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Block on rare Napoleon death mask leaving UK

An export ban has been placed on a rare Napoleon Bonaparte “death mask” in the hope that a British buyer can be found for the “macabre” object.

The plaster mask was sold for £175,000 to an overseas buyer earlier this year by a descendant of the brother of its original owner, Reverend Richard Boys. He was a chaplain on the Atlantic island of St Helena in May 1821 when the exiled French emperor died.

Leslie Webster, a member of a government committee which advised Ed Vaizey, the culture minister, about the mask, said it has “a power and immediacy that raises the hairs on the back of the neck”....

Read entire article at The Independent