Reserve heads

Reserve heads (also known as "Magical heads" or "Replacement heads", the latter term derived from the original German term "Ersatzköpfe") are distinctive sculptures made primarily of fine limestone that have been found in a number of non-royal tombs of the Fourth dynasty of Egypt; primarily from the reigns of pyramid-building pharaohs Khufu to Khafre, circa 2551-2496 B.C. While each of the heads share characteristics in common with each other (and some examples may be more caricature than reflecting a true-life appearance), the striking individuality of the pieces makes them some of the earliest examples of portrait sculpture in existence. Their purpose is not entirely clear; the name comes from the prevalent theory first put forward, in 1903, by the German Egyptologist Ludwig Borchardt that the head was to serve as an alternate home for the spirit of the dead owner should anything happen to its body.

What surprised the archeologists was the highly individual nature of these life-sized depictions, whose individual character has been compared to portrait heads of classic and modern times. For private works, Ancient Egyptian sculptors tended to capture an idealized version of a face, often eliminating individual traits in a way that, as one writer put it: "approached architectural impersonality". In contrast the reserve heads seem to depict unique individuals, with one early researcher ascribing family relationships between the reserve heads he found. With few exceptions they are of high artistic quality, and were very probably the product of the royal workshops.

The majority of the heads were made of a fine, white limestone, while a couple of examples have been found that were made of ground mud from the banks of the Nile. Although there are a few exceptions that are more crudely carved and heavily plastered, most are intricately carved and have been carefully smoothed. The smooth ones have not, however, been polished. They all depict people with shaved heads or close-cropped hair, and the largest examples are just over 30 cm (12 in) in height.

Almost all of the heads show some form of damage or mutilation that may or may not have been deliberately inflicted upon them before they were placed in the tomb. One of the most common features is for their ears to be broken off or seemingly chiseled away At least one scholar disputes that the damage to the ears was deliberate, pointing out cases where detached ears have been found in perfect condition, and that the damage may be due more to rough handling by tomb robbers. Of the many reserve heads only one has wholly intact ears; in others they have been scraped off close to the surface, whereas other or more crudely hacked or broken away. One example contained dowel holes for the attachment of external ears which were not found with the head, and another, smaller group of reserve heads were not made with any ears at all.

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