Ca. 663-30 BC. Late Period - Ptolemaic Dynasty. A mummy mask made of restrung glazed faience beads. The face is highly stylised with a yellow nose, green skin, and a red border, made of tightly strung green, yellow, red, blue, and black beads. Below the chin, the beads are arranged in stripes of colour to portray a stylised false beard. This would have been made to be placed on the face of a mummy, and had a similar function to the earlier cartonnage and wooden masks - applying a face to the mummy gave the body both identity and senses. Regaining the senses was an important mission of the recently deceased, and a key focus in the preparation and treatment of the body; many rituals and chapters in the Book of the Dead were devoted to this. Coffins and bodies from many periods of Egyptian history depicted eyes in some form to allow the body within to 'see', and here they are enlarged and exaggerated for this purpose. The skin is coloured green just like the skin of Osiris, whose green hue mimicked the eternally regenerative and resurrecting nature of plant life, as the hope of the deceased was to merge with Osiris to gain the perfect afterlife and resurrection in the next world. Size: L:105mm / W:115mm ; 32g. Provenance: From the important collection of a London doctor A.R; passed by descent to his son; formerly acquired before 2000 on the UK art market.