ANU has returned historic ancestral remains discovered at Lake Mungo in the 1960s and early 1970s to elders from the Willandra Lakes area of Western New South Wales in the first step of their journey home.
The remains, including those known as Mungo Man, were handed to elders of the Mutthi Mutthi, Ngiyampaa and Paakantji/Barkandji people during a formal ceremony at the university.
“ANU has been custodian of the remains for four decades, and has treated them with great care and respect. It is now time for them to be returned to the care of their Indigenous descendants,” said ANU Vice-Chancellor Professor Ian Young AO.
“ANU was happy to receive the request from the traditional custodians of the Willandra Lakes region to hand back the historic ancestral remains and we are pleased to see the remains start their journey back to country.”
At the request of the Willandra Lakes communities, the remains were transferred to the National Museum of Australia’s (NMA) repatriation unit ahead of their anticipated return to Lake Mungo.
The oldest human remains discovered in Australia and dating back 40,000 years, the remains have been the subject of extensive research and helped rewrite the anthropological history of Australia.
[Photo: Steve Meredith, Rose Whitau & Natasha Langley]
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