Norfolk's leading cultural institution is coming under increasing pressure to return artworks removed from Africa in the 19th century by British imperial troops.
The Sainsbury Centre's collection includes several items of so-called Benin Bronzes, elaborately decorated sculptures taken from the kingdom of Benin, in modern-day Nigeria, during an 1897 military expedition.
The centre's objects are among hundreds of the artworks held by British museums, which are facing growing calls from the Nigerian government and campaigners to repatriate them.
Those calls have intensified this week after the Horniman Museum, in London, said it would be transferring 72 items to Nigerian ownership, making it the first in the UK to take such action on this scale.
Professor Abba Tijani, from Nigeria's National Commission for Museums and Monuments, urged institutions like the Sainsbury Centre to follow the Horniman's example and "do the right thing".
"We are not looking at monetary value. We are not looking at what will be accrued," he added.
“We are looking at them doing the right thing."
The Sainsbury Centre has declined to say whether it would like to keep the items or allow them to return.
Jago Cooper, its executive director, said: "It is great to see how some of the most challenging and emotive aspects of world history are being addressed through global collaboration and open dialogue.
"Museums have to be places that continually engage and respond to societal change as this is the way they stay vibrant and relevant in an ever-changing world.”
The largest collection of Benin Bronzes is at the British Museum, which has 900 objects. There are around 5,000 scattered across the world.
The Sainsbury Centre, on the University of East Anglia campus in Norwich, declined to say how many artworks it has, but its online catalogue shows at least eight.
On the catalogue, a description next to each item says: "The Sainsbury Centre acknowledges the ownership of this object is contested due to the circumstances of its removal from the Royal Court of Benin in 1897 by British colonial action."
The British Museum is prevented from returning its Bronzes by legislation.
However, museums and galleries like the Sainsbury Centre are free to do so.
Glasgow Life is in the process of returning 17 Benin objects and similar actions are underway in Oxford and Cambridge.
In 2026, the Nigerian government will open the Edo Museum of West African Art in Benin City to house the largest collection of Benin Bronzes ever assembled.
Germany signed an agreement with Nigeria this summer to transfer ownership from its museum collections of more than 1,000 items taken from Benin. France has also returned items.
A spokesman for the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport said: "Museums and galleries in the UK operate independently of government.
"Therefore decisions relating to the care and management of their collections are a matter for the trustees of each museum."
WHAT ARE THE BENIN BRONZES?
The artworks are not from the modern state of Benin, and many are not bronze.
The items were seized from the kingdom of Benin, what is now Benin City in Nigeria, in 1897 during a military expedition against the local ruler.
Soldiers burned and partially destroyed the Benin Royal Palace in 1897, looting and pillaging as they went. The Oba, or King, was forced into exile.
At the time, the assault was claimed to be in retaliation for an attack on a British trade mission a month earlier.
Many historians now see it as part of a wider attempt by Britain to break up a wealthy trading competitor and seize its assets.
Benin was swallowed into Nigeria under the British Empire before Nigerian independence in 1960.
The Bronzes themselves are complex and elaborately decorated sculptures, made from bronze, brass, wood, ivory and other materials.
They were created over 600 years by craftsmen working for the royal court.
They include beautiful human and animal figures and royal regalia.
Among the items held at the Sainsbury Centre in Norwich include the head of an Oba sculpture, a plaque fragment representing a Portuguese soldier and the mask of a cow.
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