Recent investigations of nanoindentation unloading curves [G.M. Pharr, A. Bolshakov, J.Mater. Res. 17(10), Oct 2002, 2660.] have shown that the pressure distribution of a sharp indenter can be approximated by an "effectively shaped" indenter during the unloading process. The geometrical form of the effective indenter shape is determined by the shape of the plastic hardness impression formed during indentation. During unloading this concept allows one to extract approximately the elastic part of the surface stress determined by the effective indenter due a fit procedure applied to the unloading curve. Making use of an additional straightforward algorithm, this concept also allows the evaluation of the complete elastic field of the effectively shaped indenter and thus it may provide information about changes in the indenter stresses during the unloading process. The model is applied to example materials and the resulting fields of elastic stresses are discussed. (C) 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.