#us museum

[sportsdayonline]

Nigeria receives repatriated Benin bronzes from US museum

The Ministry of Arts, Culture, and Creative Economy on Monday took delivery of two Benin bronzes — a bronze relief plaque and a commemorative head — from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, marking a major step in Nigeria’s drive to reclaim its cultural heritage. The artefacts, looted during the 1897 invasion of the Benin Kingdom, were repatriated from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Minister of…

Nigeria receives repatriated Benin bronzes from US museum

[thoughtlessarse]

US museum returns Ghana artefacts looted 150 years ago by British forces

Rolling coverage of the international stories of interest to our readers

Seven royal artefacts looted 150 years ago by British colonial forces from Ghana’s ancient Asante kingdom and kept by a US museum have been returned. It is the latest in a series of stolen treasured items to be repatriated to African countries. Looted from British-colonised Ghana in the 19th century before being transferred to the Fowler Museum at the University of California in the 1960s, the artefacts included an elephant tail whisk, an ornamental chair made of wood, leather and iron, two gold stool ornaments, a gold necklace and two bracelets. “We are here … (because) the white man came into Asanteman to loot and destroy it,” Otumfuo Osei Tutu, the king of the Assante kingdom in Ghana’s largest city of Kumasi, said at a presentation ceremony. After decades of resistance from European and Western governments and museums, the efforts of African countries to repatriate stolen artefacts are paying off with the increasing return of treasured pieces. Activists, though, say thousands more are still out of reach.

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Lots of countries have been returning artefacts to their rightful owners. Even British museums have returned items looted from the Asante, and the Asante can keep them. For a whole six years, after which they are to be returned to the thieves that stole them in the first place.