Death mask of Oliver Cromwell

This is a plaster death mask of Oliver Cromwell. The engraver Thomas Simon took a wax impression of Cromwell’s face off his corpse, the original for which may be that owned by the British Museum. This plaster mask is taken from the wax original, and is one of around 20 such masks to survive. A curiosity with these early masks is that Cromwell’s wart is missing from his forehead. Whether it had dropped off before his death or simply didn’t appear on the cast for some reason is unclear.

Many death masks of Cromwell that survive are in fact 19th century copies. Many of these were produced as souvenirs in the Victorian period when Cromwell was revered by many people. As they didn’t feel that the original looked enough like him, the missing wart was replaced by the manufacturers; the masks can be dated by where the wart is located as different makers put it in different places!