Ancestral Remains

This report – in French, German, Italian and English – is based on research conducted between 2023 and 2025 with colleagues Bernhard C. Schär and Ahmet Köken and provides the first assessment of human and ancestral remains from colonial contexts in Swiss museums and collections. These contain at least 4,175 skulls and other skeletal parts, but very little is known about their origin and how they were acquired. This figure is remarkable, as it places Switzerland on a similar footing to former colonial empires. 26 Swiss institutions (out of 34 contacted) collaborated with us on this inventory. In the report's conclusions, we formulate four recommendations to strengthen joint efforts in the areas of research, financial support and restitution.

This report is structured around four chapters. Each chapter focuses on a principal aspect of colonial collections of human remains. The first chapter centers on the principle of a reassembled or an updated inventory. To this end, the different colonial collections of human remains related or still present at the RMCA were historically contextualized. The second chapter challenges and questions the definition of provenance research on colonial collections of human remains. Open-ended and collaborative ways of researching were suggested. Provenance research is therefore imagined as an accompanying process. In chapter three a number of case studies that are peculiar to these collections were developed. We looked into the known case of Lusinga N’Gombe (1840-1884), which gave rise to a public debate on repatriation. We also researched and addressed new cases, such as that of Ferdinand Van de Ginste (1912-1947). In the last chapter a first light is shed upon challenging collaborations in a fast-changing museumscape in Belgium and the DRC. Awareness of the necessity of equal collaborations grew even more throughout the HOME-project. Due to late programming of a visit of the Congolese partners to Belgium in October and November 2022 the different collaborations and consultations were not fully processed in this chapter. However, the various collaborations are extensively described and a first reflection on challenging collaborations is developed in the conclusions of this report.

The aim of this chapter is to critically examine the context in which Congolese bodies were disinterred under the orders of Belgian colonial agent Ferdinand Van de Ginste (1912-1947) after the Second World War between 1945 and 1946 in today’s provinces of Kwango and Kwilu. Provenance studies of this text were carried out as part of the ‘HOME’ (Human Remains Origin(s) Multidisciplinary Evaluation) project. Based on research using archives and oral histories, we attempt to trace the process in which targeted communities became scientific objects. Oral testimonies show how the past and present are inextricably linked through memory. Taking this social (memorial) dimension into account is essential to truly understand the ‘dehumanising’ nature of (human remains in) museum collections.

In 2003 historical (non-Aboriginal) human skeletal remains archaeologically excavated from St Mary’s Anglican Church cemetery in Adelaide, South Australia were reinterred in a concrete subterranean crypt. This paper examines preservation status following 15 years of interment. Skeletal remains placed in sealed plastic bags inside plastic curation boxes provided the best method to ensure physical and chemical preservation. Prefabricated concrete containers offer a cost-effective solution for the reburial of human skeletal remains associated with a range of archaeological contexts, including eroding burial sites, urban development sites, or those derived from earlier archaeological excavations. In relation to Indigenous burial sites, in cases where considered culturally appropriate, onsite crypts allow storage or repatriation of ancestral remains ‘on country’. Concrete crypts provide cultural heritage management professionals and Indigenous communities with stable, dry, long-term buri...

The Aché people inhabited the vast eastern jungles of Paraguay for centuries. Their history is marked by bloodshed and dispossession. Kryýgi's life did not escape this dynamic: after her family was murdered, her name was changed to Damiana, she was forced to work as a maid and then was taken to Argentina. When she reached adolescence, she was admitted to a neuropsychiatric hospital where she died of tuberculosis. The condition of her remains was not the best. While her skeleton was lost in the La Plata Museum, her skull ended up in a German university. A century later, the Aché people managed to reconstruct her body and return it to the jungle from where it should never have left. By Miguel H. López for Debates Indígenas.

Between the 18th and 19th centuries, travelers who arrived on the coasts of New Zealand desecrated graves and stole a large number of human remains. One hundred years later, the cooperation between Māori and Moriori communities and States opened a path for the repatriation of ancestral remains exhibited in European museums. As of today, over 700 ancestors have returned to Aotearoa-New Zealand. The Te Papa Tongarewa Museum in Wellington has played a central role in this process. By Te Arikirangi Mamaku-Ironside for Debates Indígenas.

In 2003 historical (non-Aboriginal) human skeletal remains archaeologically excavated from St Mary’s Anglican Church cemetery in Adelaide, South Australia were reinterred in a concrete subterranean crypt. This paper examines preservation status following 15 years of interment. Skeletal remains placed in sealed plastic bags inside plastic curation boxes provided the best method to ensure physical and chemical preservation. Prefabricated concrete containers offer a cost-effective solution for the reburial of human skeletal remains associated with a range of archaeological contexts, including eroding burial sites, urban development sites, or those derived from earlier archaeological excavations. In relation to Indigenous burial sites, in cases where considered culturally appropriate, onsite crypts allow storage or repatriation of ancestral remains ‘on country’. Concrete crypts provide cultural heritage management professionals and Indigenous communities with stable, dry, long-term buri...

In 2003 historical (non-Aboriginal) human skeletal remains archaeologically excavated from St Mary’s Anglican Church cemetery in Adelaide, South Australia were reinterred in a concrete subterranean crypt. This paper examines preservation status following 15 years of interment. Skeletal remains placed in sealed plastic bags inside plastic curation boxes provided the best method to ensure physical and chemical preservation. Prefabricated concrete containers offer a cost-effective solution for the reburial of human skeletal remains associated with a range of archaeological contexts, including eroding burial sites, urban development sites, or those derived from earlier archaeological excavations. In relation to Indigenous burial sites, in cases where considered culturally appropriate, onsite crypts allow storage or repatriation of ancestral remains ‘on country’. Concrete crypts provide cultural heritage management professionals and Indigenous communities with stable, dry, long-term buri...

In 2003 historical (non-Aboriginal) human skeletal remains archaeologically excavated from St Mary’s Anglican Church cemetery in Adelaide, South Australia were reinterred in a concrete subterranean crypt. This paper examines preservation status following 15 years of interment. Skeletal remains placed in sealed plastic bags inside plastic curation boxes provided the best method to ensure physical and chemical preservation. Prefabricated concrete containers offer a cost-effective solution for the reburial of human skeletal remains associated with a range of archaeological contexts, including eroding burial sites, urban development sites, or those derived from earlier archaeological excavations. In relation to Indigenous burial sites, in cases where considered culturally appropriate, onsite crypts allow storage or repatriation of ancestral remains ‘on country’. Concrete crypts provide cultural heritage management professionals and Indigenous communities with stable, dry, long-term buri...

In 2003 historical (non-Aboriginal) human skeletal remains archaeologically excavated from St Mary’s Anglican Church cemetery in Adelaide, South Australia were reinterred in a concrete subterranean crypt. This paper examines preservation status following 15 years of interment. Skeletal remains placed in sealed plastic bags inside plastic curation boxes provided the best method to ensure physical and chemical preservation. Prefabricated concrete containers offer a cost-effective solution for the reburial of human skeletal remains associated with a range of archaeological contexts, including eroding burial sites, urban development sites, or those derived from earlier archaeological excavations. In relation to Indigenous burial sites, in cases where considered culturally appropriate, onsite crypts allow storage or repatriation of ancestral remains ‘on country’. Concrete crypts provide cultural heritage management professionals and Indigenous communities with stable, dry, long-term buri...

In 2003 historical (non-Aboriginal) human skeletal remains archaeologically excavated from St Mary’s
Anglican Church cemetery in Adelaide, South Australia were reinterred in a concrete subterranean crypt.
This paper examines preservation status following 15 years of interment. Skeletal remains placed in sealed
plastic bags inside plastic curation boxes provided the best method to ensure physical and chemical
preservation. Prefabricated concrete containers offer a cost-effective solution for the reburial of human
skeletal remains associated with a range of archaeological contexts, including eroding burial sites, urban
development sites, or those derived from earlier archaeological excavations. In relation to Indigenous burial
sites, in cases where considered culturally appropriate, onsite crypts allow storage or repatriation of
ancestral remains ‘on country’. Concrete crypts provide cultural heritage management professionals and
Indigenous communities with stable, dry, long-term burial sites that allow quick and easy access should
ongoing management options, Indigenous cultural practices, or future research require re-entry into
the crypt.

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In graduate school, a friend of mine was studying variation in tooth morphology of Native American populations from a series of archaeological sites. She had developed a coding system for the curvature of shovelshaped incisors, and one afternoon while we were in the osteology lab, she asked if I would do an impression for her. I agreed, and she produced a piece of molding clay that I pressed over my upper front teeth. Giving the impression back to her, she pulled out her coding chart and a caliper and proceeded to measure and compare. I knew that my incisors were shovel-shaped, and being Native American, I was confident in the outcome. However, after a minute or so, she informed me that I was only a "two," which fell within the range that included Europeans and several other world popu-lations. If I had been a "five," she said, there would have been no question that I was Native American. We were both disappointed by the results, and at the time, I also felt compromised in some way by them.