The Linden-Museum Stuttgart and the German Lost Art Foundation will begin a research project on cultural heritage from Cameroon on 1 November 2025.
The subject of the research are important holdings in Germany’s five largest ethnographic collections: the Linden-Museum Stuttgart, the Ethnologisches Museum der Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin, the Staatliche Ethnographische Sammlungen Sachsen (SES) with its museums in Leipzig and Dresden as well as the Museum am Rothenbaum – Kulturen und Künste der Welt (MARKK).
Courtesy Linden Museum Stuttgart
The project will run for three years and focus on circa five hundred royal or power objects such as thrones, sceptres, or swords – symbols of sovereignty which the German colonisers had removed from the source communities.
In cooperation with experts from the Cameroonian communities and researchers from the university of Dschang, the university of Bertoua, and the National Museum of Cameroon, the reconstruction of the provenance of the objects will be attempted.
In the process, perspectives and narratives from the people of Cameroon will play an important part: In “community hubs”, that is local meeting points in Duala, Fumban, Edea, and Atok, permanent locations for dialogue are planned so that descendants of non-royal families can also have their say.
At the end of the project, the findings will also not be presented in Stuttgart to begin with but in Cameroon, so that access is given to the local population.
