Benin Bronze
The Case for Keeping the Benin Bronzes in the West
In 1897, members of the British military in what is now Nigeria -- members of the colonizing force, essentially -- removed many pieces of bronze statuary and other pieces from the country and brought their cache to Europe (Opoku, 2008; Cremer, 2011). From here, the pieces were dispersed to a variety of museums and collections, with substantial shares in the British Museum and in Austria but with many major museums throughout the West (and elsewhere) claiming ownership of certain pieces (Opoku,2008; Cremer, 2011). Despite continual insistence that the pieces remain the property of the royal Benin family (or alternatively to the Nigerian state) from which the pieces were stolen as indigenous cultural artifacts and evidence of the strong and sophisticated society that colonization disrupted, the pieces have remained in the West for a variety of reasons; the merits of several of these arguments are assessed below (Opoku, 2008; Cremer, 2011; DebateWise, 2011).
Arguments for Western Retention
Though there is a general consensus amongst the nations of the globe and within international organizations that ancient and historic artifacts should be under the control of the nations form whence they came, many...
Archaeological artifacts repatriation: should the artifacts go back to their homeland? The word repatriation came from a Latin transformation of patria which means fatherland. (William, 2008). Repatriation of cultural objects involves mainly returning historical artifacts to their original culture that obtained and owned by museums and institutions that collect culture materials. This term repatriation was originally created for the Native Americans who wished to restore their cultural object from modern museums.
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