Germany today returned Twenty-one (21) precious artefacts that were looted by British soldiers from the former west African kingdom of Benin 125 years ago. The stolen artefacts were handed over by Germany to Nigeria amid laughter, tears, and some audible frustration with the ongoing silence of the country that first stole them.
The objects from the haul of treasures known as the Benin bronzes, including a brass head of an Oba (king), a ceremonial ada and a throne depicting a coiled-up python, were taken from the sacked city during a British punitive expedition in 1897 and later sold to German museums in Berlin, Hamburg, Stuttgart and Cologne.
Shortly after lunchtime on Tuesday, Germany’s foreign minister, Annalena Baerbock, passed perhaps the most spectacular of the returned objects into the gloved hands of Nigeria’s culture minister, Lai Mohammed.
