Severed: A History of Heads Lost and Heads Found

by Frances Larson

A serious and seriously entertaining exploration of the dark and varied obsessions that the 'civilized West' has had with decapitated heads and skulls, from a rising star of non-fiction writing

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Death, Science, Anthropology, Historical, True Crime

260 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 6, 2014

Reviews

[karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Decapitation is the ultimate tyranny; but it is also an act of creation, because, for all its cruelty, it produces an extraordinarily potent artefact that compels our attention whether we like it or not.

who knew there were so many things to say about human heads?? not human minds, with all their psychological bells and whistles, nooks and crannies, but just… heads. decapitated heads. this book is an academic overview of all the ways in which severed heads have played a part in human history. chapters include: shrunken heads, trophy heads (war), deposed heads (executions/guillotine/war), framed heads - the severed head in (or AS) art, potent heads (relics), bone heads (phrenology - stolen heads/anthropology), dissected heads - (medical school, discomfort), living heads (cryogenics, galvanization).

so many uses for a severed head, y'all!



it's pretty fascinating stuff, and not a subject i ever expected to see, much less read an entire book devoted to, but once you see it, you know you have to read it. i have read that book of short stories, Severance: Stories, which had a fantastic premise that it just didn't live up to, while this book is just straight-up scholarship that doesn't try to be narrative, and yet its subject matter is compelling enough that you don't mind the dryness of its tone, or its occasionally puzzling distinctions:

Decapitation is a contradiction in terms because it is both brutal and effective."

not really sure how that's a contradiction, but decapitation is definitely both of those other things.

the chapter focusing on the guillotine was one of the most interesting ones, particularly in its discussion of how commonplace public beheadings became in france during its heyday, and how that affected the people as it went from being a horrifying cautionary spectacle to an entertaining diversion to just ho-hum, another beheading, pass the bread.

The guillotine had transformed decapitation into a dispassionate procedure that minimized the brutality as much as possible, but taking the drama out of death is a dangerous ideal. The Terror demonstrated well enough that the only thing more horrifying than a severed head is a society that finds it mundane.

when you start finding yourself bored by public executions, there's a real problem there.

some of her conclusions are a little ghoulish

For all their gruesome nature, severed heads are also inspirational: they move people to study, to pray, to joke, to write and to draw, to turn away or to look a little closer, and to reflect on the limits of their humanity.

and "inspirational" seems to be a bridge too far, but it's hard to argue with some of her assertions

Generally, a dry skull made a more attractive, and more manageable, trophy than a rotting human head.

even when she edges into this near-confessional-feeling celebratory tone

Taking a head is an audacious act of supremacy. It turns a person into mute matter. The headless body is leaderless and nondescript; the bodiless head is vacant and impotent.

and

In various walks of life, gruesome decapitations have become part of our cultural fabric, and part of our collective heritage.

Such violent acts can inspire a surprising range of emotions. Feelings like grief, disgust and shame are to be expected, but these negative reactions are often mirrored by a sense of intimacy and wonder. Holding a severed head in your hands, even cutting off another person's head, can be a thrill. Owning somebody else's head can be a fascinating and deeply moving experience. It can be an expression of respect or an act of abuse, or both at once.

but even though that makes you want to edge away from her slowly slowly, there's no denying how cool some of these stories are, especially those in which scientists get a little restless and curious with all the "i wonder what happens when i do this??"

In the mid-twentieth century transplanting anything other than bone, blood vessels or corneas still proved to be a hopeless venture, and Demikhov set out to prove that soft tissues, even the delicate tissues of the brain, could survive transplantation. In each case, Demikhov's team attached the head, shoulders. heart, lungs and forelimbs of one dog onto the neck of another dog. Although most of the two-headed dogs died after a few days, some lived for a few weeks and the experiments were deemed to have been a success. The donor dogs not only remained conscious, they drank water and bit people's fingers.

eek!



In May 1908, in St. Louis, Missouri, Guthrie successfully transplanted a dog's head onto the underside of another dog's throat. He grafted the arteries together so that the blood from one dog flowed through the head of the other. The transplanted heads displayed basic reflexes: the pupils contracted, the nostrils twitched, the tongue moved. Seven hours after the operation complications set in and Guthrie euthanized the dogs.

and i mean, obviously, poor doggies and all, but this still gives me not-unpleasant ripple-chills all over to discover all the shenanigans scientists get up to behind closed labs.

and i am so glad that medicine made substantial advances before my new onset epilepsy turned up and all i had to deal with was boatloads of dilantin

A German physician, Johann Schroeder, recommended pounding up the brains, skin, arteries, nerves, and whole spinal column of a young man who had met a violent end, and steeping the mixture in water and flowers, such as lavender and peony, before distilling it several times for use against epilepsy. Christian IV of Denmark, who died in 1648, was said to have taken powders partly composed of the skulls of criminals as a cure for epilepsy. These remedies were common for centuries, and executioners had to deal with the eager demands of the sick waiting to collect their prescriptions. Even in the 1860's there were reports of Danish 'epileptics stand[ing] around the scaffold in crowds, cup in hand, ready to quaff the red blood as it flows from the still quivering body'.

i would not have waited in line for the opportunity to snort skull dust. not even at a rave.

more on medicine:

In the 1560's some of the traitors' heads from London Bridge were reused as medicinal cups for a group of men working at the Royal Mint who were suffering from arsenic poisoning, the symptoms of which include headaches and lightheadedness. The ailing men drank their medicine out of the cleaned skulls, but many of them died anyway.

that last sentence kills me. the way that expecting skulls to have magical medicinal qualities kills people.

the chapter on the severed head in art was also very enlightening, and i did have a nice little "you go, girl" moment in response to her exploration of salome

By the turn of the twentieth century, Salome had become an intensely sexual character, appearing in musical halls, early films and paintings by artists like Gustav Klimt and Franz Stuck as a half-naked, self-satisfied and defiant temptress bearing her grisly prize. On the eve of the First World War, Salome was viewed as a woman who had more cunning than intellect, and who was empowered by her sexual charms. It is no coincidence that Salome had become a sexual monster in the eyes of many artists at a time when real women were deserting their "proper nature" by seeking education, employment and equal rights in greater numbers that ever before. Salome's prize of a severed head on its silver platter now stood for everything that men might lose in the face of women's emancipation - the head she held so close represented men's leadership, their authority, their intellectual and professional hegemony - while she, as its new mistress, danced on in a state of ecstatic vindication.

and one last long quote from this book, which somehow made me sadder than those dog stories, maybe because i still can't believe those dog stories are real. i mean, i can, but i am pretending it was a movie i saw or something. but this:

Morton's successors at the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia carefully inked numbers onto the forehead of each of the skulls in his collection, along with the place where it was collected, and sometimes the name of the person who collected it. In museums, the identity of the collector often got a higher billing than the identity of the person they had collected. A list of respectable donors emphasized the prestige of the institution in question. It would be a serious error if generous donors were forgotten, but it was inconsequential - perhaps it was even easier - if no one knew the names of the dead people being studied. In contrast, a person's age, sex and place of origin were often written on skulls, because this information was important in considering their demographic value.

makes me a different kind of sad.

anyway, here's a book about severed heads.

enjoy!

come to my blog!

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

The moral of the story is: Quit while you're a head.

[Rowizyx · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mi butto con questa recensione oggi, perché parlando con mio padre mi ha chiesto oggi, un po' titubante, perché e come sono arrivata a leggere un simile volume.

Perché. A parte la veste grafica e il titolo inquietantemente accattivanti, devo ammettere che io sono un'appassionata di storia, e non mi tiro indietro davanti ai suoi aspetti più macabri. Complice anche un piacere un po' puerile, nel vederle, ho recuperato tutte le stagioni delle Horrible Histories, un programma per bambini britannico che racconta per sketch e scenette la storia... e la rubrica Stupid Deaths è una perla del programma <3

Tuttavia, malgrado possa sembrare morboso, grottesco o creepy, questo libro non lo è affatto. Racconta di quanto morbosa, grottesca e creepy sia stata (e per certi versi lo è tuttora) la società occidentale nei confronti delle teste mozzate, decapitate come condanna o meno, ma lo stile è quanto di più rispettoso, serio ed elegante sia possibile concepire su un argomento così macabro. L'autrice ricostruisce storie molto complesse, lasciandosi andare solo raramente all'aneddoto (black humor - quello vero - quasi del tutto assente), e tirando fuori aspetti del tutto inaspettati.

Come i "cacciatori di teste" più esotici, in Sud America o nel Sud Est asiatico, abbiano cominciato la loro attività, trasformando una pratica rituale e spirituale in mero commercio con l'entrata in scena degli occidentali, ad esempio. O come la moda della frenologia abbia reso quasi banale la profanazione di tombe e cadaveri per preservare crani da studiare ed esibire per fare scena. Come la ghigliottina non sia piaciuta in prima battuta alle folle spettatrici delle esecuzioni capitali, perché troppo istantanea e fulminea, incapace di dare quella gratificazione che il popolino cercava... ma anche di dare la certezza della morte, paradossalmente, poiché nessuno "vedeva" il passaggio da vita a morte del condannato.
O come fosse del tutto tollerato che i soldati americani spedissero crani di giapponesi alle famiglie a casa durante la WW2 come trofei, finché la pubblicazione di una foto compromettente su una popolare rivista fece temere gravi rappresaglie sui prigionieri di guerra...

Ammetto che mi aspettavo più aneddoti e storie macabre - anche se l'amico di Haydin che fa profanare la sua tomba per asportargli la testa e quindi pulire il cranio per poterlo esporlo come parte della mobilia... - e forse ciò dimostra che tant'è il fascino nero delle morti violente colpisce in maniera più labile e subdola di quanto non si direbbe. Anna Bolena e Maria Antonietta entrano in scena in maniera discreta e rapidamente e in sordina allo stesso modo se ne vanno, ricordandoci che per due nomi illustri ci sono stati chissà quanti ignoti condannati alla stessa pena.

Un saggio sociale e storico davvero di pregio.

[K.J. Charles]

Overall a really fascinating, readable, UTTERLY HORRIFYING account of the human tendency to cut each other's heads off. Which makes more of a book and a thesis than you might think. Loads of really crunchy detail, studded with fascinating facts and great quotes. Some very gross pictures, which frankly what would you expect. And a very, very interesting lot of cultural analysis involving racism and exploitation. Highly recommended for the less squeamish. (Not kidding: the chapter on Guadalcanal was stomach churning.)

I will, however, say that this book refers on several occasions to 'decapitated heads', and this undermined my faith in it, because if you are writing 250+ pages about decapitation, I would expect you to know the meaning of 'decapitated'. I actually wonder if this was an introduced error by an editor, as there is a cluster of these in one chapter and then it doesn't arise again.

[AdiTurbo · Rating 5 out of 5]

It took me a long time to read this book, but I'm so glad I persevered. It was so worth it. The title doesn't do this book justice. It is so much richer than just a history. It looks at all of the aspects of severing a human head - the social, cultural, psychological, political, and more and more. It is rich with fascinating insights and facts about heads as a physical and cognitive concept in our culture throughout history, and in other cultures. It misses nothing in exploring all of the circumstances in which heads are separated from bodies. It isn't an easy subject matter and I had to take it in small gulps, which is why it took me so long to read it. But it's one of the most compelling and informative non-fiction books I've read in a few years.

[RKanimalkingdom · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book started off so well! Who wouldn't want to read a book about heads that had been cut off? It had an amazing start going from the infamous shrunken heads to the horrors of bone collecting in WWII to the invention of the guillotine to how we as humans generally reacted to such an event. These chapters were gory but informative and Larson did a really good job in presenting a very well thought out and detailed history of the topic at hand. You could tell she was very meticulous about not being biased and the details she provided were not only interesting to learn but shocking at times. Within these first chapters, I was really drawn into the book. It surprising at how accepted the notion of head hacking is in many cultures. It was also fascinating to learn about how heads were persevered in order to be held up for all to see.

What was surprising to learn was how barbaric the history was. As Larson put it, what was initially just a cultural concept became a dark and bloody business due to foreign investment and interest. The issue only propagates when taken to war where the consequences of military training, propaganda, and racism come to play with guns in their hands. We all know the dark stories of WWII and this book just brought it to a whole new level.

However, there were problems with this book. The first, was that it didn't seem to have an aim. I didn't know if we were going to be told infamous cases or look more into why humans cut off heads. Neither were really discussed so much as were human heads were used and the moralities of that. The second issue, was the (to be frank) dullness that is the second half of this book. It completely went in some other direction and bored me to tears. We went from the history of heads to the affect it had on art and trust me when I say it was more boring than it sounds. Finally, and this was the issue that annoyed me the most. She only discusses Europe. The act of cutting off a person's head is so universal that's it's honestly captivating in its own weird way. Despite being so different from one another, we all seem to be okay with head hacking. xD Yet, we never went into detail on any of that!

[Justin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This review was written for Historical Novel Review.

Housing four of the five senses, our brain, and the body’s most elaborate set of muscles, the head naturally ranks as preeminent among our many body parts. It’s no surprise, therefore, that it should have an exceptional impact on human history and psychology. It is this history that anthropologist Frances Larson explores. She focuses on the severed head’s history in the West, with chapters dedicated to 18th- and 19th-century headhunting (by Western procurers), the venerated heads of saints, heads as trophies, the heads of decapitated politicians, and grave robbing by medical students among many others.

Though this book often makes for grisly reading, it is amazingly thought-provoking and never macabre. What could have devolved into freak show is instead elevated to an honest and tremendously insightful study into the severed human head’s history. I had never considered how the boom in head collecting among Western buyers during the 19th century led to a supply problem that could only be met one of two ways: grave robbing and murder. It is insights such as these that make this book highly recommended—for those who aren’t squeamish (there are a lot of pictures…).

[Grumpus · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is about the history and science of human heads and it is not as much of a squeamish read as I would have anticipated. It covers the history of everything from head hunters, to skull collectors, to the scientific study of the human head, to phrenology.

My feeble effort to describe this book is to think Mary Roach and provide the following quote from the book,

"Although they are often horrific and distressing, and embody great personal injustice, severed heads demand our attention in complicated and conflicting ways. Both familiar and other-worldly, they remind us of our own fragility. They draw us in to peer inside ourselves, and invite us to survey the limits of our humanity. We may not like what we see, but that in itself is no reason to turn away."

[Nunzia Adelaide Cozzuto · Rating 3 out of 5]

Opera molto interessante, di valore antropologico e sociale, va letta con uno spirito prettamente scientifico, non come una raccolta di aneddoti su "teste famose". Ne ho tratto tantissime informazioni, e fatto analizzare contesti e situazioni di cui non ero assolutamente a conoscenza. Unica pecca, nella stesura del capitolo, alle volte viene riproposto sempre lo stesso pensiero, anche se analizzato magari qualche pagina prima. Diciamo bello, ma non da "perderci la testa"😆

[Tintaglia · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5
Sarò inquietante, ma ho trovato diverse parti di questo saggio noiose.
E sì, ho ben presente che parla di teste mozzate.
Ma da una parte l’autrice si ripete spesso, dall’altra di lancia in affermazioni che non sono altro che sue interpretazioni, non necessariamente convincenti.
Rimangono comunque degli spunti di riflessione dal punto di vista storico e antropologico, e alcuni capitoli francamente inquietanti.

[Paul Perry · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a book on the social history of decapitation, which is rather more widespread than you might imagine. Starting with a rundown of the indignities heaped on the (severed) head of Oliver Cromwell after his death - kept on a spike for years, stolen, traded and passed around - Larson then goes on to cover various aspects of the way Western society has viewed the act of decollation and the resultant cranium.

And this is about how the Western (largely European and American) culture has both informed the view of the practices and, indeed, affected it. We start with a chapter on the vogue for early anthropologists and collectors to seek out those 'savage' tribesmen who took severed heads as part of their culture, in South America and New Guinea among other places, and how the act of seeking out and collecting these 'cultural artefacts' completely changes the behaviour of the people concerned, almost entirely for the more murderous; the Shuar tribe of Peru, who collected a small number of heads and shrunk them as part of rituals to obtain the glory of that individual massively increased production when offered valuable trade goods by European anthropologists, as did the Maori in New Zealand and others in New Guinea - although many more also referred to these strange white men as 'headhunters' due to their habit of going around asking the locals if they could procure severed heads. Subsequently, a good proportion of those shrunken and tattooed heads in various museum collections, rather than being those of 'native warriors' are those of innocent people, creations made purely for the procurement of incredibly valuable trade goods. Larson continues the chapter tracing the changing attitude toward these collections.

Each subsequent chapter follows a similar pattern, taking a specific aspect of the topic from its inception through its history to the most up-to-date perspective - the guillotine, trophy heads (largely in the Pacific Theatre in WWII), art and medicine - often referring back to previous entries (often done subtly but occasionally with clumsy repetition), the author weaves together stories that are interesting in themselves on a theme that opens up some thought-provoking avenues. I guarantee that some of the ideas - as well as some of the images - will stay with me long after the final page.

[paper0r0ss0 · Rating 3 out of 5]

Poche cose come l'infliggere dolore e morte al proprio simile hanno scatenato la fantasia umana. La sadica panoplia di metodi tortura e uccisione e' li' a dimostrarlo nel corso della Storia. Tutto cio', se possibile, si potenzia geometricamente quando si ha a che fare con la testa, la parte del corpo che e' sineddoche per eccellenza del corpo tutto, dell'essere umano in quanto tale, titolare a ben vedere dell'umanita' stessa. Lo staccare la testa dal corpo ha sempre avuto quindi implicazioni enormi su molti piani differenti. Questo saggio ha il merito di affrontare la questione con un approccio interessato e curioso, mai inutilmente morboso ma non pienamente soddisfacente. A parte il focus quasi totalmente anglosassone, c'e' qualcosa che non torna nel modo di scrivere e organizzare i dati, per cui alla fine la noia prevale anche sul disgusto e la repulsione. Un'occasione in gran parte persa.

[Claudia Vannucci · Rating 3 out of 5]

Un saggio leggero e divertente per il filone "divertiamoci con la storia della medicina".
In pratica è una collezione di aneddoti, personaggi e storie strane ma vere che coinvolgono teste mozze. Decapitazioni, crani, cervelli. Tecniche per mozzare, strategie per conservare, usi scientifici e collezionismo. Scienziati, ladri di cadaveri, fanatici e altri tipi strani.
Alle lunghe però risulta un collage di tanta, troppa roba, e tende a ripetersi.
Poco prima ho letto "Stecchiti" di Mary Roach e mi è piaciuto tanto; una buona metà delle informazioni contenute in "Teste Mozze" si trovano anche in "Stecchiti", dove però sono state approfondite e raccontate meglio. Purtroppo Teste Mozze non regge il confronto.

[Ruby Atkin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pulled my neck mid-way through reading this for the immersive experience (banger - loved it)

[Ellie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Like many books on a niche subject, Severed explores heads from different angles, using history, culture and science. It’s split into fairly long chapters on Shrunken Heads, Trophy Heads (war), Deposed Heads (execution), Framed Heads (art), Potent Heads (religion), Bone Heads (skulls), Dissected Heads (medical) and Living Heads. It seems there’s a long-standing fascination with the human head once it’s been removed from the body.

Obviously it covers the well-known guillotine and the French obsession with it during the revolution. It’s worrying to think it was created to reduce the spectacle; an efficient machine to remove head but to reduce the gore and horror that could be seen, and revelled in, by the crowds. I didn’t know that Madame Tussaud was an actual person and her original wax museum was filled with portraits cast from heads fresh from the guillotine.

It does serve as a reminder of the awfulness of Europeans throughout history (and I’m including those who colonised America in this, they weren't innocent either). From creating an artificial demand for shrunken heads, so much so that people (or sloths!) were killed to order, to the degrading way bodies of the poor were treated, this is a side of history many would like to forget.

We hear a lot about the Victorian obsession with classification of the natural world but not that it extended to the human race as well. Thousands of skulls were collected and studied in an aim to work out what made some people better than others. To classify races and keep a record of indigenous peoples practically wiped out by the rabid colonisation of the world.

I found the most uncomfortable reading was that surrounding the experimentation on recently guillotined heads to see if they were still alive in there. There’s something really unsettling about this, and if it were true, what horrible tortures were committed during the period.

On a more positive note, it redresses some of the bad rep of medical students, showing a huge amount of respect, and even tenderness, for their cadavers. There are no tales of pranks, but shows how people come to terms with cutting up a human being, how it’s not always an easy thing to live with, even if the end goal is something worthy.

It’s a grisly but fascinating look at human history, I was probably less engaged in the parts about saints and the severed head in art. Not to say there weren’t interesting bits but I felt these chapters were too long for the material contained. There’s a fair bit of repetition across the chapters and the final one, “Living Heads” seemed to be a bit of a mish-mash of some areas already covered as well as a little bit on cryogenics and scientific experimentation.

[Ape · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love it when someone goes at history at a really odd and niche angle. What about severed heads in history? What do they mean culturally? Ethically? What why how? There's a lot more to this book than I had first assumed. I learned all kinds of random things - perhaps some is my own personal ignorance in the first place, but it has given me a fresh perspective on a lot of things and things to think about.

Severed heads. Ok, what is this going to be about? Horror films and gratuitous gore? Not really... consider the various chapters and introductions.... the several centuries of Oliver Cromwell's preserved head and where he has ended up and what people thought of it (ie his head). Shrunken heads and ritualistically preserved heads (interestingly, as you'll find out if you read this, it says more about Westerners than it does about S Americans and South Pacific islanders). World War Two in the South Pacific and the Americans and their head hunting of the Japanese. Heads of executions. Heads in art. Religious (Christianity - saints and all that) heads. Medicial disection, research and experimentation of... yep, you've got it, heads.

You may think this is too shocking to read, or for ghouls only, but as the medical students mentioned in this book, when you get into it, you will be surprised by what you can do and what soon feels like normality.

[Fishface · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was often very interesting, a discussion of some of the ways severed heads resonate in our own heads, and what we use them for, think of them, believe about them, and so forth. This book could have gone a lot farther, in my opinion, but it was a good read overall. I confess I cringed every time I saw the odious phrase "decapitated head," as if it were possible to cut the head off someone's head. Subject-verb agreement was also sorely lacking. But I was enchanted to learn for the first time that all the head-collecting in the Pacific Theater of WWII was not echoed in the European Theater, and the stories about the heads of guillotined criminals flushing with anger, flinching and snapping their jaws were nothing if not intriguing. Still, it would have been nice to see a single mention of Dr. Carl Hill, or the odd staying power of the rumor that Walt Disney's head is among those stored in one of those cryogenic deep-freeze facilities...

[Zach Anderson · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF @ 60%. I struggled with finishing this versus giving it up. The main reason why I struggled with it was its interesting premise contrasted with its long-winded, tedious content. On one hand this book is indeed about severed heads and their appropriate cultural and contextual history. But I thought it would be more about *specific* severed heads (i.e. "this chapter is about Daniel Boone's head being buried in one state and the rest of his body being buried in another"). Instead, the book reads like a more academic approach the subject of severed heads. Chapters focus on specific types of severed heads, for example, heads gathered from victories in war, or heads painted by artists. What sounds at first like a novelty and gruesome book, ends up being a much too meticulous for my liking College Style broaching of the subject.

[Emma · Rating 4 out of 5]

CHARMING. For, like, one of the most morbid books I've ever read, and I read a lot of morbid material. I could have read twice as much content as is in here, which is why it loses a star, but quite well done. Read it in tandem with Robert Olen Butler's 'Severed'.

[Baylee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Puoi trovare questa recensione anche sul mio blog, La siepe di more

Ci stiamo avvicinando a Halloween e quale modo migliore per festeggiarlo se non leggendo un libro sulle teste mozze? Sono certa che in questi giorni troverete ottimi consigli di lettura se volete leggervi letteratura horror, ma è davvero raro veder consigliata della saggistica in tema. Quindi, eccomi qua a scrivervi di Teste mozze.

Quando l’ho visto sul catalogo di UTET ho deciso che doveva essere mio, perché – dai – come diavolo si fa a resistere a un titolo così intrigante? Un libro sulle teste mozze – che cavolo ci sarà mai da dire sulle teste mozze!? E invece, il racconto di come gli esseri umani si sono rapportati alle teste mozze nel corso della storia ci permette di svelare degli insospettabili retroscena.

Per esempio, durante il colonialismo, non era inconsueto trovare signori europei disgustati dalla pratica di alcuni popoli di decapitare i nemici e di rimpicciolirne la testa. Eppure, questa pratica ebbe un impennata proprio per la smania di collezionare queste teste rimpicciolite da parte di quegli stessi azzimati signori – facendo sì che l’usanza si svincolasse dal suo significato rituale. Oppure, la storia della nascita della frenologia, alla base della moderna neuroscienza, che ci racconta del desiderio degli esseri umani di capire, con poche semplici misurazioni, le caratteristiche dei propri simili, per catalogarli in maniera incontrovertibile. Sfociata ben presto nella ricerca delle differenze tra le “razze” umane, gli scienziati rimasero fin da subito frustrati dalla vanità della ricerca – pure le teste mozze rifiutavano con pervicacia di essere divise in “razze”.

Le teste delle persone riuscivano sempre a mettere in dubbio in modo irritante le idee prevalenti riguardo alle gerarchie razziali.
[…]
La razza si definisce in base alla nazione, alla regione, al paese, al sistema di credenze? Alla fine da qualche parte dovrai pur tracciare un confine, ma troverai sempre individui “simili” tra loro al di qua e al di là della linea.

Larson è molto brava, nonostante l’argomento si presti al grottesco, a mantenere uno stile sobrio e rigoroso, con giusto quella punta di ironia necessaria a rendere Teste mozze un libro estremamente interessante e godibile.

Noi diamo per scontato che il disgusto per queste brutali cerimonie di morte [decapitazioni] sia naturale e istintivo, ma non lo è. Anzi, non soltanto le esecuzioni pubbliche non erano poi così sconvolgenti per gli spettatori del medioevo, ma non turbavano granché nemmeno quelli del XVIII, XIX e persino XX secolo. A distinguerci, nel XXI secolo, è proprio l’empatia con la sofferenza del prossimo, nel quale ci identifichiamo con forza: ma è una differenza forse molto meno netta e salda di quanto vorremmo.

[Alex (Spells & Spaceships) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Incredibly interesting and well researched book! I had no idea just how in depth and in so many different contexts I could learn about the human head.

The first half of the book was a real page turner, whereas the second half in places was a little slower. In being more comprehensive and covering all bases, I feel like at times in the second half it meant the traction was lost a little bit as parts felt slower to me - for example you go from headhunting tribes, trophy hunting in WW2, executions in the middle ages and an in depth look at the French Revolution towards art and medical study. For some, of course these sections might still be the highlight but I did feel for many it will be a change of pace.

Every chapter though is well researched, considered and thought provoking. We aren't just told stories and interesting factoids as you might expect, there is a thorough examination of the impact heads had on society, culture, of politics, philosophy, media, basically everything. Through the author's examination of human attitudes we are able to get a better idea of who we are as a species, as a society and whether that's ever really changed - have we just become more civilised on the surface?

Reading this will probably surprise you as it will be incredibly thought provoking and deeper than you'd imagine. If you want to know about the human head, you don't necessarily need a morbid curiosity in the macabre - there is plenty here to interest most people and to learn about people as much as learning about heads. It has academic merits but is perfectly accessible to all (so long as you're old enough/mature enough to deal with the themes - probably would only recommend this to adults or mature teenagers).

It's not a delightful book that will help you get to sleep - it can be deeply uncomfortable and even put you on edge but it's enlightening, interesting and eye opening. One you should definitely read once.

[Chloe · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this exploration of various topics related to severed heads! Larson touches upon heads as objects that have been removed from their cultural context and displayed in museums, heads as Christian relics, heads in the context of medical dissections, decapitation as a method of execution, phrenology, the search for proof of consciousness post-decapitation, heads as war trophies, and more! There is a ton that's covered in this book, but Larson keeps it moving, so that the book never gets bogged down in any one section. I'd recommend this to any of my friends who have a streak of morbid curiosity in them.

[Ben · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book. Reminded me of some of Caitlin Doughty subject matter and (slightly) the writing.

Morbid.
But fascinating book.

Could have dealt with less history, and more "head facts" (Vsauce reference).

Still, it was fun! Eye-opening!

I had a look at some of the preserved heads on display (via Google search) - terrifying in my opinion. But they apparently is very sacred.

Heads will roll!

I'll close the guillotine on this review!

3.4/5

[Cora · Rating 2 out of 5]

Couldn't finish this one.

[Rana Adham · Rating 5 out of 5]

I wonder why this book is not a bestseller. The amount of research that went into this must have been flabbergasting.

[Aubrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

A little dry at times, but, overall, a very interesting exploration of the liminal nature of decapitated heads and the roles they have played (and still play) in culture, religion, art, science, and history.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I took a a couple big breaks while reading this book. It had a hard time holding my attention towards the middle.

I liked the chapters regarding soldiers keeping human “trinkets” and the last chapters about dissection and medical experiments were good.

[G. Lawrence · Rating 5 out of 5]

Much like the heads it deals with, this book is grisly, at times horrifying, and frequently compelling. An interesting book, thoughtful and raises a number of questions to challenge cultural assumptions and ideas. Frequently an uncomfortable read, and I think it is important for that exact reason. Recommended.

[Jerrod · Rating 2 out of 5]

Two sentence review: This book really just didn't grab my attention;I quit about halfway through. Full of equivocation and uses an inconsistently applied judgmental tone.

The first couple of chapters were essentially of the form: 18th and 19th century Europeans thought X about indigenous peoples of some Pacific Islands or South America; those Europeans were wrong and hypocritical and lacked any kind of self-reflection; I must heap scorn on them. I don't mind calling out archaic views of peoples of the past if they are inconsistent (heck... sometimes when they are consistent) with some of their other views or actions, but Larson seems to have a special (and non-circumspect) animosity towards those colonial powers of old that can only be born from a formal study in contemporary anthropology. She notes that once Europeans began to buy shrunken heads, the head hunting raids increased (a nice economics lesson there). She fairly points out hypocrisy of calling head hunters savage while also participating in the market for shrunken heads, but she elides over the savagery of head hunting by arguing that heads were not taken as spoils of war but were, instead, taken on special head hunting raids. I'm not quite sure what to think about this framing... it seems, at best, a bit obtuse. If you want to point out the inherent savagery of buying shrunken heads (and heap scorn on those who did), it seems only fair to point out the more despicable action of actually taking the heads (either reserve judgment or judge equally).

The next one or two chapters were on soldiers taking heads and other body parts during war. Here she has a more disinterested tone that would have served the first chapters well. She focuses on the Pacific Theater during WW2. I can't tell how widespread the practice of taking body parts was because she constantly waffles between evidence that fellow soldiers thought those who took body parts were disgusting and abhorrent and statements trying to suggests that this kind of behavior was not common but not incredibly rare. Given the more than occasional equivocation, I would suspect Larson is trying to make the practice seem more common than it was. She does provide nice insight into how these practices did help soldiers cope with the horrors of war. And while the indigenous islanders make an appearance in this section, they are given special consideration in how she writes about them. She notes the shock of an Australian officer when one of the islanders brings him the head of a Japanese soldier and how the islanders earned a reputation for taking heads. She then suggests that this behavior was encouraged because the islanders were provided weapons by the Allied forces, but in less than a page or two, she informs the reader that the islanders mostly used their own weapons because they would have required too much training to learn how to use the guns they were given.

Exploring the topic of disgust by using the history of heads (and other severed body parts) is what I was expecting. Larson did not secure my trust in her ability to accurately portray that story.

[Justine Olawsky · Rating 4 out of 5]

C'mon, admit it: just looking at the title of this book, you are intrigued. What is it about decapitation that immediately catches the eye, quivers the lips, twitches the nose, makes us gulp with revulsion? Could it be that we just want to use our heads when contemplating their potential removal? There is a reason that militant, extremist Islamists behead their victims on camera: it compels a visceral reaction of disgust, horror, and fascination in the viewer like no other form of execution can. The head removed from its body, whether held up in triumph in the midst of war or cleaned and dried to a luminous, white skull, is the ultimate reminder of our frailty and human mortality.

Ms. Larson does a good job of laying bare every facet of decapitation, from the shrunken heads of South America to war souvenirs to general Western execution to the efficient guillotine of the French Revolution to the power of the severed head in art. Most compelling to me, though, was the next to last chapter entitled, "Living Heads", which starts with the fascinating question of exactly how long a head retains some semblance of consciousness after being separated from its body and the lengths that scientists have gone to through the years to determine that and ends with a look at modern attempts at head transplants and the potential physiological and ethical ramifications of successful cryogenic neurosuspension. Wow.

Morbid, but riveting.