Human Remains at the Museum für Naturkunde

The history of human remains in the collection of the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin. Research and historic responsibility

As part of its Future Plan, the Museum für Naturkunde intensively addresses the process of collection discovery and development. In the context of this collection discovery, we have gained new insights regarding human remains at the Museum für Naturkunde. These will be described in the following.

The Museum für Naturkunde Berlin was part of the local and national network of institutions that integrated human bodies in their collection, categorized, analyzed, and sold them.[1] Even before the establishment of modern-day disciplines such as biology, medicine, and anthropology, scientists were involved in the racialization, objectification, and categorization of humans under the influence of the theory of evolution.[2] Especially in the context of colonial expansion, but also during the Nazi reign and in the GDR, ethical boundaries were crossed in the acquisition and study of human remains.[3] This contexts as well as the importance of human remains for societies of origin and descendants require special care in dealing with these sensitive parts of the collection. Thus, they necessitate a special prioritisation regarding the exploration of their origin.

The Museum für Naturkunde Berlin in the context of Berlin’s collection history

The network of institutions that acquired and stored human remains included several multiple collections in Berlin. Besides the oldest anthropological collection in Berlin, the Charité’s Anatomical Collection, another collection (the “S-Sammlung” at the Museum für Völkerkunde) was formed under Felix von Luschan. The “S-Sammlung” is exemplary for the paths of several collections through Berlin’s institutions: following Luschan’s death in 1924, it was given to the Berlin University and located at the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Institut für Anthropologie (Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology) under Eugen Fischer. After the end of World War II, it came to  the Institut für Anthropologie (Institute for Anthropology) at the Humboldt University Berlin where it was curated along with the Rudolf Virchow collection by the Berliner Gesellschaft für Anthropologie, Ethnologie und Urgeschichte (BGAEU) (Berlin Society for Anthropology, Ethnology and Prehistory). As part of the univerity reform of 1968, these collections found their way to the Museum für Naturkunde, from there to the Charité in 1996 and ultimately to the Museum für Vor-und Frühgeschichte (Museum for Prehistory and Early History) and thus returned into the BGAEU’s possession.[4] This network of institutions is interlinked both historically and in the context of the history of collections. We can therefore assume a shared historical connection that requires a trans-institutional investigation into the history of human remains in Berlin.

Human remains at the Museum für Naturkunde

So far, our preparatory work has shown that the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin no longer keeps human remains that can for certain be assigned to colonial contexts. In the case of collections that potentially come from a context of appropriation characterized by colonial structures of power, we currently investigate the specific circumstances under which these objects were acquired. Therefore, the results presented here are preliminary.

The paleontological collection contains a skull with mandible from New Guinea with ritual engraving and staining on the os frontale and some teeth replaced by wooden pins (MB.Ho.169). Originally, this skull was part of the collection of Heinrich Christian Umlauff in Hamburg that specialized on the ethnographic part of the company Umlauff and organized “Völkerschauen” and exhibitions. Thus, the skull possibly comes from a colonial context. The circumstances of its acquisition are the subject of ongoing research. Throughout the last years, the skull was not used for exhibition, research, and teaching purposes. However, it is possible that it was used in teaching during the 1990s since the skull was stored in a cabinet on the “developmental history of the human” alongside skeleton parts and skulls for teaching purposes. Furthermore, a photo of the skull was available on the MfN’s website for many years.

Moreover, the paleontological collection holds bones and bone fragments from Ecuador that were appropriated between 1868 and 1876 and partially feature anatomical inscriptions. The collection’s catalogue, the labels, and the associated publications provide further evidence. We quote them in their original language to answer questions of provenance and point out that racialized designations can be found in catalogues and publications until today: ‘Rec. Indianerknochen der Coll. Reiss & Stübel cf. Branco Pal. Abh. 1. Punin, Ecuador’ (‘indian bones’) (collection nr. MB.Ho. 508-532).[5] According to the definition and overview of the German Museums Association’s guideline on collections from colonial contexts, Ecuador after 1821 is not considered a colonial context. However, it must be assumed that colonial structures continued to have an effect even after the end of formal colonial rule, affecting the acquisition of the indigenous population’s mortal remains by Europeans.

The mentioned researchers, Wilhelm Reiß (1838–1908) and Alphons Stübel (1835–1904), travelled to South America between 1868 and 1876 to study volcanoes. They studied chemistry and mineralogy but collected and researched across multiple disciplines. They found experts to help them in publishing their ethnological and natural-historical collections.[6] Their ethnological collections in particular was met with great interest. Today, these collections are kept at ethnological museums in Berlin, Leipzig, and Dresden. Also, Reiß and Stübel dedicated a comprehensive publication to the burial ground of Ancon in Peru where they excavated numerous mummy bundles.[7]

In its foreword, the book mentioned in the collection catalogue as well as on the labels of these human remains includes the following comments by Wilhelm Reiß:

“I also want to note that the collections obtained by the Indians of the surrounding area contained bones by living domestic animals as well as by humans mixed with fossil remains. Just as the fossil bones washed out from the tuffs, the skeleton parts of those animals that currently perished on the pastures and paths as well as the rests of the Indian graves located in the Quebradas (mountain gorges KK) must be washed up together in the brook bed. For the Indian, all bones are equally worthless, but since the foreigner pays for these bones, he brings him everything that he can find.”[8] 

Not only does this quote contain racist language, but also derogatory and generalizing statements on the worth of human remains for the local population who, maybe under the circumstances of material need, were forced to sell these bones. According to Reiß and Stübel, the specific context of acquisition was characterized neither by violence exerted in this situation nor by grave-robberies. Apparently, Reiß and Stübel did not deliberately acquire human remains since they were actually searching for fossil mammal bones when they bought collections of bones from the local population.

Further statements on the acquisition context describe the situation in the “bone gulch” of Punin. According to these statements, many fossil mammal bones were just scattered about as it would otherwise have been difficult to remove them from the tuff:

“One is forced to collect the fossil remains washed out by the rainwater, or one must at least limit oneself to removing such pieces where the atmospheric gases have already done some work in advance. And there is no shortage of that here. Skulls were revealed in the brook bed and on the sides, large tubular bones protrude from the ravine’s walls like mighty pegs, and many lie loosely between the large blocks in the ground of the ravine.”[9] 

So far, we cannot determine whether these human remains from Ecuador were used for research or exhibited.

Further human remains in the collection of the Museum für Naturkunde

According to our present knowledge, the following human remains can also be found at the Museum für Naturkunde: Human bones in the osteological reference collection for reference and teaching purposes that partially come from bombed-out graves in Berlin and war ruins from the time of World War Two, including a few from Morocco with no further details as well as some bones and remains from German and French sites. Furthermore, there is a complete skeleton of unknown origin. In GDR times, it was exhibited next to the Brachiosaurus brancai in the dinosaur hall for size comparison. Also, as part of the embryological subcollection, there are human remains in the form of developmental stages as a series of cuts or as alcohol material. The embryological subcollection is a permanent loan from the Netherlands and not the property of the MfN.

Next steps

We are currently developing a research project on the aforementioned human remains at the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin. In addition, we are working on documenting the human remains that have previously been held at the Naturkundemuseum Berlin and clarifying their contexts of acquisition. We aim at closing the research gap concerning the history of human remains at the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin, especially with regards to the interconnection between museums and university collections in Berlin and in Germany. In order to do so, it is vital to analyze the appropriation of human remains as part of the disciplinary history of natural science and as an expression of a widespread transdisciplinary collection practice.

The Museum für Naturkunde works on funding for more intensive research on these connections and our own collection history of human remains in the context of Berlin’s institutions. Results from other research projects on collection objects from colonial contexts are very useful in researching the history of human remains at the MfN.

For any questions and suggestions, please contact humanities@mfn.berlin.