They Kept Human Heads as Trophies
The Maori people weren’t just cannibals. They also kept human heads on stakes driven into the ground, and kept them as trophies of their conquests. During the Musket Wars, various tribes were killing one another and eating the bodies of their enemies to absorb their spirits. Instead of eating the heads, they began to keep them, so they could look at the faces of the enemies who they conquered for eternity. This was considered to be one of the biggest insults to an enemy. The heads were called the “Mokomokai“. The brains and eyes were removed, mouths and eyes were sealed shut, and the skin was steamed or boiled to prevent it from rotting.
To make matters worse, some English explorers saw the Mokomokai and thought they were fascinating. This was especially true for a man named Major General Horatio Gordon Robley. He was an artist, and he was fascinating in drawing the tattoo designs that were on Maori people’s faces. He loved the fact that with a severed head, he could take as much time as he wanted to sketch those tattoo designs. (Yes, this is exactly as morbid as it sounds.) He wanted some of these heads for himself, so he was willing to trade one gun for one head.
This was exciting for the Maori people who were eager to get more firepower, and it lead to even more killings with the sole purpose of beheading and making more of these preserved heads. Between the years 1820 and 1831, there was a high demand from Europeans both in New Zealand and overseas who wanted to buy these “Mokomokai”. After a while, though, they became so common, that the market was oversaturated, and they stopped trying to buy them from the Maori. This actually contributed to the ending of the Musket Wars, as well. While these heads can be found in private antique collections all over the world, General Horatio Gordon Robley’s massive head collection was purchased by the Natural History Museum and New York City.