In the museum catalogue
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Mummy Mask
Paracas200/100 B.C.
- Attribution
- Paracas South coast, Peru
- Medium
- Cotton, plain weave with bundles of extended warps; painted
- Physical dimensions
- Without extended warps: 20.8 × 20.7 cm (8 3/16 × 8 1/8 in.)
- Credit line
- Simeon B. Williams Fund
CATALOGUE RECORD
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Source rights statement: Public domain
View the museum record ↗From the museum
Painted to emulate the features of a human face, this mummy mask also has fringe suggestive of hair, this mask probably was part of a mummy bundle. When the Paracas buried their dead, they placed the deceased in a seated position and wrapped it in layers of woven garments; masks were placed atop the bundle and served as a reminder of the human body within the many layers of wrapped cloth.
Description: Art Institute of Chicago · CC BY 4.0