“The future of some of Oxford’s most popular artefacts – the shrunken heads at the Pitt Rivers Museum – could be in doubt,” writes the Oxford Mail. The museum curator’s Laura Peers has begun a review of the heads, questioning the ethics of keeping and displaying them. She says, “I personally would like to know more what the communities in Ecuador and Peru feel. Philip Pullman has weighed in on the argument, saying that “I think the shrunken heads should stay”.

“The value of the shrunken heads is that they are real – you could replace them with plastic models but that would not be the same. It would be very hard to find the living relatives. I can understand the complexity of feeling about this, and we could be on the cusp of a cultural change regarding this kind of exhibit. The great value of the Pitt Rivers is the higgledy-piggledy nature of the displays, which itself is a window into the past, and the shrunken heads are part of that.” Read more.

The Pitt Rivers museum is featured in The Subtle Knife – it’s where Lyra examines the trepanned heads and meets Lord Boreal. On display at the museum in our Oxford are also the Samoyed furs and sledge Lyra recognises, plus several examples of circular Chinese artefacts that resemble the alethiometer.