WELLINGTON, New Zealand — The remains of scores of Indigenous Maori and Moriori people began a journey
home to
New Zealand on Tuesday, officials said, most of them stolen by a
notorious 19th-century Austrian grave robber.
اضافة اعلان
The bones of about 64 Maori and Moriori — the
Indigenous people of mainland New Zealand and the Chatham Islands, respectively
— are being returned by the Natural History Museum Vienna.
They will be received at Te Papa, the national
museum of New Zealand in Wellington, on Sunday as part of a government-funded
program to bring Indigenous remains back to the Pacific nation.
The remains,
including skulls, were housed for decades in Austria’s capital after being
plundered from New Zealand’s “iwi” (tribes) more than 130 years ago, officials
from the two countries said.
Records show that
most of the bones were collected by Austrian taxidermist and grave robber
Andreas Reischek, who toured New Zealand for 12 years until 1889.
Reischek’s diaries recount how he looted graves
without permission in several locations including the Chatham Islands,
Christchurch and Auckland.
“These ancestors
were stolen by those with no regard for the Maori communities they belonged
to,” said William “Pou” Temara, chairman of Te Papa’s Repatriation Advisory
Panel, in a statement Tuesday.
“In his diary entries, Reischek boasts of eluding
Maori surveillance, looting sacred places, and breaking ‘tapu’ (sacred rules) —
he knew exactly what he was doing.”
77 years of negotiations
The remains began their long
journey home on Tuesday at a ceremony attended by New Zealand’s ambassador to
Austria.
On Sunday a Maori welcoming ceremony, the Powhiri,
will mark the repatriation in Wellington — the biggest so far from Austria.
It will conclude 77 years of negotiations between
New Zealand and Austria, which began in 1945 when Maori leaders sought the
remains’ return.
The remains will be kept at Te Papa’s “wahi tapu”
(sacred space) while the museum consults with Maori and Moriori iwi to determine
the final resting place.
Sunday’s ceremony is the latest return of Indigenous remains
since New Zealand created a government-funded repatriation program in 2003.
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