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ABSTRACT
The study and curation of human remains in the United Kingdom underwent a sea-change in response to the publication of the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) guidance in 2005. Curatorial and research ethics and practice have improved, but these unique collections face new challenges – archives which are full and an increasing demand for samples for stable isotope and ancient DNA studies. This article reviews how holdings were and continue to be created and the ethical and practical issues that arise from these decisions. In contrast to much of the literature on this topic, it does not focus on the repatriation process and its consequences for UK museum practice. Instead, we address contemporary and future concerns regarding human remains excavated and curated in England, particularly issues of consent, permission and ancient DNA analysis.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the editor and reviewers for their suggestions regarding this work, and thank our colleagues working in the commercial sector for their advice, Simon Mays (HE) for his advice, Heather Bonney (NHM) and the HTA for their help regarding licensing. RR is grateful to her colleagues, Jelena Bekvalac, Helen Ganiaris and MoL’s Visitor Hosts. MC is grateful for many discussions with colleagues at many institutions including the Natural History Museum, University College London, National University of Australia, Te Papa Museum (New Zealand) and the Smithsonian Institute.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1. An HTA licence is required for the storage or use of relevant material for a scheduled purpose as defined by the Human Tissue Act (2004). If an applicant is successful, a charge will be made for issuing one.
2. See Mays (Citation2017) for an overview of when and which licences are necessary for the excavation/removal of human remains in England.
3. The most significant documents are the ‘Guidance to the care and treatment of human remains in museums’ published by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (Citation2005) and the ‘Human Tissue Act’ (Human Tissue Act 2004; Human Tissue (Scotland) Act 2006).
4. Formerly, the Advisory Panel on the Archaeology of Christian Burials in England (APABE), which was created by the Ministry of Justice, the Church of England and Historic England (formerly, England Heritage).
5. A contractor may be responsible for the human remains for many years, over a decade from excavation to archive in some cases (see McKinley Citation2013).
6. Often the site archive will be divided between a museum/archive and the university, with only the human remains being deposited at the university.
7. APABE has produced guidelines to help practitioners in the UK (Mays et al. Citation2013).
9. As defined by the Museums Association (https://www.museumsassociation.org/about/frequently-asked-questions).
10. For example, as part of the accreditation scheme implemented by Arts Council England (http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/supporting-museums/accreditation-scheme-0). We recognize that there is considerable variation in standards within the museum sector, and, with cuts, many struggle to uphold the standards of the accreditation scheme, which impacts on collections.
11. This is an area of considerable debate, particularly as public funding decreases, with many arguing that they should be exempt (see Bell Citation2014).
12. A faculty is a licence issued by the Church to allow work to take place on church buildings, their contents and grave-yards (http://www.churchcare.co.uk/churches/guidance-advice/making-changes-to-your-building/permissions/faculty-jurisdiction).
13. Mrs Maxwell was excavated from Chelsea Old Church in 2000 and is curated by the Museum of London (Redfern and Bekvalac Citation2017).
14. Only a limited number of published excavations have been carried out at disused non-conformist/dissenter or nineteenth-century Roman Catholic burial grounds, although HS2 may change this.
15. For example, https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/oct/25/london-dumping-ground-essex-skeleton-crossrail-closet.
16. For the United Kingdom, this is outlined by the Intellectual Property Office (Citation2015) and Bradshaw, Bowyer and Haufe (Citation2010). An analogous situation is that of cast material and the ethical and legal aspects of its ownership, use and selling (see Monge and Mann Citation2005).
17. Where descendants of named individuals are known to the institution, it is standard practice to include them in this decision-making process, but they too are providing, at best, only proxy consent.
18. In 2016, Citigen was established to help engage the public with genetic information about past communities, and to provide an informed voice for debates concerning national identity and citizenship (http://www.citigen.org).
19. Researchers undertaking genetic work are obliged to deposit their data with a bank as part of the peer-review process. For example, the publication Nature (http://www.nature.com/sdata/data-policies/repositories).
20. The depositing institution is named on the burial licence but does not have stewardship of the remains until the deed of transfer is given over.
21. For example, the American Sioux Indian Chief ‘Long Wolf’ was buried at Brompton Cemetery in London in 1892. His remains were repatriated in 1997 to his community in South Dakota (BBC News Citation2005). His grave was marked by a tombstone, but for many others, particularly of low socio-economic status, and where cemetery plans have been lost, their graves will be anonymous.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Rebecca Redfern
Rebecca Redfern, PhD, is a Curator of Human Osteology at the Museum of London, having previously worked as the Curator of Physical Anthropology at the British Museum and as a osteoarchaeologist on the Spitalfields Project for Museum of London Archaeology. Her research interests and publication history include the ethics and practice of curating human remains, the bioarchaeology of Roman Britain and a book focusing on injury and trauma in past societies.
Margaret Clegg
Margaret Clegg, PhD, is now an honorary senior research fellow at UCL, having been the Head of the Human Remains Unit at the Natural History Museum, London. She is a biological anthropologist who has worked at a number of UK universities, and her work at the NHM involved the provenancing of human remains requested for repatriation but also a large-scale data collection project. Her research interests and publication history cover repatriation, ethics and the effects of culture on the skeleton.