British Museum: Africa

(asked on 21st September 2023) - View Source

Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay on 20 September (HL9874), how many of the 3.5 million items not in the British Museum's public database were looted from Africa in the course of British military actions launched against African nations.


Answered by
Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay Portrait
Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay
Shadow Minister (Digital, Culture, Media and Sport)
This question was answered on 17th October 2023

It is not possible to answer the Noble Lord’s question without unpacking the loaded terms contained within it. The British Museum, like so many other institutions, seeks to provide detailed contextual information about all the items in its collection, so that scholars, visitors, and members of the public from around the world can engage with them and form their own views about them. Examples of ways in which the Museum does that can be found on the sections of its website which deal with:

The British Museum’s African collections as a whole are well-catalogued, and the Museum has undertaken extensive documentation and history work, including on the collections highlighted above. The British Museum continues actively to research its collections, and its records are updated regularly with references to military looting where evidence is found.

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