Craniofacial reconstruction of Raphael Sanzio from Urbino: Face and features of a “mortal god”

Forensic anthropology aims at identifying human remains when the skeleton represents the last recourse for forensic evaluation. Facial reconstruction is a multidisciplinary technique combining anatomical, anthropological, artistic and graphic principles to reconstruct the living appearance based on the morphology of the skull for recognition or identification purposes. The alleged skeletal remains of Raphael Sanzio were recovered in 1833 in the Pantheon in Rome, together with the corpses of some of his disciples. This research, on the five-hundredth anniversary of his death, aims at confirming, through 3D facial reconstruction using a manual computerized technique, that the plaster cast of the cranium engraved following Raphael's exhumation and now stored at the Museum “Casa Natale di Raffaello” in Urbino, definitively belonged to the great artist. Comparison of our reconstruction with Raphael's self-portraits resulted in their total superimposition on the profile of the “divine painter”. When completed, the approximation was also compared with a controversial painting “Portrait of a man”, by Sebastiano del Piombo. This research provides, for the first time, the concrete proof that the skeleton exhumed from the Pantheon in 1833 belongs to Raphael, paving the way for possible future molecular studies for further validating his identity.