{"id":91521,"date":"2025-08-26T23:53:00","date_gmt":"2025-08-26T23:53:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/?p=91521"},"modified":"2025-08-26T23:53:00","modified_gmt":"2025-08-26T23:53:00","slug":"france-returns-three-colonial-era-human-skulls-to-madagascar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/?p=91521","title":{"rendered":"France returns three colonial-era human skulls to Madagascar"},"content":{"rendered":"
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France on Tuesday returned three colonial-era skulls held in a Paris museum to Madagascar 128 years after they were taken to France, including one believed to be that of a Malagasy king killed by French troops.<\/p>\n

The skull, presumed to be that of King Toera and two others from the Sakalava ethnic group, were formally handed over at a ceremony held at the French Culture Ministry.<\/p>\n

France has sought to confront its colonial past by returning artefacts and human remains from its museums to their countries of origin. This is the first restitution under a law passed in 2023 that facilitates the return of human remains from France\u2019s public collections.<\/p>\n

French Culture Minister Rachida Dati described the return of the skulls that had been stored at the Museum of National History in Paris as an \u201chistoric event\u201d between France and Madagascar.<\/p>\n

\"France<\/figure>\n

\u201cThis ceremony also symbolises the completion of a historical, scientific, and memorial process between our two nations,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

Her Madagascar counterpart, Volamiranty Donna Mara, hailed the return of the skulls as \u201ca significant moment for the Sakalava community and the nation,\u201d saying the remains had great cultural and emotional importance.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey are not collectors\u2019 items; they are the invisible and indelible link that unites our present to our past,\u201d Mara said.<\/p>\n

\u201cTheir absence has been \u2013 for more than a century, 128 years \u2013 an open wound in the hearts of the Big Island and particularly of the Sakalava community of Menabe,\u201d Mara added.<\/p>\n

Mara said the Malagasy government plans to honour the remains in a tribute coinciding with the anniversary of King Toera\u2019s execution in late August 1897 at Ambiky during France\u2019s colonisation of the Indian Ocean island.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"FranceFrance on Tuesday returned three colonial-era skulls held in a Paris museum to Madagascar 128 years after they were taken to France, including one believed to be that of a Malagasy king killed by French troops.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":91522,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_2277560469115098_106292521332774":"","twitter_aToxNzczMzI3Njk4OTg4ODUxMjAxOw==_1773327698988851200":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1972,2082,7373,7374,10,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-91521","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-africa","category-france","category-human-skulls","category-madagascar","category-politics","category-popular"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91521","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=91521"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91521\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/91522"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=91521"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=91521"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=91521"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}