A mysterious mummy known only as the gilded lady because of her golden headdress can be seen for the first time after scientists rebuilt her face.
The woman lived in Roman-occupied Egypt and died in her 40s, perhaps of tuberculosis, and her mummy carried no hieroglyphics to reveal her name.
In order to protect her remains, she was never unwrapped, but she was CT scanned for the first time in 2011, unearthing new details about the body.
Now her true face has been revealed more than 1,500 years after she died, revealing her ‘delicate’ features as they were during life.
Cicero Moraes, lead author of the new study, said the reconstruction was assisted by the mummy’s careful preservation.
A mysterious mummy known only as the gilded lady because of her golden headdress can be seen for the first time after scientists rebuilt her face
The woman lived in Roman-occupied Egypt and died in her 40s, perhaps of tuberculosis, and her mummy carried no hieroglyphics to reveal her name
He said: ‘The structure is very well preserved, in the original state of discovery, without the mummy being unwrapped.
‘Something that draws attention is the presence of short, curly hair, which can be seen in the tomography reconstruction.’
He continued: ‘Initially, we reconstructed the skull, based on the computed tomography, and later adjusted the position of the jaw.
‘The skull allows us to design structures such as the nose, ears, eye position, lip limits and others, using data measured in tomography scans of living people.
‘Furthermore, we use measurements carried out using ultrasound, also on living people, to find out the thickness of the soft tissue in different regions of the skull.’
Because of her origins in Roman-occupied Egypt, tissue-thickness data was used from modern European women aged 40 to 49.
The resulting face was blended with another face made using a process called anatomical deformation.
Her true face has been revealed more than 1,500 years after she died, revealing her ‘delicate’ features as they were during life
The team created two versions of the face: one objective, with eyes closed, and in greyscale to avoid making judgements about skin tone
Mr Moraes said: ‘This is where we adjust the face and skull of a virtual donor to suit the parameters of the gilded lady, resulting in a structurally compatible face.
‘At the end we cross-reference all the data, interpolating the projections to create the final face.’
The team created two versions of the face: one objective, with eyes closed, and in greyscale to avoid making judgements about skin tone.
The other adds more artistic elements, breathing life into the recreation with colour and a hairstyle.
In both cases they were assisted by the unusual preservation of short curly hair, which revealed another aspect of the living woman’s appearance.
Cicero said: ‘It is a delicate, youthful-looking face.
‘She reminds me of my mother-in-law in some ways! During the process I showed it to some family members and they all agreed.’
CT scanning also showed the living woman had a slight overbite, as well as revealing lumps of resin likely inserted during mummification to improve the odour
They were assisted by the unusual preservation of short curly hair, which revealed another aspect of the living woman’s appearance
CT scanning also showed the living woman had a slight overbite, as well as revealing lumps of resin likely inserted during mummification to improve the odour.
Cicero’s co-author, archaeologist Michael Habicht of Flinders University in Australia, said the burial ‘points to a middle-class individual’.
The remains are now kept by the Field Museum in the US city of Chicago.
The multinational team behind the reconstruction spans three continents.
Authors include Elena Varotto, also of Flinders University, Francesco Galassi of the University of Lodz in Poland, Veronica Papa of the University of Naples in Italy, and Thiago Beaini of the University of Uberlândia in Brazil.
They published their study in Anthropologie – International Journal of Human Diversity and Evolution.