What Dante’s real face looks like

A collage comparing modern and past images of Dante.

The Telegraph

Brazilian computer graphics expert Cicero Moraes together with scientists and artists, he was able to recreate the face of the outstanding Italian poet of the Renaissance Dante Alighierireports The Telegraph.

For more than 700 years, his exact image remained a mystery, because artists created portraits after the poet’s death. A new 3D rendering of his face revealed that Dante had a less pronounced chin and an aquiline nose, but without the downward-pointing tip as previously depicted.

Moraes used a 1921 study of the poet’s skull and combined it with information from a 2007 paper. It turned out that he had a rather large head and an elongated face with large eyes.

A team from the Federal University of Uberlandia in Brazil used a process called “face approximation”. This technology makes a series of projections based on statistical data obtained from tomography and ultrasound analysis and is combined with anatomical deformation. That is, the digitized face of the live model is deformed until it begins to reproduce the desired skull and begins to form a corresponding new face.

“Two sets of images were created, one with an objective approach, in shades of gray, without hair and with eyes closed. The other is already colored and with subjective elements such as eye, skin and clothing color according to the most famous images“, the researcher said.

In addition, studies have shown that the skull of the poet was larger than the skull of the average person of that time. Cicero Moraes also added that Dante had a sad or even embittered face. The reason for this was the expulsion from Florence in 1302.

The most popular images of Dante

Dante Alighieri – Italian poet, known for his “Divine Comedy”. He is also called the father of Italian literature.

Previously, the most famous image of Dante was a portrait made by the Italian artist Sandro Botticelli in 1495. It was his descriptions that used to recreate the face of the poet. In a similar way, he was depicted on one of the frescoes of the Florence Cathedral.

However, according to Cicero Moraes, Botticelli was born near the end of Dante’s life: “However, Boccaccio did not know Dante personally and collected testimonies from people close to the poet and those who lived with him“.