A New Zealand professor says that Maori are talking about the possible revival of the ancient practice of preserving tattooed heads.

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He says some artists have been experimenting with using the technique on the heads of piglets.

The debate was given fresh momentum this week after France returned 20 preserved Maori heads and sets of remains, some 200 years after they were taken from their homeland.

The tattooed heads and bones of the twenty Maori, collected from nine universities and a museum in France, were given a send-off in Paris this week and a heartfelt welcome home at Wellington's Te Papa museum.

Professor Pou Temara chairs the museum's repatriation group, which has fought for five years for the return of the 20 tattooed heads - known in Maori as toi moko.

He says although 130 toi moko have been returned to New Zealand, an estimated 500 are still at large - most likely in private collections in the United States and Europe.

They wound up there via early European traders, settlers and whalers who sought the heads as curios.

Maori quickly saw a business opportunity and traded toi moko for muskets. They would not trade heads from their own tribe, however, because they were revered.

Instead, tribes mounted raids on their neighbours to kill people and seize their heads for trade.

"[They were] usually chiefs but Maori people quickly caught on that it wasn't fashionable then to be tattooed," Professor Temara said.

"There's a great revival in tattooing the faces of men in Aotearoa in New Zealand, but they are not nearly as good as the designs on the tattooed heads.

"So because of that, artists wonder about how Maoris were able to achieve that very high level of artistic ability and how they were able to preserve that art by way of preserving the heads."

Professor Temara says there are "cup-of-tea discussions" in Maori circles about whether the practice of preserving heads should be reintroduced.

He says some artists are already experimenting with piglets.

"They shave them, then apply the tattoo, and then preserve the piglets," he said.

But given today's laws, Professor Temara believes 21st century head tattoos will probably remain a living artwork and will not be preserved for posterity.