MEET MARCO ANTINOUS OF EGYPT By Flamen Antinoalis Antonius Subia

I have the pleasure to introduce someone very special. A beautiful boy who was very likely one of our brothers.

Mummy of Marco Antinous, encaustic painting on linen, the frieze of the aureus protector in gilded stucco. 

Egyptian civilisation, Roman Empire, 3rd Century. Paris, Musée Du Louvre.

The hauntingly lovely portrait from the heyday of Antinoopolis features the face of a young man with striking, realistic features painted with encaustic (wax-based paint) on thin wood panels and embellished with intricate gold-leaf details.

Portraits like these are highly treasured today. They are often known as FAYOUM PORTRAITS, after the region, near Antinoopolis, where most of them were found. There are fewer than 1,000 extant.

The Ancients believed Antinous worked miracles in the lives of his faithful followers. 

Antinous healed the sick, he granted people love and prosperity, he shielded them from peril.

Historian Royston Lambert's book Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous devotes a full chapter to the Religion of Antinous and mentions the miracles he was able to bring forth.

The oracle priests of Antinous could intercede with the God, or followers could appeal directly to Antinous:
 

"There is evidence of oracles at Tarsos and perhaps at Rome itself," Lambert writes. "No doubt it was through these pronouncements and visitations that he wrought miracles and healing for which he evidently became famous in the east."

In many areas, people named their children Antinous in the fervent belief that he would watch over and protect their offspring all their lives.

Marco Antinous undoubtedly is one of these children named after Antinous ... undoubtedly a follower of Antinous ... we hail Marco Antinous as our brother in Antinous!

~ANTONIUS SUBIA

MEET MARCO ANTINOUS OF EGYPT By Flamen Antinoalis Antonius Subia

 

I have the pleasure to introduce someone very special. A beautiful boy who was very likely one of our brothers.

Mummy of Marco Antinous, encaustic painting on linen, the frieze of the aureus protector in gilded stucco. 

Egyptian civilisation, Roman Empire, 3rd Century. Paris, Musée Du Louvre.

The hauntingly lovely portrait from the heyday of Antinoopolis features the face of a young man with striking, realistic features painted with encaustic (wax-based paint) on thin wood panels and embellished with intricate gold-leaf details.

Portraits like these are highly treasured today. They are often known as FAYOUM PORTRAITS, after the region, near Antinoopolis, where most of them were found. There are fewer than 1,000 extant.

The Ancients believed Antinous worked miracles in the lives of his faithful followers. 

Antinous healed the sick, he granted people love and prosperity, he shielded them from peril.

Historian Royston Lambert's book Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous devotes a full chapter to the Religion of Antinous and mentions the miracles he was able to bring forth.

The oracle priests of Antinous could intercede with the God, or followers could appeal directly to Antinous:
 

"There is evidence of oracles at Tarsos and perhaps at Rome itself," Lambert writes. "No doubt it was through these pronouncements and visitations that he wrought miracles and healing for which he evidently became famous in the east."

In many areas, people named their children Antinous in the fervent belief that he would watch over and protect their offspring all their lives.

Marco Antinous undoubtedly is one of these children named after Antinous ... undoubtedly a follower of Antinous ... we hail Marco Antinous as our brother in Antinous!

~ANTONIUS SUBIA

MEET MARCO ANTINOUS OF EGYPT By Flamen Antinoalis Antonius Subia

I have the pleasure to introduce someone very special. A beautiful boy who was very likely one of our brothers.

Mummy of Marco Antinous, encaustic painting on linen, the frieze of the aureus protector in gilded stucco. 

Egyptian civilisation, Roman Empire, 3rd Century. Paris, Musée Du Louvre.

The hauntingly lovely portrait from the heyday of Antinoopolis features the face of a young man with striking, realistic features painted with encaustic (wax-based paint) on thin wood panels and embellished with intricate gold-leaf details.

Portraits like these are highly treasured today. They are often known as FAYOUM PORTRAITS, after the region, near Antinoopolis, where most of them were found. There are fewer than 1,000 extant.

The Ancients believed Antinous worked miracles in the lives of his faithful followers. 

Antinous healed the sick, he granted people love and prosperity, he shielded them from peril.

Historian Royston Lambert's book Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous devotes a full chapter to the Religion of Antinous and mentions the miracles he was able to bring forth.

The oracle priests of Antinous could intercede with the God, or followers could appeal directly to Antinous:
 

"There is evidence of oracles at Tarsos and perhaps at Rome itself," Lambert writes. "No doubt it was through these pronouncements and visitations that he wrought miracles and healing for which he evidently became famous in the east."

In many areas, people named their children Antinous in the fervent belief that he would watch over and protect their offspring all their lives.

Marco Antinous undoubtedly is one of these children named after Antinous ... undoubtedly a follower of Antinous ... we hail Marco Antinous as our brother in Antinous!

~ANTONIUS SUBIA

MEET MARCO ANTINOUS OF EGYPT By Flamen Antinoalis Antonius Subia

I have the pleasure to introduce someone very special. A beautiful boy who was very likely one of our brothers.

Mummy of Marco Antinous, encaustic painting on linen, the frieze of the aureus protector in gilded stucco. 

Egyptian civilisation, Roman Empire, 3rd Century. Paris, Musée Du Louvre.

The hauntingly lovely portrait from the heyday of Antinoopolis features the face of a young man with striking, realistic features painted with encaustic (wax-based paint) on thin wood panels and embellished with intricate gold-leaf details.

Portraits like these are highly treasured today. They are often known as FAYOUM PORTRAITS, after the region, near Antinoopolis, where most of them were found. There are fewer than 1,000 extant.

The Ancients believed Antinous worked miracles in the lives of his faithful followers. 

Antinous healed the sick, he granted people love and prosperity, he shielded them from peril.

Historian Royston Lambert's book Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous devotes a full chapter to the Religion of Antinous and mentions the miracles he was able to bring forth.

The oracle priests of Antinous could intercede with the God, or followers could appeal directly to Antinous:
 

"There is evidence of oracles at Tarsos and perhaps at Rome itself," Lambert writes. "No doubt it was through these pronouncements and visitations that he wrought miracles and healing for which he evidently became famous in the east."

In many areas, people named their children Antinous in the fervent belief that he would watch over and protect their offspring all their lives.

Marco Antinous undoubtedly is one of these children named after Antinous ... undoubtedly a follower of Antinous ... we hail Marco Antinous as our brother in Antinous!

~ANTONIUS SUBIA

MEET MARCO ANTINOUS OF EGYPT By Flamen Antinoalis Antonius Subia

I have the pleasure to introduce someone very special. A beautiful boy who was very likely one of our brothers.

Mummy of Marco Antinous, encaustic painting on linen, the frieze of the aureus protector in gilded stucco. 

Egyptian civilisation, Roman Empire, 3rd Century. Paris, Musée Du Louvre.

The hauntingly lovely portrait from the heyday of Antinoopolis features the face of a young man with striking, realistic features painted with encaustic (wax-based paint) on thin wood panels and embellished with intricate gold-leaf details.

Portraits like these are highly treasured today. They are often known as FAYOUM PORTRAITS, after the region, near Antinoopolis, where most of them were found. There are fewer than 1,000 extant.

The Ancients believed Antinous worked miracles in the lives of his faithful followers. 

Antinous healed the sick, he granted people love and prosperity, he shielded them from peril.

Historian Royston Lambert's book Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous devotes a full chapter to the Religion of Antinous and mentions the miracles he was able to bring forth.

The oracle priests of Antinous could intercede with the God, or followers could appeal directly to Antinous:
 

"There is evidence of oracles at Tarsos and perhaps at Rome itself," Lambert writes. "No doubt it was through these pronouncements and visitations that he wrought miracles and healing for which he evidently became famous in the east."

In many areas, people named their children Antinous in the fervent belief that he would watch over and protect their offspring all their lives.

Marco Antinous undoubtedly is one of these children named after Antinous ... undoubtedly a follower of Antinous ... we hail Marco Antinous as our brother in Antinous!

~ANTONIUS SUBIA

WE WEEP FOR THE INNOCENT GAY MARTYRS OF IRAN, IRAQ, SYRIA AND OTHER LANDS

ON August 27th we commemorate the countless LGBT people who have been persecuted and executed in Iran, Iraq, Syria and other countries ... many of these innocent martyrs were teenagers.

Iran still regularly kills minors no matter what international law says. Amnesty International recently decried the hanging of gay Iranian teenager, Hassan Afshar, as proof of the country's "sickening enthusiasm for putting juveniles to death that knows no bounds."

Several years ago ... 19 July 2005 ... Iran publicly executed two teenage boys for being gay. Their names were MAHMOUD ASGARI and AYAZ MARHONI, 16 and 18 years old. 

Since then many more LGBT people have been tortured, imprisoned and publicly executed in Iran ... no one knows how many. 

For their suffering, the Religion of Antinous proclaims Mahmoud Asgari and Ayaz Marhoni and all of the named and unnamed gay victims of Iranian persecution, Saints and Innocent Martyrs of the Religion of Antinous.

Putting to death any juvenile violates United Nations covenants. Still, Iran hasn't shied from the most extreme penalty when prosecuting even the youngest men for gay sex and other crimes under Islamic law.

An Amnesty International report in January found that four people were killed last year despite being juveniles at the time of their crime. And between 2005 and 2015, 73 were executed.

In this latest case, Afshar was charged at age 17 with raping another boy. His family said it was consensual, which is sometimes a moot point. If the other boy hadn't called it "rape" instead of consensual sex, he too could have faced the death penalty.

Amnesty International reports that Afshar was hanged in Arak's Prison in Markazi Province on July 18.

Another teen, Alireza Tajiki, is next in line for execution, accused of raping and murdering a friend.

Amnesty International notes that Iran’s Supreme Court had said there's no evidence Tajiki committed the crime, and it says a confession is invalid because it was provoked by torture.

International outrage over Afshar’s death has so far managed to put the next killing on hold.

A rare photo of one of these executions (seen above) outraged the world in 2005, when a blindfolded Mahmoud Asgari, 16, and Ayaz Marhoni, 18, were publicly hanged in Mashhad, Iran, on charges of raping boys. The photos might have stopped, but the killings haven't.

A United Nations report in 2014 reported that 160 young men are on death row in Iran having been convicted of a myriad of crimes. Another United Nations investigation this year found that the death penalty reached a 20-year high in 2015, with 966 people killed.

Under Islamic law, these offenses — called hodud — can include "insulting the Prophet of Islam," extra-marital heterosexual sex, and consensual gay sex. Under hodud, death is one of four possible punishments, which could also include crucifixion, banishment, and amputating the right arm and left leg.

MEET MARCO ANTINOUS OF EGYPT By Flamen Antinoalis Antonius Subia

I have the pleasure to introduce someone very special. A beautiful boy who was very likely one of our brothers.

Mummy of Marco Antinous, encaustic painting on linen, the frieze of the aureus protector in gilded stucco. 

Egyptian civilisation, Roman Empire, 3rd Century. Paris, Musée Du Louvre.

The hauntingly lovely portrait from the heyday of Antinoopolis features the face of a young man with striking, realistic features painted with encaustic (wax-based paint) on thin wood panels and embellished with intricate gold-leaf details.

Portraits like these are highly treasured today. They are often known as FAYOUM PORTRAITS, after the region, near Antinoopolis, where most of them were found. There are fewer than 1,000 extant.

The Ancients believed Antinous worked miracles in the lives of his faithful followers. 

Antinous healed the sick, he granted people love and prosperity, he shielded them from peril.

Historian Royston Lambert's book Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous devotes a full chapter to the Religion of Antinous and mentions the miracles he was able to bring forth.

The oracle priests of Antinous could intercede with the God, or followers could appeal directly to Antinous:
 

"There is evidence of oracles at Tarsos and perhaps at Rome itself," Lambert writes. "No doubt it was through these pronouncements and visitations that he wrought miracles and healing for which he evidently became famous in the east."

In many areas, people named their children Antinous in the fervent belief that he would watch over and protect their offspring all their lives.

Marco Antinous undoubtedly is one of these children named after Antinous ... undoubtedly a follower of Antinous ... we hail Marco Antinous as our brother in Antinous!

~ANTONIUS SUBIA

OSCAR WILDE SAINT OF ANTINOUS

ON October 16th, the Religion of Antinous honors SAINT OSCAR WILDE who was born on this day in 1854. He died in ignominy and poverty on November 30th, 1900.

Ostensibly, Saint Oscar Wilde was an Irish playwright, poet and author of numerous short stories and one novel.

Known for his biting wit, he became the most successful playwright of the late Victorian era in London, and the greatest "celebrity" of his day.

His plays are still widely performed, especially The Importance of Being Earnest.

As the result of a widely covered series of trials, Wilde experienced  a dramatic downfall and was imprisoned for two years' hard labour after being convicted of homosexual relationships, described as "gross indecency" with other men.

After Wilde was released from prison he set sail for Dieppe by the night ferry and he never returned to Ireland or Britain.

That is the truth, pure and simple, of his life. But as Saint Oscar himself once famously said: "The pure and simple truth is rarely pure and never simple."

For that reason (and for many others) we remember him not only because he was notorious (something for which he might claim to be quite proud) but because he remembered Antinous.

He kept the name of Antinous alive through his poetry: 
"—A moment more, the trees had stooped to kiss
Pale Daphne just awakening from the swoon
Of tremulous laurels, lonely Salmacis
Had bared his barren beauty to the moon,
And through the vale with sad voluptuous smileANTINOUS had wandered, the red lotus of the Nile.
"Down leaning from his black and clustering hair
To shade those slumberous eyelids — caverned bliss,
Or else on yonder grassy slope with bare
High-tuniced limbs unravished Artemis
Had bade her hounds give tongue, and roused the deer
From his green ambuscade with shrill hallo and pricking spear.FROM "THE BURDEN OF ITYS" BY OSCAR WILDE.


"—Lift up your large black satin eyes which are like cushions where one sinks!
Fawn at my feet fantastic Sphinx! and sing me all your memories!
Sing to me of that odorous green eve when couching by the marge
You heard from Adrian's gilded barge the laughter of ANTINOUS
And lapped the stream and fed your drouth and watched with hot and hungry stare
The ivory body of that rare young slave with his pomegranate mouth!

FROM "THE SPHINX" BY OSCAR WILDE. Here are some quotations from Oscar Wilde:
We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

Ordinary riches can be stolen, real riches cannot.
In your soul are infinitely precious things that cannot be taken from you.

I have the simplest tastes. I am always satisfied with the best.

Man can believe the impossible, but can never believe the improbable

The critic has to educate the public; the artist has to educate the critic.

Whenever a man does a thoroughly stupid thing, it is always from the noblest motives.

It is absurd to divide people into good and bad. People are either charming or tedious.

I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying.

I love talking about nothing. It is the only thing I know anything about.

Always forgive your enemies — nothing annoys them so much.

A true friend stabs you in the front.

I don't want to earn my living — I want to live.

Every saint has a past and every sinner has a future.

Nothing that is worth knowing can be taught.

The only thing worse than being talked about is NOT being talked about.

A gentleman is one who never hurts anyone's feelings unintentionally.

What is a cynic? A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.

To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all.

Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.

THE TWO LOVERS OF ANTINOOPOLIS

ON MAY 10th the Religion of Antinous honors two men we call the Two Lovers of Antinoopolis who lived in the Sacred City of Antinoopolis and who worshiped the Beauteous Boy and whose joint portrait is one of the great mysteries of Egyptology.

This round portrait, called a "tondo" because of its circular format, was used as a face plate on a mummy. The vicinity of Antinoopolis and the Fayoum Oasis region is famous for hundreds of such mummy portraits which give us a priceless look at how the residents of the Sacred City actually looked. It is believed these were portraits which had hung in people's homes and which were interred with the deceased, as a reminder to their Ka about who they were in mortal life.

The tondo is unique, though, because it shows two faces. Archaeologists have no explanation as to why anyone would want the face plate on a mummy to show two men's faces. The conventional explanation is that they were perhaps brothers and when one of them died, his surviving brother insisted on burying him with their joint portrait to show his fraternal love.

But one glance at the portrait shows that the two men bear little resemblance to each other.

Even more striking is the difference in skin coloring. Throughout Egyptian art, males were portrayed as having typically ruddy-brown skin and girls and women as having creamy colored skin — that was the iconic rule in Ancient Egyptian art. The skin colors do not represent the ACTUAL skin tones of the people, just as the idealized features of pharaohs don't reflect how they actually looked.

In Ancient Egyptian art, even if two individuals appear to be identically dressed with wigs and flowing robes, you can distinguish gender roles by skin color. Ruddy skin means male. Creamy skin means female.

That makes it all the more interesting to look at the Tondo of the Two Lovers, because one man has dark "male type" skin coloring and the other man has very light "female type" skin coloring. Such contrasting skin coloring traditionally was used only for married male-female couples in Ancient Egyptian art.


Even when the hairstyles and clothing are barely indistinguishable in Egyptian art, the difference in skin tones is a gender-role clue. Any Egyptian would instantly register the visual "pun" and would think it no accident.The artist who painted the Tondo of the Two Lovers appears to have been giving us a clue as to the relationship between the two men.

The Tondo has been dated between 130-150 AD which would place them as nearly contemporaries of Antinous, living in His Sacred City in the first bloom of the Religion of Antinous. French architectural historian Jean-Claude Golvin painted this stunning rendering of Antinoopolis at its height.

But of even more significance are the small images of Greco-Egyptian gods placed above their shoulders. The darker man is guarded by a figure which some experts identify as Hermanubis, a god of the underworld adored in the nearby city of Hermopolis. His name is variously interpreted as "Hermes/Anubis" or "Horus-as-Anubis", depending on whether you read the Latin or the Egyptian spellings.

The cult of Hermanubis was on the rise in Rome at this time and he was interpreted as a solar deity who (like Hermes/Mercury and Horus) led the dead through the darkness to everlasting sunlight. A crack runs through the figure, however, making its identity somewhat unsure. At one point Hermanubis had a large cult following in Rome itself and his face graced Imperial coins. But his cult was suppressed almost as quickly as it rose, for moralistic reasons which are hard to reconstruct.

The lighter skinned and more beautifully dressed boy is watched over by Antinous, the patron god of Antinoopolis, who grasps a Dionysiac scepter and who wears the SWTY (Two Feathers) crown of divinity symbolic of his many-faceted Sacred Powers. It is ironic that the Christians later suppressed the cult of Antinous for moralistic reasons, just as the cult of Hermanubis had been suppressed by the Romans. Was there a sexual/moral connection between the two cults?

At any rate, this makes the Tondo of the Two Lovers the only portrait painting of Antinous to have survived, and the only image of two probable followers of HIS religion.

The faint inscription beneath the image of Antinous reads 15 Pachon, which is a date in the Greek calendar that corresponds to the 10th of May. No one knows what the significance of this date might be. An anniversary, perhaps.

The younger figure is wearing a splendid red wrap held in place by an impressive amethyst brooch in a gold setting — a family heirloom perhaps. The artist has gone to pains to render it perfectly. The embroidery on his white tunic is very fine. An oriental swastika good-luck charm is stitched into his right sleeve.

Perhaps the portrait was commissioned for the day (May 10th) when he donned his manly robes for the first time on his 16th birthday, as was the Roman custom. The peach-fuzz on his face gives him the appearance of an adolescent.

The older man (who could 30-something) stands behind him, as if symbolically showing his love and support of his young companion. He could be an older brother or uncle. He could even be the youth's father — life expectancies were shorter then, and people married early in those days and were grandparents by their mid-30s.

But just perhaps the composition and skin-tone nuances are subtle clues by the artist that these two men shared an older-man, younger-man relationship — a Classical Greek-style erastes/eromenos relationship — similar to that of Hadrian and Antinous. After all, this city was founded on Hadrian's love for Antinous.

The Religion of Antinous honors these two men on May 10th — the day which was so special to them, for reasons known only to them and to the gods they worshiped — Hermanubis and Antinous!

BOYS IN ANTINOOPOLIS EGYPT HAD SPECIAL PRIVILEGES IN ROMAN TIMES

IN Roman Egypt, 14-year-old boys were enrolled in a youth organization in order to learn to be good citizens, according to a new study into a field that has never properly been studied until now … boyhood in Roman-ruled Egypt.

The researchers from the University of Oslo and Britain's University of Newcastle, have unearthed papyrus documents from the 5th Century AD from OXYRHYNCHUS Egypt. 

(Image: Head of a 2nd Century AD Roman-era boy with Egyptian-style "Sidelock of Horus" in Oslo Museum of Cultural History)

The documents shed new light into boyhood in Egypt in the heyday of Antinoopolis, which was located only a short distance from Oxyrhynchus (also spelled Oxyrhynchos).

Only boys born to free-born citizens were entitled to be members of the town's youth organization, which was called a "gymnasium." These boys were the children of local Egyptians, Greeks and Romans. 

Their families would necessarily have been quite prosperous, and have had an income that placed them in the "12 drachma tax class." 

It is uncertain how large a proportion of the population would have qualified, probably somewhere between 10 and 25 per cent, says social historian and historian of ideas Ville Vuolanto.

Girls were not enrolled as members of the gymnasium, but are often mentioned in the administrative documents as being the boys' siblings. This may have had to do with family status or tax class. Both girls and women could own property, but in principle they had to have a male guardian.

For boys from well-off families of the free-born citizen class, the transition to adult life started with enrollment in the 'gymnasium'.

Other boys started working before reaching their teens, and might serve an apprenticeship of two to four years. 

(Illustration by Roger Payne)

The researchers have found about 20 apprenticeship contracts in Oxyrhynchus, most of them relating to the weaving industry since Oxyrhynchus was a major weaving center in Egypt. 

Males were not reckoned to be fully adults until they married in their early twenties.

Slave children could also become apprentices, and their contracts were of the same type as for the boys of free-born citizens. Slaves lived either with their owners or in the same house as their master, while free-born children generally lived with their parents.

But life was different for slave children nonetheless. Vuolanto says they have found documents to show that children as young as two were sold and separated from their parents.

(Image: Boys learning to write)

In one letter, a man encourages his brother to sell the youngest slave children, and some wine ... whereas his nephews should be spoiled. He writes "…I am sending you some melon seeds and two bundles of old clothes, which you can share with your children."

Little is known about the lives of children until they turn up in official documents, which is usually not before they are in their early teens. 

It seems that children began doing light work between the ages of seven and nine. Typically, they might have been set to work as goatherds or to collect wood or dry animal dung for fuel.

There were probably a good number of children who did not live with their biological parents, because the mortality rate was high.

"It's like putting together a jigsaw puzzle. By examining papyri, pottery fragments with writing on, toys and other objects, we are trying to form a picture of how children lived in Roman Egypt," explains Vuolanto.

The documents originate from Oxyrhynchus in Egypt, which was a large town of more than 25,000 inhabitants. 

(Image: Mummy-face portrait of a young boy from Antinoopolis)

Oxyrhynchus was so important that Antinous and Hadrian visited the city only a few days before Antinous died in the Nile in 130 AD.

The city had Egypt's most important weaving industry, and was also the Roman administrative centre for the area.

Researchers possess a great deal of documentation precisely from this area because archaeologists digging one hundred years ago discovered thousands of papyri in what had once been the city's rubbish dumps.

MUMMY PORTRAIT OF A YOUNG MAN FROM ANTINOOPOLIS MAKES HEADLINES

TAKE a good look into the eyes of this young man and you see a person who lived at or near the sacred city named for Antinous 1,900 years ago.

This remarkable portrait has rarely been seen in public, having been in a private art collection for decades.

The Bowdoin College Museum of Art in Brunswick, Maine, in the USA is celebrating the acquisition of the portrait, made all those centuries ago, at or near the city of ANTINOOPOLIS.

It shows a teenage boy with dark, liquid eyes, a long neck, and a gold laurel wreath. He has tight curls, a long nose, and a triangular jaw line, which makes him seem somewhat feminine.

The image is hauntingly lovely, and its acquisition is a coup for Bowdoin, since this ancient portrait has rarely been seen in public.

This "Mummy Portrait of a Young Man" from the heyday of Antinoopolis in the 2nd Century AD features the face of a young man with striking, realistic features painted with encaustic (wax-based paint) on thin wood panels and embellished with intricate gold-leaf details.

Portraits like these are highly treasured today. They are often known as FAYOUM PORTRAITS, after the region, near Antinoopolis, where most of them were found. There are fewer than 1,000 extant.

Bowdoin and its associated curator Jim Higginbotham have been looking for a good example for about a decade. 

The museum acted decisively when this portrait, previously owned by private collectors in Europe, came up for sale at Christie's last October.

Combining stylistic traits of Egyptian, Roman, and Greek portraiture, such works were painted in a restricted palette of of colors: white, black, yellow ochre, and red earth suspended in beeswax.

They were painted on thin panels of wood, or sometimes linen.

Since they were used as face plates on mummy casings, they are mostly life-size.

According to Frank Goodyear, the museum’s co-director, a piece of this panel that had come loose was examined by scientists in the college’s biology department. 

They determined that it was limewood, which was common in Northern Europe but did not grow in Egypt. The discovery, he said, emphasizes the centrality of Egypt to international trade routes at the time.

What's striking about Fayum portraits is not just the economy of means and the visible, rhythmic brushstrokes, but how plainspoken and honest they are. The best of them attain a level of immediacy and genuine realism that can force a gulp of recognition.

The persons depicted will often have dark patches under the eyes, asymmetrical features, heavy jewelry, or distinctive hairstyles, including facial hair. 

The sense of realism is enhanced by highlights and shadows created by a single light source ... in this case, coming from the left and raking lightly across the youth’s face.

And then, of course, there are those signature dark, slightly enlarged eyes, often with prominent eyelashes. They can remind the modern viewer of portraits by El Greco, Modigliani, or Lucian Freud.

Bowdoin has reason to celebrate the arrival of its own Fayum portrait, after a long, arduous, 2000-year journey.