CATEGORY 4 HERITAGE RESTITUTION INITIATIVES
1 . Repatriation of the “ Negro de Banyoles ”
Name of the initiative
Year Participants Status
Repatriation of the “ Negro de Banyoles ” ( or “ Banyoles Bushman ”) to Botswana |
1991-2007 |
Alphonse Arcelín United Nations ( UN ) Organisation of African Unity ( OUA ) Spanish State |
Finalised Approved |
Description : |
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In 1991 , Alphonse Arcelín , a Spanish-Haitian doctor and member of the Catalan Socialist Party in Cambrils , led a major international campaign for the repatriation of the famous “ Negro de Banyoles ” ( also known as the “ Banyoles Bushman ”), on display until 2001 in the Darder Museum in Banyoles , in the province of Girona ( Catalonia ). It is the body of a Bushman warrior that was dug up , stuffed and sent to Paris in 1830 by two French taxidermists , the brothers Jules and Édouard Verreaux . After removing him from his grave , they stuffed the body with newspaper and used materials such as wood for the shoulders and wire as a backbone , and it was subsequently exhibited in a gallery on Rue Saint-Fiarce , Paris . It circulated around different fairs and shops in France until 1886 , when it was acquired by the veterinarian and taxidermist Francesc Darder . Darder , who was the first director of the Barcelona Zoo , added the stuffed body of the Bushman to his natural history collection in Barcelona and exhibited it there . In 1916 Darder moved the remains to his museum in Banyoles . There it would end up becoming a tourist attraction and a true hallmark of the Girona town until its repatriation to Botswana in 2007 .
The repatriation process began with the letter that Arcelín sent to the mayor of Banyoles , 75 years after the body arrived at the Darder Museum , demanding the removal and return of the human remains to the place from which they were taken . This demand took place a year before the 1992 Barcelona Olympics , which gave visibility to the case on a national and international scale . Proof of this is the support it received from institutions and figures such as the United Nations , UNESCO , the former OAU and the mayors of New York and Chicago . In May 1992 , the vice-president of the International Olympic Committee , Keba Mbaye , called for the removal of the remains from the museum . However , the socialist governor Joan Solana said he would only consider the demand seriously if it came from the Organising Committee of the Barcelona Olympic Games . Finally , as a result of the controversy , “ El Negro ” was removed from the museum ’ s display in 1997 and stored in the centre ’ s warehouse . A large demonstration promoted by Arcelín on 19 March 1996 in Banyoles , in which the Black Panther Party took part , among other groups and figures in defence of human rights , contributed to the controversy .
After years of conflict among the people of Banyoles , who had made “ El Negro ” a symbol of the town ’ s identity , in 2007 , the body was returned to its supposed place of origin , Botswana . The burial was held on 4 October of the same year in Gaborone , accompanied by a tribute ceremony attended by various political and religious representatives of the country . Before its arrival in the Botswana capital , the body was previously sent to Madrid , to the National Anthropology Museum , where the materials that had been used to stuff it were removed .
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