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RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) \u2014 Indigenous chants and the rattle of maracas resounded Thursday in a Rio de Janeiro park, where Brazil’s Tupinamb\u00e1 people gathered to celebrate the homecoming of a sacred cloak absent for some 380 years.<\/p>\n
Made of feathers from the scarlet ibis, the artifact from northeastern Brazil resided in Copenhagen until the Danish National Museum donated the cloak to its Brazilian counterpart.<\/p>\n
President Luiz In\u00e1cio Lula da Silva<\/a> and Indigenous Peoples Minister Sonia Guajajara attended a ceremony at Brazil\u2019s National Museum atop a hill in the Boa Vista Park.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is impossible not to appreciate the beauty and strength of this centuries-old and well-preserved piece, even after so much time outside Brazil, abroad. It is our commitment to preserve this heritage,\u201d Lula said, addressing dozens of Indigenous people plus others of the general public.<\/p>\n Celebrations to welcome the cloak have been underway since last week. The Tupinamb\u00e1 traveled 28 hours overland from the northeastern state of Bahia to enter the museum where it hangs in carefully calibrated lighting and temperature conditions to ensure its preservation. There, they conducted rituals and prayers with the cloak they view as a living ancestor rather than an object.<\/p>\n Reconnecting with the cloak, which was once central to certain ceremonies, was “really wonderful,\u201d Jamopoty Tupinamb\u00e1, one of the group’s leaders, said Wednesday near their encampment in the park. \u201cThe emotion was too much. The enchanted ones arrived, too,\u201d she said, referring to spiritual ancestors.<\/p>\n Some at the encampment pounded drums on the parched grass amid drifting incense smoke, adorned in feathered headdresses. Anticipation and excitement due to the momentous occasion hung in the air.<\/p>\n The cloak stands at nearly four feet tall, and the Dutch took it from Brazil in about 1644, according to a statement from Brazil’s federal government. It has been in Denmark’s National Museum for 335 years, it said.<\/p>\n \u201cIn the process of colonization, he (the cloak) was taken away abruptly, violently, taking from the people what represented their greatest strength,\u201d said Yakuy Tupinamb\u00e1, an elder of the Indigenous group.<\/p>\n Centuries later, in 2000, the museum in Copenhagen lent the cloak to an exhibition in Sao Paulo. That\u2019s when Jamopoty\u2019s mother, Amotara Tupinamb\u00e1, first saw it.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen she arrived there, she felt great emotion. The cloak showed her, \u2018I am here.\u2019 \u2026 She was amazed,\u201d Jamopoty recalled. The notion of petitioning for the cloak’s permanent return was born.<\/p>\n Years later, Glic\u00e9ria Tupinamba, from a village in Bahia state, traveled to Copenhagen to help identify pieces they have in their collection. The idea of securing its homecoming gathered pace.<\/p>\n Museums across Europe are under pressure to repatriate cultural objects. For years, the Greek have demanded the return of sculptures from the Parthenon temple<\/a> on the Acropolis, which currently reside in the British Museum. French President Emmanuel Macron oversaw the much-trumpeted restitution of colonial-era treasures to Benin in 2021<\/a>. Since then, France has sent little else of significance amid critics\u2019 claims such moves would empty France\u2019s cherished museums.<\/p>\n Denmark\u2019s National Museum has received three repatriation requests in the past decade, head of research Christian Sune Pedersen told The Associated Press. They responded positively to two, including that of Brazil, deciding to donate one of its five feathered cloaks partly to help rebuild Brazil\u2019s national museum that was ravaged by flames in a devastating 2018 fire<\/a>.<\/p>\n Bringing it back to Brazil was a complicated operation coordinated between the foreign affairs ministry, Brazil’s embassy in Denmark, the national museums of both countries and Tupinamb\u00e1 leaders.<\/p>\n Extreme care was required to avoid damaging the delicate feathers, and its sealed box was only opened once in an air-conditioned environment, said Jo\u00e3o Pacheco de Oliveira, an anthropologist and curator of the National Museum\u2019s ethnographic collections.<\/p>\n It marks the first time that an Indigenous artifact of such significance has been returned to Brazil, he said.<\/p>\n \u201cThe expectation is that this will create new possibilities for donations or even repatriation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Lula\u2019s government took office in 2023, pledging to defend Indigenous groups\u2019 land rights and established a ministry for Indigenous peoples. Such action stood in contrast to his predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro, who refused to expand Indigenous land.<\/p>\n