Ryū Sensei: Ma-Mummia!

Happy Halloween!

It's hard to deny that art has a lot of very interesting history behind it, and that's not limited to just the artwork but even the materials used to make artwork with.

The Paint in today's topic had many different names over the past millennia including "Mummy Brown", "Caput Moruum", and "Mars Violet". But why did it have so many names and what did they represent?

As the blog title may imply, that would even include the use of " "Mummia"(also spelled mumiya or mumia) which was originally a medicine, but at one point was "Ground up Mummies".

Origins of Mummia

In today's texts, the term "mummy" will translate to "embalmed body" where "Mummia" would translate to the medicine when referring to the historical origin of the word.

Mummia was a key ingredient in the pigment "Caput Mortuum" or "Mummy Brown" during the Medieval era of Europe. The compound, both as a medicine and a pigment, was in high demand, and due the substance becoming harder to find, European traders found another source for their material ,and thus went into the Egyptian Tombs and dug up mummies.

Asphaltum and Bitumen(Asphalt) had been used in many different ways in everyday Ancient Egyptian Life. It would be used for glues, mortars, waterproofing and even embalming mummies!

Persian mumiya (black pissasphalt: the in-between of petroleum and asphalt)

was the beginning of a famous remedy used to heal wounds and fractures. It was often confused for the same material the Ancient Egyptians used to embalm mummies (Bitumen/asphalt).

Medieval Persian physicians used this compound to heal ulcers, cuts, and fractures. The best pissaphalt was said to be found from the mountains of Darabgerd, Persia as well as the Dead Sea.

During the Crusades Period, European Soldiers heard of the healing powers deriving from mummia and the medicine then went into high demand. Natural occurring bitumen became limited, and thus the Europeans searched for a new source for this medicine. During this era, the Ancient Egyptian's embalming liquid was mistaken for the Persian mumiya, and was translated along the way as "whole mummies". From the 12th - 19th century, bitumen specifically from Egyptian mummies had been extracted and sold for medicine and art materials in Europe.

Funny enough, Today, Acetaminophen or better known as "Tylenol", derives from similar ancient ingredients of coal tar (Bitumen/ Asphalt).

Origins in Alchemy

A Later Variant of this pigment was first manufactured in the 17th century from the

by- product of Sulfuric Acid in Alchemy. The name origin "Caput Mortuum" is believed to have originated with this mineral compound. In Latin Caput Mortuum translates to "Dead Head" but in Alchemy also means "Worthless Remains", which was what this reddish brown residue was. The term was to describe the chemical reaction when these left-overs where initially created. Alchemists used a stylized skull to represent this oxidized left-overs in various texts.

Caput Mortuum Alchemic Symbol

Caput Mortuum in Paintings

Mummy brown/ Caput Mortuum, is a unique paint that can look brown or maroon depending on the lighting. Some variants can even lean towards the yellow or even lavender color schemes. This pigment was created from the "mummia" made from mummies.

Mummy Brown/ Caput Mortuum Swatch

Mummy Brown Palette

Despite the popularity of the medicine created from Egyptian Mummies, it wasn't until the 18th century that the paint created from mummies became more widely used. Apparently, the fact it was made from bodies gave it a "unique" color and transparency even different from straight Asphalt paint.

Here is a unique excerpt of "Mummy Brown" from the book

The Chemistry of Paints and Painting by Arthur H. Church

"'Mummy,' as a pigment, is inferior to prepared, but superior to raw, asphalt, inasmuch as it has been submitted to a considerable degree of heat, and has thereby lost some of its volatile hydrocarbons. Moreover, it is usual to grind up the bones and other parts of the mummy together, so that the resulting powder has more solidity and is less fusible than the asphalt alone would be. "

~ Arthur H. Church

Artist Martin Drölling even used it to paint the whole art piece "Interior of a Kitchen".

What made this paint special was not only it's transparency, but it's wide ability to create varying skin tones ironically.

It was also very well known for creating warm tints for depicting light and had a certain "glow" that was also unique to the paint.

One of the major downsides of this paint however, similar to asphalt paint and especially because of the literal body fat that was in the paint, the paint would crack and dinge over time. The paint was also terrible unstable and would literally "rust" and "decay" and fade overtime.

1815 Martin Drolling "Interior of a Kitchen"[Public domain], through Wikimedia Commons

Paint Companies would continue to manufacture this paint into the mid 20th century however, artists stopped using this paint in the early parts of the century when they learned of it's macabre ingredients and failure of being archival and long lasting. By this point in time however, other "friendlier" paints with this hue where being manufactured.

The very last batch of mummy brown/Caput Mortuum was produced in the 1960's.

In the October 1964 issue of Times magazine, Geoffrey Roberson-Park, managing director of venerable "London's venerable C. Roberson Color Makers" admitted the company ran out of mummies and could no longer produce genuine Caput Mortuum Paint. He apologized and stated "We may have a few odd limbs lying around somewhere, but not enough to make more paint. We sold our last complete mummy some years ago for, I think, £3. Perhaps we shouldn't have. We certainly can't get any more."".

Caput Mortuum Today

Is this Paint still used today?

The color is still used, however, the method of using bodies to create the pigment as well s the medicine, were ceased in the early -mid 20th century.

The Paint is more commonly known today as "Mars Brown or Mars Violet" due to the use of hematite in the paint. (Hematite is an iron Oxide commonly also found on the planet Mars) Funny enough, Hematite's nickname is "Bloodstone" which brings us to a full circle on this blog.

The Paint is still sometimes referenced as Caput Mortuum in some Brands, like Lukas Paint! (I used to own a tube myself)

Today, "Mummy Brown" is usually created from quartz, kaolin, goethite, and hematite.

See You Soon!

Thank you everyone for reading this blog. Once again, look forward to upcoming art ideas and topics. Make sure to subscribe to stay up to date! You can also take a look at my social media updates on Instagram!