Latest news with #Asru
CairoScene
21 hours ago
- General
- CairoScene
Manchester Museum Asks Visitors: Should Asru's Mummy Stay on Display?
Manchester Museum has launched a public consultation asking whether it should continue displaying the 2,700-year-old mummy reflecting a wider shift in ethical museum practices and decolonisation. Jun 30, 2025 Manchester Museum is inviting visitors to share their views on whether the 2,700-year-old mummy known as Asru should remain on display. This comes as part of a broader decolonisation effort at the museum, which was named the 2025 European Museum of the Year. A plaque beside the exhibit reads: 'Should we continue to display the body of Asru?' with a postbox nearby for anonymous an affluent woman from ancient Thebes (located in modern Luxor), was mummified and displayed in Manchester since 1825, after her sarcophagus was donated by early 19th-century British collectors. Her presence in the museum is now raising questions about the legacy of colonial-era acquisitions and the ongoing ethical debate over exhibiting human remains taken during imperial rule. The issue reflects wider public concern, including calls from UK MPs to ban the display of ancestral remains acquired during colonial periods. A 2025 report from the All‑Party Parliamentary Group for Afrikan Reparations recommended ending the public display of human remains without consent and facilitating repatriation wherever possible. As part of its wider 'Decolonise!' trail, Manchester Museum has also recontextualised objects from Africa and Asia, pairing them with contemporary artworks and informational booklets that encourage questions about provenance, ethics, and climate justice.
The Guardian
21 hours ago
- General
- The Guardian
Manchester Museum asks visitors if Egyptian woman's body should be taken off display
One of Europe's leading museums is asking visitors if it should continue to display the body of an ancient Egyptian woman 200 years after it was brought to the UK by cotton merchants, as it 'decolonises' some of its most famous exhibits. Manchester Museum, which in May was named 2025's European museum of the year, is running a consultation on the future of Asru, a woman who lived in Thebes, the ancient city in the location of modern-day Luxor, 2,700 years ago. A plaque at the museum asks: 'Should we continue to display the body of Asru?', inviting visitors to submit answers in a postbox underneath. It adds: 'Asru's mummified body was unwrapped at the Manchester Natural History Society in April 1825. She has regularly been on display for the two centuries since. In that time, we have also changed as a museum and are thinking more about how we care for people.' The story of Asru's body is one of several that show how the development of the UK museum sector benefited from colonialism and transatlantic slavery, at a time when the ethics of displaying human bodies and spoils from imperial expansion are being questioned. In March a report by MPs from the all-party parliamentary group for Afrikan reparations called for bans on selling ancestral remains and publicly displaying them without consent. Asru's finely decorated wooden coffin reveals a few biographical details. An affluent woman who was about 60 when she died, her father was called Pa-Kush, which means 'the Kushite', a Black man from modern-day Sudan. Pa-Kush worked as a scribe, a high-status role, when Egypt had Kushite pharaohs. Asru's name means 'her arm is against them'. In the 19th century, Asru's sarcophagus was acquired by Robert and William Garnett, the sons of a former trader in enslaved African people, who had followed him into the cotton industry, research by one of the museum's curators, Campbell Price, found. The Garnetts donated Asru's body to the Manchester Natural History Society, the forerunner to Manchester Museum. Alongside the Asru consultation, the museum has launched its Decolonise! Trail , named after the initiative in arts and culture that is being used to challenge stereotypical perspectives linked to empire and colonialism. The trail links displays of items from Africa and Asia, subverting traditional 'Eurocentric' narratives about them through artworks newly displayed alongside them. It is supported by a booklet that asks questions such as 'Should a desire for knowledge override the wishes of ancient cultures?', 'Do you know where the minerals in your technology come from?' and 'What is climate justice?'. Sign up to The Long Wave Nesrine Malik and Jason Okundaye deliver your weekly dose of Black life and culture from around the world after newsletter promotion Next to African spearheads – items that the booklet describes as having 'reinforced reductive and inaccurate ideas about African people' – is an LGBTQ+ comic strip story by the Congolese artist Edher Numbi. A mural by the British artists the Singh twins in the museum's south Asia gallery examines the link between enslavement and India's colonisation. It features a 1928 quote from the then UK home secretary, William Joynson-Hicks, who, speaking of India as a major export market for 'Lancashire cotton goods', said: 'We did not conquer India for the benefit of the Indians … We conquered India as an outlet for the goods of Britain. We conquered India by the sword, and by the sword we shall hold it.' Chloe Cousins, Manchester Museum's social justice manager, who created the trail, said: 'The trail is new but the concept of decolonising isn't new to Manchester Museum at all. Telling more accurate and nuanced accounts of the history of the collections is one of the ways we can care for the people and communities whose belongings, stories and histories are held here.'
Yahoo
2 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
Manchester Museum poses interesting question to visitors about mummy display
The Manchester Museum is asking visitors whether they think it should take an Egyptian mummy away from display after being in the museum for 200 years. A small plaque has been placed next to the body of Asru, a woman who lived in Thebes some 2,700 years ago. For 200 of those years Asru has been at the Manchester Museum since her she was unwrapped there in 1825. READ MORE: Friends left stunned at Manchester Airport after landing £24,000 in terminal READ MORE: Man killed after being hit by car in M60 horror with motorway closed for 12 hours Join the Manchester Evening News WhatsApp group HERE Now visitors are met with a plaque asking them: 'Should we continue to display the body of Asru?' It also goes into some of her history, explaining: 'Asru's mummified body was unwrapped at the Manchester Natural History Society in April 1825. "She has regularly been on display for the two centuries since. In that time, we have also changed as a museum and are thinking more about how we care for people.' The question is a part of a wider shift in museums across Britain as they more closely interrogate the link between their collections and imperialism, including the Transatlantic Slave Trade, the Guardian reports. Much of the money which built both the physical museum buildings and their collections had its origins in the extractive policies of the British Empire and the mass trafficking of human beings from Africa to North and South America and the Caribbean. Museums and collections dating from after the abolition of slavery are also a part of this. Much of the huge amount of capital given to slave owners as "compensation" would go on to become a massive cash injection for the industrial revolution, including in Manchester, as the former slavers reinvested their money. Asru's body was acquired by Robert and William Garnett, the sons of someone who made money trafficking enslaved people from Africa and who then followed him into the city's booming cotton industry. Study has revealed that Asru was around 60 years old when she died, and the daughter of a "Pa-Kush", meaning a black Sudanese man, who worked as a scribe. The Museum has also launched a Decolonise! Trail, challenging eurocentric approaches to collections. Chloe Cousins, Manchester Museum's social justice manager, who created the trail, said: 'The trail is new but the concept of decolonising isn't new to Manchester Museum at all. Telling more accurate and nuanced accounts of the history of the collections is one of the ways we can care for the people and communities whose belongings, stories and histories are held here.' The Manchester Museum is not the only institution in Manchester to be grappling with the often difficult history of its collections. A piece by artist Kani Kamil at Manchester Art Gallery as part of the exhibition Rethinking the Grand Tour saw her put a pre-1910 Iraqi Kurdish dress on display - but still in the box in which it is stored. This was accompanied by a message written on the wall in Kurdish reflecting on the memory and humanity contained within that box. It is like so many other boxes from all around the world kept hidden away in museum archives here in the UK, hundreds or even thousands of miles from their homes and the people that created them.
The Guardian
2 days ago
- General
- The Guardian
Manchester Museum asks visitors if Egyptian woman's body should be taken off display
One of Europe's leading museums is asking visitors if it should continue to display the body of an ancient Egyptian woman 200 years after it was brought to the UK by cotton merchants, as it 'decolonises' some of its most famous exhibits. Manchester Museum, which in May was named 2025's European museum of the year, is running a consultation on the future of Asru, a woman who lived in Thebes, the ancient city in the location of modern-day Luxor, 2,700 years ago. A plaque at the museum asks: 'Should we continue to display the body of Asru?', inviting visitors to submit answers in a postbox underneath. It adds: 'Asru's mummified body was unwrapped at the Manchester Natural History Society in April 1825. She has regularly been on display for the two centuries since. In that time, we have also changed as a museum and are thinking more about how we care for people.' The story of Asru's body is one of several that show how the development of the UK museum sector benefited from colonialism and transatlantic slavery, at a time when the ethics of displaying human bodies and spoils from imperial expansion are being questioned. In March a report by MPs from the all-party parliamentary group for Afrikan reparations called for bans on selling ancestral remains and publicly displaying them without consent. Asru's finely decorated wooden coffin reveals a few biographical details. An affluent woman who was about 60 when she died, her father was called Pa-Kush, which means 'the Kushite', a Black man from modern-day Sudan. Pa-Kush worked as a scribe, a high-status role, when Egypt had Kushite pharaohs. Asru's name means 'her arm is against them'. In the 19th century, Asru's sarcophagus was acquired by Robert and William Garnett, the sons of a former trader in enslaved African people, who had followed him into the cotton industry, research by one of the museum's curators, Campbell Price, found. The Garnetts donated Asru's body to the Manchester Natural History Society, the forerunner to Manchester Museum. Alongside the Asru consultation, the museum has launched its Decolonise! Trail , named after the initiative in arts and culture that is being used to challenge stereotypical perspectives linked to empire and colonialism. The trail links displays of items from Africa and Asia, subverting traditional 'Eurocentric' narratives about them through artworks newly displayed alongside them. It is supported by a booklet that asks questions such as 'Should a desire for knowledge override the wishes of ancient cultures?', 'Do you know where the minerals in your technology come from?' and 'What is climate justice?'. Sign up to The Long Wave Nesrine Malik and Jason Okundaye deliver your weekly dose of Black life and culture from around the world after newsletter promotion Next to African spearheads – items that the booklet describes as having 'reinforced reductive and inaccurate ideas about African people' – is an LGBTQ+ comic strip story by the Congolese artist Edher Numbi. A mural by the British artists the Singh twins in the museum's south Asia gallery examines the link between enslavement and India's colonisation. It features a 1928 quote from the then UK home secretary, William Joynson-Hicks, who, speaking of India as a major export market for 'Lancashire cotton goods', said: 'We did not conquer India for the benefit of the Indians … We conquered India as an outlet for the goods of Britain. We conquered India by the sword, and by the sword we shall hold it.' Chloe Cousins, Manchester Museum's social justice manager, who created the trail, said: 'The trail is new but the concept of decolonising isn't new to Manchester Museum at all. Telling more accurate and nuanced accounts of the history of the collections is one of the ways we can care for the people and communities whose belongings, stories and histories are held here.'
