Update: pre-Hispanic mosaic skull repatriated to Mexico

The Mixtec human skull with turquoise, shell, jadeite and quartz mosaic ornamentation has been repatriated to Mexico after more than 60 years spent on display at the National Museum of Ethnology (Wereldmuseum) in Leiden, the Netherlands. It will first go on display at the Museo de las Culturas de Oaxaca, but its permanent home will be the Yucu Saa Community Museum in Villa de Tututepec, Oaxaca, a local museum in the heart of the indigenous Ñuu Savi community, descendants of the Mixtec.

The Wereldmuseum acquired the skull from an American antiquities dealer in 1963 for the equivalent of about $20,000. There was no provenance, very common in an era when unrestrained looting of archaeological sites was rampant and neither the market nor collectors nor museums cared about legitimate ownership histories. The elaborate adornment of the skull ranked it as one of the greatest examples of Mixtec craftsmanship from the Late Postclassic Period (1200-1521 A.D.).

Doubts begin to rise about its authenticity in 2010 after a similar skull was discovered to be a forgery. Studies in 2011 and 2012 found that the skull itself and the mosaic materials did date to that period, but 99% of the adhesive used to affix the mosaic to the skull was from the 20th century. Researchers believe it was created in Oaxaca’s border region using turquoise and human remains found in a dry cave to create a plausible fake for the international art market.

The campaign for repatriation came a decade later when artist Daniel Aguilar Ruvalcaba found about the skull and its complex history while he was in Amsterdam doing a residency at the Rijksakademie. He teamed up with the Nchivi Ñuu Savi collective, an organization dedicated to the promotion of Ñuu Savi culture and rights, to petition the Netherlands’ government for restitution. In 2023, Mexico’s government filed a request for repatriation which was approved at the end of 2024.

The skull was officially returned to Mexico in May 2025 where it was transferred to the Directorate of Public Registry of Monuments and Archaeological and Historical Zones (DRPMZAH) of the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH).

Physical anthropologist Olaf Bello Cardoso, from the DRPMZAH, emphasizes that the skull offers biological and social information, which can be further studied in complementary studies, such as radiocarbon dating. He considers it feasible to obtain samples from some teeth or from the temporal bone, the hardest part of the skull, which exceptionally preserves ancient DNA.

“From an anthropological perspective, in addition to conducting physical analyses of the skull, it is important to decipher who the person behind the turquoise mosaic is. For example, it is known that the skull from Tomb 7 of Monte Albán was part of an offering dedicated to a principal figure; in the case of the now repatriated skull, it is possible that the intention was to exalt the individual with the ornamentation of his skull,” he notes.

Meanwhile, the Nchivi Ñuu Savi collective submitted a petition signed by 1,020 residents of Tututepec to INAH asking that their ancestor’s skull be displayed at the community’s own museum, not in the capital. INAH representatives visited the Yucu Saa Museum in June and worked on a plan for the Mixtec’s skull’s safe display. The museum is working to improve its security and exhibition space to make it appropriate for such a significant piece. The plan is for the skull to go on display there in April 2027 after the changes have been completed.

* This article was originally published here