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UK museum returns human skull to Australia

(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-05-14 10:29

LONDON – Aboriginal elder Major Sumner, wearing a loincloth and chanting a dirge, danced Wednesday in front of the Edwardian facade of the World Museum Liverpool to mark the return of a skull taken from Australia more than a century ago.

Aboriginal elder Major Sumner performs a ritual dance outside the World Museum following the return of an Australian indigenous human skull in Liverpool, England, May 13, 2009. The remains which where taken from Australia between 1902 and 1904 have been part of the museum's collection since 1948 when they where purchased from Dr William Broad. [Agencies]

The skull, believed to be of mixed Aboriginal and European ancestry, is one of three human relics the Australian government has requested from the Liverpool museum. Dates for the return of the other two have not been set.

The ceremony at the northern England museum was the latest in a series of hand-overs of human remains from British institutions to the Australian government.

Australia is lobbying for the return of remains taken from the country and now housed in museums across the world. Since 1996, more than 1,000 such remains have been returned.