Death masks

A ‘death mask’ is a cast of a person’s head taken soon after death. They were much-studied items in the 19th century when phrenology – deducing personality traits and mental ability from the shape and size of the skull – was a popular sideline of anatomical study. The death mask of an infamous criminal was supposed to be particularly instructive. By studying them, phrenologists thought they could find a physiological basis for criminal tendencies. Although extremely popular in the early 1800s, phrenology was debunked as pseudoscience over the next few decades due to its inconsistencies and lack of evidence. The Harry Brookes Allen Museum holds the death masks of Australian bush rangers Ned Kelly and Dan Morgan, and three other executed criminals from Australia and the United Kingdom.