Journal Article

Broken Chains of Custody: Possessing, Dispossessing, and Repossessing Lost Wampum Belts

BRUCHAC, MARGARET M.

2018

Overview

In the spring of 2009, two historical shell bead wampum belts--identified as \"early\" and \"rare\" and valued at between $15,000 and $30,000 each--were advertised for sale at a Sotheby's auction of American Indian art objects belonging to the estate of Herbert G. Wellington. 3 One belt, identified as having been collected by Frank G. Speck from the Mohawk community in Oka (Kanesatake, Quebec) before 1929, was tagged with an old accession number from the Heye Foundation/ Museum of the American Indian. The Sotheby's notice caught the attention of the Haudenosaunee Standing Committee on Burial Rules and Regulations (HSC), a consortium of Six Nations Iroquoian chiefs, tribal historians, and community leaders who serve as advocates and watchdogs for tribal territory and cultural property interests. In sum, although both of the wampum belts advertised at Sotheby's were successfully reclaimed, this case study illustrates the pernicious influence of categorical and conceptual distinctions that continue to exert very real power over Indigenous patrimony.

• Publisher: THE AMERICAN PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY PRESS,University of Pennsylvania Press
• Subject: Advertisements / American Indians / Cultural heritage / Mohawk / Museums / Native art / Native culture / Native North Americans / Repatriation