AN ancient murder mystery may be about to be solved by scientists planning to x-ray a mummy's head.

The disembodied human head, which dates back thousands of years, is to be scanned at Newcastle's Royal Victoria Infirmary.

Investigators hope to discover how the owner of the head met his grisly end.

The scan is part of ongoing research into the Eygyptian collection at the city's Hancock Museum.

Initial research raised questions as to how the unfortunate Egyptian died after it was found that part of the neck had been displaced.

Radiographs of the mummy, named Kephren, were shown to a team of forensic experts, who concluded he was garrotted.

Gillian Scott, a palaeopathology student at Durham University, is heading up the research as curatorial assistant of Egyptology, at the museum.

She said: "The aim of this research is to clarify the findings of work undertaken during the early 1990s, but also to further investigate any similarities and anomalies between the heads.

"By looking at the cranial measurements of a head and comparing them to research of a known population we hope to be able to discover the subject's potential origin.

"All of the heads are thought to be male and are in various states of mummification.

"We hope to be able to discover more detailed information about the heads to increase our knowledge of the museum's collections.

"This data will then be recorded and made available to anyone wishing to study these heads in the future."

It is one of four Egyptian heads which form part of the Hancock Museum's collection of ancient Egyptian artefacts, which will feature in an exhibition at the museum called Egypt Revealed: Life and Death in Ancient Egypt.

It opens on Saturday, July 30, and tells the real stories of ordinary and royal Egyptians, from their astonishing funerary practices to their mysterious hieroglyphs.