Horsemaning

[1] The practice derives its name from the Headless Horseman, an evil character from Washington Irving's short story "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow".

[2][3] Horsemaning saw a revival in 2011, along with other photo fads such as planking and owling.

All three were considered among the top 10 Facebook sensations of 2011[4] and a series of horsemaning photos began trending on sites like BuzzFeed as people were inspired to recreate the original fad.

The objective of horsemanning is to make it appear that the photo's subject has been beheaded.

[5] The resulting photo appears to show a headless body with a disembodied head lying beside it; in fact, it consists of one person's body and a different person's head.