What is “NAGPRA” and why is it controversial in the discovery of historical artifacts?


Image source: pbs.org
NAGPRA stands for the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. It is a federal law passed in 1990 that states a process for museums and federal agencies to return Native American artifacts to their original, lineal descendants or tribes. These could be human remains, sacred objects, funerary objects, or artifacts of cultural patrimony. While it all sounds black and white, museums and agencies are deeply challenged by this law, making it a controversial cultural debate over the years.


Since NAGPRA’s legislation, it became a common belief that American Indians were happy about its passing. However, there were still some natives who felt that government was not doing enough to compensate for the damages that they have inflicted over the course of history. These include theft from the tribes and the damage that science has brought.

Image source: theangryhistorian.blogspot.com

At the same time, archaeologists and museum curators believe that NAGPRA is a free pass for Native Americans to throw revenge as they spitefully take back museum collections so they can destroy them. Museums were at the vanguard of this controversy, and were ordered to make complete inventories of all remains and objects of any cultural significance within the next five years.


It is a daunting task, considering how much work will be put into re-examining the vast collections and some objects that have been on loan to other learning institutions or museums for more than a decade. Since the NAGPRA’s legislation, there are still 118,000 sets of American Indian remains that have yet to be returned.


Sadigh Gallery is a family-owned, New York-based art gallery specializing in ancient art works, ancient artifacts, and coins. They also do appraisals to avoid fraud, fake, and ripoff products. For more articles about collecting ancient artifacts, visit this page.

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