The Metropolitan Museum of Art (Met) in New York has returned three looted art treasures to Nigeria.
the essentials in brief
- Art treasures were stolen from the legendary palace during the colonial era.
The three objects are two brass tablets and a brass head from the 14th to 16th centuries that once adorned the royal palace in the Kingdom of Benin in what is now Nigeria, as the museum announced on Monday.
They were stolen under British occupation in 1897 and initially ended up in the British Museum in London. In 1950 Great Britain gave the works of art back to Nigeria. After their return to the National Museum in Lagos, they ended up on the art market and were bought by a private investor who donated them to the Met in 1991. They were exhibited in New York for years.
On Monday, the return of the art treasures announced in June by Met director Max Hollein and the general director of the Nigerian Commission for Museums and Monuments, Abba Isa Tijani, was officially sealed in New York. Tijani thanked the Met in a statement for the “transparency” of the return. Nigeria’s Minister of Culture Alhaji Lai Mohammed urged other museums to take the decision as a model.
Nigeria’s government has been demanding the return of cultural goods that were stolen during the colonial era for years. The West African country has now agreed on a cooperation with Germany to regulate the return of so-called Benin bronzes from German museums.
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