“These skulls entered the national collections in circumstances that clearly violated human dignity and in a context of colonial violence,” French Culture Minister Rachida Dati is quoted by the AFP agency as saying at the ceremony.<\/p>\n
In August 1897, a French force sent to assert colonial control over the Menab\u00e9 kingdom of the Sakalava people in western Madagascar massacred a local army.<\/p>\n
King Toera was killed and decapitated: his head sent to Paris where it was placed in the archives of the Museum of Natural History.<\/p>\n
Nearly 130 years later pressure from the king’s descendants as well as the government of the Indian Ocean nation has opened the way for the skull’s return.<\/p>\n
There is no DNA proof that the skull is King Toera’s – tests carried out several years ago were inconclusive. Ultimately it was a traditional Sakalava spirit medium who confirmed the skull was that of the monarch.<\/p>\n
Madagascar’s Culture Minister Volamiranty Donna Mara, who also gave a speech at the handover, said the return of skulls was a “significant gesture”, AFP reports.<\/p>\n
“Their absence has been, for more than a century… an open wound in the heart of our island,” she said.<\/p>\n
It is not the first time human remains from the colonial era have been given back by France.<\/p>\n