Mi’kmaq regalia to return home to Nova Scotia after 130 years in an Australian museum

By The Canadian Press on February 15, 2023.

HALIFAX – Mi’kmaq regalia kept in an Australian museum for more than 130 years will finally be returned to Millbrook First Nation in Nova Scotia.

Heather Stevens, manager and senior heritage interpreter with the Millbrook Cultural and Heritage Centre, says she will travel next month to Melbourne and bring the regalia home.

Stevens says work to repatriate Mi’kmaq moccasins, a jacket, a pipe and a brooch from Australia began 12 years ago.

She says it will be incredibly emotional to have the items at Millbrook First Nation, which is near where they are believed to have been crafted by a Mi’kmaq artist in the 1800s.

The plan is for the items to be displayed prominently in the cultural centre near Truro, “so it’s the first thing people see when they walk in.”

Stevens says she will be accompanied by a Mi’kmaq pipe-carrier on her trip to the Museums Victoria in Melbourne who will perform ceremonies there and in Nova Scotia upon the regalia’s return, some time in March.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 15, 2023.

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This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Meta and Canadian Press News Fellowship.