly handled light contrast and the chromatic effect add to the beauty of the painting . The portrait pictures a young naked baby boy leaning against a wall with his legs slightly flexed and his finger on his mouth . The child is shown with the same posture of Harpocrates , the god of silence adapted by the Greeks from the Egyptian child god Horus . A scarf is freely wrapped down the boy's tights and legs . On his feet the child wears a fine sandal of high taste , typical to the style prevailing at that time . Hanging down from his neck is a fine round golden pectoral decorated with beads of different sizes . A golden bracelet circulates the boy's right hand . The brush of rosy color on the body renders the portrait livelier . To the left appears a dog in play: it is shown posing on its rear legs with its tongue getting out , which indicates the vigorous state both of the two figures are distinct with . Most admired is the multi-colored laurel wreath topping the boy's head .
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