Repatriated house post heading back to B.C. Indigenous First Nation from Harvard museum | 24CA News

A longhouse put up initially taken from the Gitxaala Nation round 138 years in the past, close to Prince Rupert, B.C., is being repatriated to the territory from the Peabody Museum at Harvard University.

The black and purple, three-metre tall, 180-kilogram home put up has been shipped from Harvard University’s Peabody Museum in Massachusetts and is predicted to reach in Prince Rupert in March.

The put up depicts a grizzly bear of the ocean and her cubs, that are the 2 fundamental crests of the home throughout the nation. The home put up was one of many 4 posts that stood within the Grizzly Bear longhouse.

Christian missionaries threatened and compelled Indigenous leaders to transform to Christianity whereas destroying their cultures, in keeping with the Gitxaala Nation. The home put up was bought “under duress,” in 1885.

Gitxaala Nation’s cultural program supervisor, Dustin Johnsons, stated its return is an emotional one that can assist join the neighborhood to their ancestors.

“If the Peabody Museum didn’t take care of it — it would have been completely lost,” he instructed Global News.

“So it’s bittersweet because it was desecrated when it was cut down and also when it arrived in Boston as they inserted rods and lights inside. It’s a priceless treasure for our people. Bringing home our item is a symbol of pride. We are still here, our people are still here.”

He stated the nation hosted a gathering after phrase that the Peabody Museum at Harvard had agreed to return the put up. Some elders, together with a 96-year-old member, recalled the darkish historical past of the destruction of their tradition.

“The trauma that they’ve seen, the sadness from seeing the great-great-grandparents being forced to cut down poles and burn them because of the Christian missionaries and the colonial government,” Johnson stated. “So, this one coming back is symbolic of reclaiming our belongings, but also asserting our place back in the world.”

Gitxaala Nation additionally launched a press release relating to the repatriation.

“The house post is the surviving section of the original totem pole that was cut down and burned along with many other totem poles and Gitxaała cultural belongings. This surviving portion of the totem pole was saved by Gitxaała ancestors and stored inside the longhouse of the Gitnagun’aks. This was during the period of the potlatch ban in Canada when many aspects of First Nations’ culture and governance had been made illegal under colonial law and when First Nations people were struggling to survive amidst genocide,” Gitxaala Nation employees stated.

Jane Pickering, a Peabody Museum director, acknowledged the home put up’s “dark history” in an interview. A fishing firm used the put up as an ornamental object in a “completely inappropriate” method, Pickering stated.

“It came into the museum’s possession in 1917, it was brought back from a New England fishing company. The director of the museum of the time requested that the pole be donated and the company agreed,” she stated.

Pickering stated it wasn’t till the museum was contacted by the Gitxaala Nation in 2021 to return the put up that they discovered of its “incredibly symbolic cultural value.”

The Gitxaala Nation shall be holding an enormous celebration in April to have a good time the standing up of the home put up.

Johnson stated the put up is considered one of 73 objects the nation is attempting to return residence.

“And that’s what we know of at the moment, but there are still many out there,” he stated.

The Museum of Northern British Columbia will take care of the home put up till the completion of the Gitxaała Cultural Center and Museum in 2024 within the village of Lax Klan (Kitkatla BC).

2:03Sewing purple ribbon skirts in honour of MMIWG

— With information from Canadian Press

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