In a moment of solemn reckoning, France returned three colonial-era human skulls to Madagascar in late August 2025. This comes 128 years after they were taken following a violent confrontation. Among them is believed to be the skull of King Toera of the Sakalava people, decapitated by French troops in 1897. This restitution, under France’s 2023 law, marks a significant, if belated, step toward repairing colonial-era wrongs. But it’s also a reminder of how many sacred ancestral remains remain stranded in distant museums, often taken under brutal violence or dubious legal codes. This is a story not just about bones, but about memory, justice, and the long arc of repatriation.
Skeletons as Trophies: The Violence of Colonial Collecting
Colonial powers treated human remains as curiosities—scientific specimens or trophies—rather than the sacred relics they were for communities. King Toera, for example, led resistance efforts against French encroachment before being beheaded in 1897; his skull was shipped to a Paris museum and placed among hundreds of other remains. The return of these skulls allows the Sakalava to perform the Fitampoha, a purification ritual, transforming objects of colonial dehumanization into sacred ancestral tools.
This is not unique to Madagascar. European museums often acquired ancestral remains through force, coercion, or farcical legal frameworks. In India, colonial laws like the 1878 Treasure Trove Act enabled British authorities to claim anything unearthed including bronze idols, ceremonial items, and even remains as unclaimed government property. Many of those items now populate British museums. These laws didn’t just permit looting but rather systematized it, turning archaeology into legalised expropriation.
Restitution is about reversing that legacy. When the ceremonial skulls of King Toera and his warriors returned, they carried more than biological weight. They embodied cultural healing and a rebuke of colonial entitlement.
A Gentle Precedent: Legal Avenues and Ethical Redress
Madagascar’s retrieval of ancestral remains is made possible by France’s 2023 law permitting returns of human remains from its collections. This is a rare (in Europe) legislative recognition of historical harm. It marks a subtle pivot toward accountability, and a model that other former colonial nations could emulate. As Al Jazeera noted, France is currently unique among European nations in having a legal framework for human remains restitution.
In contrast, countries like the UK and Belgium have more improvisational approaches. They continue to rely on piecemeal responses rather than codified restitution. The Treasure Trove Act from the colonial era is living evidence of how colonial-era laws favoured seizure over sovereignty, allowing colonial governments to dislocate heritage. These laws traded ancestral legacy for archival value, something modern legal frameworks now seek to reverse.
The emergence of formal regimes for repatriation, like France’s, paves the way for legal clarity and ethical return. They signal seriousness: this is not hush-hush repatriation, but transparent redress with procedural weight.
Beyond Repatriation: Toward Ethical Stewardship and Reciprocal Memory
The return of colonial-era skulls should not be a flashpoint but a foundation. Ethical stewardship means engaging communities in how artefacts and remains are preserved, honoured, or displayed, rather than segregating them as museum specimens. For the Sakalava, King Toera’s remains will be buried in Ambiky and accompanied by rituals across several stops.
India, too, has a role to play in this transition from extraction to empathy. The example of delayed, but deeply emotional, restitution supports claims to oral histories, burial grounds, and objects displaced or excavated under colonial codes. The Piprahwa gems case earlier in 2025 illustrates how cultural advocacy and legal frameworks can pause unethical auctions and potentially restore sacred relics.
Moving forward, countries like the UK and France could adopt more formal restitution laws paralleling their leaders’ calls for reconciliation. To think of cultural heritage as static is ludicrous. It lives in the responsibilities we honour. Returning relics like the skulls of King Toera shows that history doesn’t just echo in books but breathes in ceremonies, memories, and the people it belongs to.
Conclusion: A First Step Toward Restorative Justice
As Madagascar receives back the skulls of its ancestors, one can sense more than ceremony. A law that allows for restitution, ensures that descendants receive the remains with dignity, and acknowledges the public impact of colonial violence are not small matters. If restitution is the first stitch in the tapestry of justice, then ethical cultural policy must follow—across borders and museum walls. Here’s hoping King Toera’s skull finds rest not only in the ground of Ambiky but in the conscience of institutions that once treated him as a mere collection.