The skulls of four tribal warriors killed nearly 150 years ago have been returned to a Taiwanese Indigenous community by Edinburgh University.
The Paiwan tribesmen were killed during a Japanese invasion of southern Taiwan.
It is believed their skulls were taken as war trophies and came into the university’s possession in 1907.
The university presented the skulls to dignitaries from the Mudan community in a first of its kind repatriation to the island.
Once the skulls have returned directly to Taiwan, they will be temporarily placed in the National Museum of Prehistory until a permanent resting place is confirmed.
‘This repatriation is a culmination of international cooperation between the University and the Taiwanese community,’ said Professor Tom Gillingwater, from the university.
‘We are committed to addressing our colonial legacy and this repatriation is the latest action we have taken in line with our longstanding policy of returning items to appropriate representatives of the cultures from which they were taken.’
Mudan is a township in the south of Taiwan predominantly populated by the Paiwan people, the second-largest indigenous group in Taiwan.
The four Mudan warriors were killed in 1874 during a battle with Japanese invaders to avenge the deaths of 54 sailors who were killed three years prior by the Paiwanese.
The sailors were ambushed after becoming shipwrecked in Taiwanese territory in what is now referred to as the ‘Mudan Incident’.
The understanding is that the four Mudan warriors were unlikely to have been the perpetrators of the original incident.
In the following 30 years, the skulls were in the possession of Stuart Eldrige, a US doctor and skull collector living in Yokohama, and John Anderson, the first curator of the Indian Museum at Calcutta.
The skulls finally reached Edinburgh in 1907 after being given to the University’s Principal William Turner.
The University holds one of the largest and most historically significant collections of ancestral remains, notably skulls.
The majority of the skulls in Edinburgh’s collection were assembled by Turner and like many UK universities with anatomical collections, the skulls came from the British Empire’s colonies or through their global networks.
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