Cambridge University’s Trinity College has agreed to return to the local Sydney clan four Aboriginal spears taken by British explorer Captain James Cook and his landing party when they first arrived in Australia in 1770.
The spears are believed to be the last ones remaining, of dozens collected by the first colonialists.
The decision to return them follows a 20-year campaign by indigenous people.
According to the BBC, Captain Cook first set foot in Australia on a beach at Botany Bay in Sydney’s south, where his arrival with his crew was challenged by two men from the Gweagal clan of the Dharawal peoples, the traditional owners of the land.
The report notes that while many Australians have long seen Captain Cook’s landing story as a foundational event in Australia’s modern history, this view is increasingly controversial, given that Aboriginal people had already been living on the land for tens of thousands of years.
Ray Ingrey, chairman of the community’s Gujaga Foundation, said the Gweagal people had a deep, spiritual connection with the wooden, multiple-tipped spears.
He told the BBC: ‘It’s part of a dreaming story that tells us how our people came to be. So not only that they’re over 253 years old, and gives us a window into our historic past, but also toward that spiritual connection, which makes it so more important.’
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