--- title: Food researcher and biblical scholar analyze ballooning portions in paintings of the Last Supper description: To analyze how portion sizes have changed, not just in the last two decades, but in the last millennium, the director of the Cornell University... canonical: https://time.com/archive/7144787/sizing-up-the-swelling-portions-of-the-last-supper/ author: TIME Staff article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2010-03-25T17:02:47.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-03-19T02:15:16.529Z article:section: Health og:title: Food researcher and biblical scholar analyze ballooning portions in paintings of the Last Supper og:description: To analyze how portion sizes have changed, not just in the last two decades, but in the last millennium, the director of the Cornell University... og:url: https://time.com/archive/7144787/sizing-up-the-swelling-portions-of-the-last-supper/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Food researcher and biblical scholar analyze ballooning portions in paintings of the Last Supper twitter:description: To analyze how portion sizes have changed, not just in the last two decades, but in the last millennium, the director of the Cornell University... twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- * [Health](/section/health/) # Sizing up the swelling portions of the Last Supper > Sponsored content. 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There is no cost and no subscription requirement. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-network-2026q3/newsletters?i=a595e122-eb92-4024-8251-e0216c67c1d5&cr=time-nl-network-2026q3-v1) by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) Mar 25, 2010 5:02 PM UTC by [TIME Staff](https://time.com/author/time-staff/) Mar 25, 2010 5:02 PM UTC  To analyze how portion sizes have changed, not just in the last [two decades](http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16076842/ns/health-diet%5Fand%5Fnutrition/), but in the last millennium, the director of the Cornell University Food and Brand Lab and his brother, a biblical scholar at Virginia Wesleyan College, sized up portion sizes in paintings of the Last Supper over time, according to an [article](http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-last-supper23-2010mar23,0,7531075.story) published earlier this week in the _Los Angeles Times_. In total, Brian Wansink of Cornell, and Craig Wansink of Virginia Wesleyan, analyzed 52 depictions of the Last Supper across a span of 1,000 years. By contrasting the head sizes of Jesus and his apostles with the size of the food portions before them, the Wansink brothers were able to note a clear trend: in the last 1,000 years, portions sizes—and artistic depictions of them—have been steadily growing. more During the time frame studied, the size of the main course portions before Last Supper attendees grew by roughly 70%, and the bread included in the paintings grew by about 23%. And it wasn’t only the food getting bigger, the _L.A. Times_ reports. According to the research, plates themselves grew steadily across the centuries—increasing by nearly 66% during the millennium studied. In the midst of growing global efforts to rein in obesity, our expanding portion sizes have come under frequent scrutiny, yet, the Wansink brothers point out, piling more onto our plates is hardly a recent phenomena. As they wrote in the [_International Journal of Obesity_](http://www.nature.com/ijo/journal/vaop/ncurrent/abs/ijo201037a.html), according to the _L.A. Times_, “”The contemporary discovery of increasing food portions and availability may be little more than 1,000-year-old wine in a new bottle.” Read the full _L.A. Times_ story [here.](http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-last-supper23-2010mar23,0,7531075.story) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/archive/7144787/sizing-up-the-swelling-portions-of-the-last-supper/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/archive/7144787/sizing-up-the-swelling-portions-of-the-last-supper/"},"headline":"Sizing up the swelling portions of the Last Supper","datePublished":"2010-03-25T17:02:47.000Z","dateModified":"2026-03-19T02:15:16.529Z","description":"To analyze how portion sizes have changed, not just in the last two decades, but in the last millennium, the director of the Cornell University...","url":"https://time.com/archive/7144787/sizing-up-the-swelling-portions-of-the-last-supper/","keywords":[],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"TIME Staff","url":"https://time.com/author/time-staff/"}],"articleSection":"Health","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/section/health/","name":"Health"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/archive/7144787/sizing-up-the-swelling-portions-of-the-last-supper/","name":"Sizing up the swelling portions of the Last Supper"}}]}] ```