Fifteen Colonial Thefts : A Guide to Looted African Heritage in Museums

Eloquent and powerful’ – Françoise VergèsDebates around restitution and decolonising museums continue to rage across the world. Artefacts, effigies and ancestral remains are finally being accurately contextualised and repatriated to their homelands. Fifteen Colonial Thefts amplifies these discussions, exploring the history of colonial violence in Africa through the prism of fifteen African belongings – all looted at the height of the imperial era and brought to European museums. Structured around three arenas – the battlefield, the royal palace, and the realm of the sacred – the book displays how colonial officers violently plundered Africa. It explores the meaning of those cultural artefacts at the time of their appropriation and today in an era of restitution. With writers from Europe and Africa, including scientists, museum professionals, artists and activists, the book illuminates the collective trauma and loss of cultural, historical and spiritual knowledge that colonial theft engendered.