A Window Across Time

The Fayum portraits create an uncanny feeling: you look into the eyes of someone who lived nearly two thousand years ago and sense a real human connection.

Many subjects are strikingly young, a reflection of how short life often was in Roman Egypt. They wear the hairstyles and jewelry of their day — women in gold earrings and necklaces, men in garlands or military dress. Unlike the idealized faces of Greek sculpture or the formulaic style of Egyptian art, these portraits capture individual personalities with startling immediacy.