Geneva museum returns sacred objects to Haudenosaunee Confederacy

A museum in Switzerland has returned two sacred objects that were taken without consent nearly two centuries ago from the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) confederacy this month. The Haudenosaunee External Relations Committee asked the Geneva Museum of Ethnography (MEG) to return a mask and rattle that were displayed in the museum's 'Archive of Human Diversity' exhibit.

A museum in Switzerland has returned two sacred objects that were taken without consent nearly two centuries ago from the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) confederacy this month.

The Haudenosaunee External Relations Committee asked the Geneva Museum of Ethnography (MEG) to return a mask and rattle that were displayed in the museum's "Archive of Human Diversity" exhibit.

"We want [...] this mask and rattle to come back to us so that they can be properly cared for [...]. We have an obligation to them that we have not been able to fulfill for 200 years, so we have a responsibility to do everything we can to end this separation from our community," said Tuscarora Brennen Ferguson, a member of the committee. "We have a responsibility to bring them back."

The items were returned in a ceremony in Geneva on Feb. 7.

The museum said in a news release that it considers the Haudenosaunee the traditional owners of the mask and rattle, that the items have "cultural value that makes them unsuitable for exhibition," and that they have a cultural value that "ensures the well-being of the Haudenosaunee."

"The restitutions and returns are not an end in themselves. It is a step in a very long process that will continue through regular exchanges and collaborations. We plan to dedicate a section of our 2024 temporary exhibition to retracing the biography of these two sacred objects and more broadly to reaffirming the self-determination of the Haudenosaunee confederacy," said MEG director Carine Ayélé Durand in the release.

The Haudenosaunee Confederacy is made up of six nations on both sides of the American and Canadian border: the Kanien'kehá:ka (Mohawk), Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, Tuscarora, and Seneca.