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Benin bronzes were stolen by artifacts during the imperial looting of the United Kingdom of Benin, in the south of modern Nigeria.
The Netherlands officially rendered 119 old sculptures on the former Nigerian kingdom in Benin over 120 years ago during the colonial era.
Olugbile Holloway, director general of the National Commission of Nigeria for Museums and Monuments, said on Saturday that the artefacts were the “modes of realization of the spirit and identity of the people from which they were taken”.
“All we ask about the world is to treat ourselves equity, dignity and respect,” he said during a ceremony held at the National Museum of Lagos.
Holloway added that Germany had also agreed to return more than 1,000 additional parts.
The artifacts, known as Benin bronzes, are the last return of precious history to Africa while pressure increases on Western governments to return the elements taken during imperialism.
Four of the artifacts are exhibited in the museum’s courtyard and will remain in the permanent collection of the museum, while the others will be returned to the OBA of Benin, Ewuare II – the traditional leader of the Kingdom of Benin in southern Nigeria.
Benin bronzes include metal and ivory sculptures dating from the 16th to the 18th century.
The articles were stolen in 1897 when the British forces, under the command of Sir Henry Rawson, ransacked the Kingdom of Benin – the southern Nigeria of Modern Times – and forced Ovonramwen Nogbaisi, the monarch at the time, in exile of six months.
In 2022, Nigeria officially asked for the return of hundreds of museum objects around the world. The same year, around 72 objects were returned from a museum in London and 31 years old were returned from Rhode Island to the United States.
