This open access publication presents the results of a research project which is probably unique in this form: In the course of only two years, the provenances of approximately 1100 sets of Human Remains from the territory of the present-day nations of Kenya, Tanzania, and Rwanda were examined. Editors are Charles Mulinda Kabwete and Bernhard Heeb.
On 7 July 2025, the French National Assembly has approved the restitution to Ivory Coast of the Djidji Ayôkwê, an important talking drum, stolen in 1916. In the same period, the British Museum came with a statement that it is unwilling to restitute an equally important drum to the Pokomo council of elders in Kenya.
At the global Museum & Heritage Awards 2025 the Pitt Rivers Museum won Partnership of the Year for the Maasai Living Cultures Project. The annual award celebrates the best in the world of museums, galleries plus cultural heritage visitor attractions.
The repatriation of African art is gaining momentum, but a number of highly important and symbolic pieces remain in the hands of the continent’s former colonisers.
With joy and ululation two families from the Loita clan of the Maasai in Narok South received 98 cows from Oxford University for ‘stolen’ cultural artefacts.
[ in French ] Museums in the modern sense of the term first appeared in Africa during the colonial era. After independence, the colonial museum became the national museum. It was only a change of name, but the model remained Western
In 1905, a colonial British officer killed Koitalel Arap Samoei, the supreme leader of the Nandi tribe. According to oral history, his severed head was taken to the UK. The Nandi have been searching for it ever since. The Nandi have been searching for it ever since.
The Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford U.K. holds 188 Maasai items from Kenya and Tanzania. The seven-year Living Cultures project brought a new approach to decolonisation and repatriation through creating equitable partnerships with Indigenous peoples and facilitated visits to the museum by Maasai representatives.
