Hellenistic Mummy Burial Mask of a Woman

Rather than joining the throngs at the shopping centers for Black Friday, Martine and I visited the Getty Villa in Malibu. Not to be confused with the Getty Center off the San Diego Freeway, the Getty Villa is primarily a museum of the ancient world, concentrating on Greece and Rome.

The big draw today, however, was the Cyrus Cylinder, a cuneiform clay cylinder distributed by the Emperor Cyrus in 539 B.C. upon the occasion of the conquest of Babylon. The museum was crowded with Persian families visiting one of the most important historical milestones in their country’s history. The cylinder is shown below:

Cyrus Cylinder

We tend to ignore ancient history because, well, it’s “ancient history.” What we don’t take into account is the often startling realism of portraiture, particularly by the Romans and Hellenistic Greeks. Shown at the top is a painted fabric mask applied to a mummy of a woman who died around the Fourth Century A.D. Several of the exhibit halls are filled with uncomplimentary busts of Roman emperors and commoners. One classic example is a somewhat sinister bust of Caligula, and another of a bearded old man. Roman coins, for example, make no attempt to “photoshop” their emperors with a more beautiful or imposing face. Being realists, the Romans wanted the plebs to know what their leaders really looked like.

Because we get four days off for Thanksgiving Weekend, I have usually made a reservation at the Villa for the day after Thanksgiving. Unfortunately, the idea seems to have caught on. Especially toward the end of the afternoon, the place was jammed. No matter, there is a serenity about art that has lasted for two thousand odd years. Will ours be venerated two thousand years from now? I think not.

No matter, we had a great time strolling through the