How seven skulls from a California tribe got to the University of Birmingham is unclear. But their return appears to be the first event of its kind in the state.
“Nobody thought much about the locked metal cabinet in the medical school at the University of Birmingham in the United Kingdom. It was another forgotten fixture in the anatomy department — until a researcher last year found seven skulls with yellowing labels indicating the remains were those of Native Americans from California’s Central Coast.
Earlier this month, the skulls and several bone fragments were boxed and gingerly placed aboard a jet to LAX at London’s Heathrow Airport. In a quiet ceremony, they were reburied in San Luis Obispo County, more than a century after their odyssey began.
“They didn’t volunteer to leave the U.S.,” said John Burch, a spiritual leader of the tiny Salinan tribe. “They were kidnapped, and now they’re home.”
Repatriation, the return to tribes of indigenous bones and artifacts, is not always a smooth road. A 1990 federal law, the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, calls for museums and other institutions to give remains and relics back to federally recognized tribes that request them. The process, however, is cumbersome for tribes and frustrating for scientists who believe certain items should remain accessible for study.
The act and similar state laws do not apply to foreign institutions. Still, the University of Birmingham, among others, sees repatriation as “a moral choice,” said June Jones, a bioethicist in the university’s School of Medical and Dental Sciences. The school also is returning aboriginal bones to Australia and Maori bones to groups in New Zealand.”
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