Claimed by Nigeria, these objects had been looted in 1897 during the sack of the Edo Royal Palace by British colonial troops.
This would be the most important restitution of treasures of the Kingdom of Benin looted during the colonial era. The British universities of Cambridge and Oxford announced on July 29 their intention to return to Nigeria 213 objects kept in their collections since the sacking of the royal palace of Edo.
The two institutions must still receive the green light from the Charity Commission, which should rule by autumn on the validity of their respective restitution, justified as “a moral obligation” by universities. A formality, assures the British daily The Telegraph recalling that a first return of an object kept by the University of Cambridge had already been authorized last fall.
Read alsoNigeria: two bronzes looted during the colonial era returned to the Oba of Benin
The sets being restored consist mostly of figures in brass and other copper alloys, a collection known as “Benin bronzes”. The lot of objects assembled by the universities of Cambridge and Oxford also includes wooden and ivory pieces looted from the same event. Among the 213 pieces, the oldest of which dates from the 13the century, 116 come from the collections of the MAA, while 97 pieces are held by the Pitt Rivers Museum and the Ashmolean Museum, administered by the University of Oxford.
Increasing refunds
“It is becoming increasingly clear that illegitimately acquired objects must be returned to their country of origin”, said Nicholas Thomas, director of the Museum of Archeology and Anthropology (MAA) in Oxford, in a press release. The two venerable universities are responding to a request for restitution issued by Nigeria, accepted in principle last March. Additional research carried out in the meantime has narrowed down the number of objects that can be returned. And to lower, in the case of the University of Cambridge, a first number of “about 160 pieces” returnable to 116 objects.
The National Commission for Museums and Monuments in Nigeria has welcomed the progress of this restitution project announced by the universities of Cambridge and Oxford and has expressed its willingness to discuss a possible loan of these objects. . Their amicable deposit could allow the two institutions to continue to exhibit the returned objects in their English galleries.
These objects were looted in 1897 by British soldiers during a punitive expedition to Edo (now Benin City). The attack on the city by the colonial troops was marked by the looting and then the setting on fire of the palace. Several tens of thousands of cultural goods – statuettes, plaques, precious objects and numerous bronze figures – which were kept there were immediately brought back to Europe and then dispersed in several private and public collections.
Read alsoRestitution of five of the 12,000 books of Georges Mandel, Jewish minister assassinated by the Vichy militia
Long ignored by major European museums, the issue of the restitution of African cultural property has arisen with renewed insistence in recent years, notably on the occasion of the opening in Berlin of the Humboldt Forum. Inaugurated in December 2020, the institution brings together the collections of several ethnological museums in the German capital as well as a large collection of bronzes from Benin. The arrival of these colonial collections in the reconstructed palace of the kings of Prussia had aroused indignation in Nigeria as well as controversy in Germany.
Since the opening of the Humboldt Forum, the German government has undertaken in 2021 to return part of its Benin bronzes. Other international institutions, such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, also announced last year their intention to return to Nigeria their bronzes looted from the Edo Palace. The most important collection, however, is in the British Museum in London, under the care of a management that refuses to consider the slightest restitution. The violent context of the acquisition of these 900 objects is explained and put into context by mediation devices, advances the museum.
SEE ALSO – In Benin, Macron wishes to continue the restitution of the royal treasures of Abomey