A sandstone Celtic head circa 2nd century AD | 約公元二世紀 砂岩石雕凱爾特頭像

A Cambridge private collection.
Finch and Co., London, 2018.
劍橋私人收藏
Finch and Co，倫敦，2018年

Sages, Saints & Satyrs, Catalogue No. 31, Finch and Co., London, 2018, cat. no. 32.
《Sages, Saints & Satyrs, Catalogue No. 31》，Finch and Co，倫敦，2018年，編號32

The cult of the head was a widespread practice in Celtic Britain, in which the Celts would carve austere stone heads as surrogates for decapitated human heads that had been lost in battle. The Celtics held a deep reverence for the head, as they regarded it as the vassal of the soul that had strong protective power against evil spirits, as well as a symbol of power that served as a source of supernatural wisdom. The Celtic emphasis on the head was later carried over to the Christian belief in the head as the locus of the soul, and hence their preservation of the heads of saints as sacred relics.