At the fringes of cultural value and significance, repatriation comes down to property: who owns what, and who has a right to sell it. However, in the matter of Indigenous repatriation, the question becomes one of justice. After all, can an entity like Hudson’s Bay claim ownership over potentially stolen goods?

The context behind how cultural items are removed from their origin is at the centre of the repatriation argument. Without fully understanding how an item was acquired, sourced or cataloged, there’s no real way to determine ownership. What can be determined, however, is where an item originates. In the end, does it matter if the item was legally traded 300 years ago during a time when colonization — and all of the harm, violence and cultural erasure that came with it — had yet to peak? The reason the item is significant now is because of where it comes from, and what it could symbolize to return it.

In the case of Hudson’s Bay, the issue at hand is one of transparency. The retailer’s choice to move forward with an auction for these artifacts without public assurance that these items are not stolen seems to contradict not only Canada’s commitment to reconciliation but also a 2019 resolution by the United Nations Human Rights Council that calls on member states to develop  a process “to facilitate the international repatriation of Indigenous peoples’ sacred items and human remains,” with support from a variety of specialized international organizations and Indigenous peoples themselves.

And while the focus of recent discourse has been on Indigenous peoples, preservation of cultural heritage is important for all of us. The early preamble to the 1954 Hague Convention, the first treaty written to protect cultural items in times of peace and war, stated that any damage to cultural property regardless of the people or community to whom it belonged constituted “damage to the cultural heritage of all humanity, because every people contributes to the world’s culture.”

When artifacts are sold to the highest bidder, there’s no way to ensure their safe preservation. And because history has already happened, there is no way to replicate the significance of an artifact after it’s been lost, especially when it gets squirrelled away only to be mounted on the wall of a wealthy collector’s study.

Repatriation can be an incredibly emotional and powerful push towards reconciliation.

When a member of the Nisga’a Nation in British Columbia discovered that a memorial totem pole carved for her ancestral grandmother in the 1860s was being housed in Scotland’s National Museum, she quickly mounted an effort to bring the pole home. In 2022, the museum’s board of trustees approved a plan to “rematriate” the pole, honouring the Nisga’a Nation’s matrilineal heritage. In 2023, after nearly 100 years, the totem pole was finally brought home.

Similarly, back in March 2013, a ceremony held in Port Alberni, B.C. saw the repatriation of student artwork done at Alberni Indian Residential School between 1959 and 1964.The artwork was originally collected by volunteer art teacher Robert Aller, who kept samples of all his students’ works before they were donated by his family to the University of Victoria upon his death. The ceremony marked the culmination of a two-year-long project aimed at returning the paintings to their owners or families.

While some survivors chose to accept their artwork into the privacy of their homes, others gave permission for their artwork to be used to raise awareness of the legacy of residential schools in Canada. And while student paintings from the ‘60s are not exactly what we tend to think of as artifacts, their return reinforces the logic of repatriation. Consultation with Indigenous communities can often help determine where an artifact of cultural significance might serve the greatest purpose.

Whether they’re needed for education or for healing, HBC’s artifacts symbolize a deeply rooted and fraught legacy in Canada. Where those items end up is an issue of national importance.

Raquel Medina is currently completing a master’s degree in journalism. She has a previous degree in political science and anthropology from the University of Alberta.