Winifred Mabel Brunton ''née Newberry'' (6 May 1880 – 29 January 1959) was a South African painter, illustrator and

Egyptologist Egyptology (from ''Egypt'' and Greek , '' -logia''; ar, علم المصريات) is the study of ancient Egyptian history, language, literature, religion, architecture and art from the 5th millennium BC until the end of its native religious ...

Early years

Brunton was born in 1880 in the

Orange Free State The Orange Free State ( nl, Oranje Vrijstaat; af, Oranje-Vrystaat;) was an independent Boer sovereign republic under British suzerainty in Southern Africa during the second half of the 19th century, which ceased to exist after it was defeat ...

South Africa. Her father, Charles Newberry, a millionaire who made his money in Kimberly, was the builder of

Prynnsberg Estate Prynnsberg was a manor built between 1881 and 1884 in Clocolan, Free State, South Africa, by Charles Newberry (1841–1922) who immigrated to South Africa in 1864 as a carpenter to join his older brother John, mining in Greytown, KwaZulu-Natal, ...

. Her mother Elizabeth was the daughter of a missionary to

Moshoeshoe I Moshoeshoe I () ( – 11 March 1870) was the first king of Lesotho. He was the first son of Mokhachane, a minor chief of the Bamokoteli lineage, a branch of the Koena (crocodile) clan. In his youth, he helped his father gain power over som ...

and was herself intensely artistic. Winifred was presented at court in 1898 in London when she presumably met Guy Brunton, an Egyptologist who later became her husband.

Later years

They built the house in Berea, in Johannesburg, in 1906, the same year they were married. She became best known for her portraits of

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...

ian

pharaoh Pharaoh (, ; Egyptian: ''pr ꜥꜣ''; cop, , Pǝrro; Biblical Hebrew: ''Parʿō'') is the vernacular term often used by modern authors for the kings of ancient Egypt who ruled as monarchs from the First Dynasty (c. 3150 BC) until the an ...

s, published as ''Kings and Queens of Ancient Egypt'' (1926) and ''Great Ones of Ancient Egypt'' (1929). She married Egyptologist

Guy Brunton Guy Brunton (1878 in London, England – 17 October 1948 in White River, Mpumalanga, South Africa) was an English archaeologist and Egyptologist who discovered the Badarian predynastic culture. He married Winifred Newberry on 28 April 1906. ...

on 28 April 1906 and together they studied at University College London, during which time she painted a portrait of

Flinders Petrie Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie ( – ), commonly known as simply Flinders Petrie, was a British Egyptologist and a pioneer of systematic methodology in archaeology and the preservation of artefacts. He held the first chair of Egypt ...

in 1912, which is now in the collection o
UCL Art Collection
At UCL they trained with

Margaret Murray Margaret Alice Murray (13 July 1863 – 13 November 1963) was an Anglo-Indian Egyptologist, archaeologist, anthropologist, historian, and folklorist. The first woman to be appointed as a lecturer in archaeology in the United Kingdom, she work ...

, before travelling to

Lahun El Lahun ( ar, اللاهون ''El Lāhūn,'' alt. Illahun, Lahun, or Kahun (the latter being a neologism coined by archaeologist William Matthew Flinders Petrie) is a workmen's village in Faiyum, Egypt. El Lahun is associated with the Pyramid o ...

in Egypt to join Flinders Petrie for fieldwork in 1912–14. Working with her husband on the archaeological digs, she studied the evidence of the various painting, sculptures and even the mummies to develop her final portraits. Guy and Winifred both continued to contribute to excavations organised by

's British School of Archaeology in Egypt in the 1920s at sites like Badari,Brunton, G. and Caton-Thompson, G. 1928. The Badarian Civilisation. London: British School of Archaeology in Egypt. with Winifred drawing many of the objects discovered. Brunton died, aged 78, in

Clocolan Clocolan, established in 1906, is a small town in the Free State (South African province), Free State Province of South Africa. The Basotho called the place Hlohlolwane (Hlohla-o-lwane, "get up and fight"). New inhabitants mispronounced the name a ...

, Free State,

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

Popular culture

Her portraits have been hugely influential and defined the faces of the Pharaohs and the Queens in Popular culture and have been adopted in many films and documentaries.

Publications

1926. ''Kings and Queens of Ancient Egypt. Portraits by Winifred Brunton. History by Eminent Egyptologists''. London. 1929. ''Great Ones of Ancient Egypt. Portraits by Winifred Brunton. Historical Studies by various Egyptologists''

References

External links

Egypt: The Artwork of Winifred Brunton
{{DEFAULTSORT:Brunton, Winifred 1880 births 1959 deaths 19th-century English painters 20th-century English painters 20th-century English women artists 19th-century English women artists Alumni of University College London British expatriates in South Africa English women painters English Egyptologists English archaeologists British women archaeologists British women historians