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ľ�ϸ���Ӱ�� College Utrecht Alumnus Manolis Marakis is currently doing his MPhil in Heritage Studies in Cambridge. Curious to know what he is working on? Read his blog below.

Gweagal Spears at the MAA: Questions of heritage, repatriation and object entanglements

Repatriation is a theme familiar to any museum that houses ethnographic or anthropological collections. As such, the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology (MAA) in Cambridge, also has procedures and protocols in place to review and accommodate repatriation requests. In 2017, a repatriation request for the four Gweagal Spears in the MAA collection concluded unsuccessfully. Taking a look at the objects in questions and this repatriation case reveals fascinating dynamics between objects, histories, identities and heritage.

I came to the ľ�ϸ���Ӱ�� of Cambridge to pursue a MPhil in Heritage Studies, the museum module of which is taught by the curators of the MAA. Therefore, I was quickly taken in by the museum’s collection, and I soon started finding interesting parallels with my experience during my CHIP placement: in the summer of 2019, I interned at the British Museum (BM), in the Department of Africa, Oceania and Americas. Another object, from the BM, had recently also failed to be repatriated: the Gweagal shield. Both repatriation requests, to each museum, were made by the same man, and the objects became entangled as sister items of significance for the history and heritage of Australia.

In March 2016, on the last day of the Encounters: Revealing Stories of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Objects exhibition at the National Museum of Australia in Canberra, Rodney Kelly began the repatriation campaign for two sets of objects which had been included in the exhibit, borrowed from museums in Britain (Nugent & Sculthorpe, 2018). The objects concerned are the Gweagal shield from the British Museum and the four Gweagal spears from the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology (MAA) in Cambridge, both of which were on loan to the National Museum of Australia for the Encounters exhibition, marking their first return to Australia since their removal in 1770. The objects have become intertwined with discourses of colonial violence, nation, citizenship, indigenous rights and self-determination not only thanks to their unique provenance, but also thanks to the symbolic potency they gathered in a growing late-20^th and early-21^st-century Australian narrative of the first encounter between Captain Cook and the island’s New Holland inhabitants. The meaning of the objects for Australian Aboriginal heritage has become unparalleled, as can been seen clearly in the quote by dr Shayne Williams, of the Gweagal Families group: they represent “a whole history of this country” (2015). Neil McGregor, then director of the British Museum, also stated how the shield, for example, “become symbolically charged, freighted with layers of history, legend, global politics and race relations” (2012).

It is now generally accepted that, on April 28th, 1770, Cook and the HMS Endeavour landed at Botany Bay, Australia, and were confronted by a group of Gweagal men holding shields and spears. An altercation ensued, in which Cook is also noted to have fired his musket. Drawings from that encounter by Sydney Parkinson, and on the inventory of items collected at Botany Bay by John F. Miller, the shield and the spears can be placed at this event (Nugent, 2009). It is still unclear whether the shield and/or the spears are the exact ones noted to have been held by the Gweagal men, or whether they were collected otherwise in that encounter (Nugent & Sculthorpe, 2018). The spears have a clear history from that point onwards: they enter the possession of Trinity College through the Earl of Sandwich in 1771, and eventually the MAA collection in 1914. For the shield, a period of obscurity predates its first mention in the British Museum collection in 1817, allowing only for a formal registration in 1978. 

These repatriation cases highlight the difficulty of separating individuals from communities and attempting to find who ‘speaks’ for a community. Two names have already been mentioned that are crucial in this case: Rodney Kelly and Shayne Williams. Both have direct membership ties to the Gweagal clan of the Dharawal indigenous Australian people. Rodney Kelly, the person who initiated both repatriation cases, presented extensive documentation of his relationship to the Gweagal, as a direct descendant of Cooman - someone who was described as one of the men involved in the initial Gweagal party of the encounter with Cook in 1770 (MAA, 2017). Using oral histories and family trees, he not only ties himself to the first encounter, but also places the object in question at the locus of Gweagal heritage, arguing for the necessity of their return. On the other hand, the position of dr Shayne Williams became a significant reason for the failure of the repatriation cases. A La Perouse elder, Dharawal person and representative of the Gweagal Families group, Williams questioned Kelly’s kinship to the men of the first encounter, and instead described the opportunity for collaborative engagement and mobility between Gweagal people and the two museums in Britain (MAA, 2017). Most significantly, he described how, due to lack of resources or appropriate housing, the objects’ return is not necessary for his community’s heritage as it is.

And indeed, this opportunity of collaboration is encouraged by the MAA curators too, not only through the many workshop and seminars organised for visiting Aboriginal people, but also with the loan of the spears to museum in Australia. As seen in the description that accompanies the spear on display at MAA, the three other spears are currently at the National Museum of Australia in Canberra. Many questions remain in the case of the Gweagal shield and the Gweagal spears, including: how relevant is the object’s provenance for their symbolic potential in heritage? What is the responsibility for institutions like museums to engage in pro-active efforts of heritage-making with individuals and communities? How can a repatriation committee judge which individual is representative of a community? How can a community assert their kinship in a repatriation case? How relevant is the location and legal possession of objects for their heritage narratives?        

References:

British Museum Collection Online. Shield [online]. Available at [Accessed on 2/12/20].

MAA Management Committee. 2017. SUB-COMMITTEE ON REPATRIATION OF ARTEFACTS REPORT [online]. Available at [Accessed on 2/12/20].

MAA Online Collection. Accession No D 1914.2 [online]. Available at [Accessed on 2/12/20].

MacGregor, N., 2012. A History of the World in 100 Objects. London: Penguin. 490.

Nugent, M., 2009. Captain Cook was here. Cambridge ľ�ϸ���Ӱ�� Press.

Nugent, M. and Sculthorpe, G., 2018. A shield loaded with history: Encounters, objects and exhibitions. Australian Historical Studies, 49(1), pp.28-43.

Williams, S., 2015. Our National Treasure. Encounters: Revealing Stories of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Objects from the British Museum. Canberra: National Museum of Australia Press. 50.