How it works
A museum decides what to acquire, keep, and return based on an object's provenance — its documented history of ownership. ProvenanceQuest hands you real decisions and asks you to reason like a collections professional.
The move in each case
- Read the chain of custody. Who owned it, when, and how did it change hands? A gap in the record — especially over a period of upheaval — is itself evidence.
- Apply the framework. Different situations are governed by different public rules (below).
- Weigh the arguments on every side. These cases are genuinely contested; each choice is a defensible position, tagged with the value it puts first.
- Decide, then reflect. Make the call, read the realistic consequence, and answer the reflection question — the same shape as a real decision memo.
The frameworks (all public)
- NAGPRA (1990) — the US federal law on Native American human remains and sacred objects: inventory, consult descendant communities, and repatriate where affiliation is established.
- The 1970 UNESCO Convention — museums should refuse cultural and heritage material that left its country of origin unlawfully.
- The ICOM Code of Ethics for Museums — acquire nothing without establishing clear, lawful title; do due diligence.
A note on respect
These cases are illustrative — they do not name a real dispute or a real community, and you are never asked to speak as a community. You reason as the museum professional who must decide, taking a claimant community's position as it is publicly stated. That is the discipline: to hold the collection accountable, honestly.
What it's good for (and what we don't claim)
ProvenanceQuest is practice in sourcing, contextualisation, and ethical reasoning (C3 D2.His; RH.11–12.7–9). It is not legal advice and makes no claim to a proven outcome — it's a place to think carefully about hard, real questions.