Sacred image
stirs title fight

The Bishop Museum claims
the 8-inch kii in an ongoing
debate over native artifacts

The Bishop Museum has notified several native Hawaiian organizations that it is not the rightful owner of two sacred items that were found on Molokai and are in the museum's collection.

In a letter to the organizations, the museum also claimed legal ownership of a third Molokai item, a kii, an 8-inch wooden stick figure believed to have spiritual powers.

"No, they don't own the kii under the definition of federal law," said Edward Halealoha Ayau, a spokesman for Hui Malama I Na Kupuna O Hawaii Nei, one of four groups that have staked a claim to the three items.

In the letter dated last Friday, the Bishop Museum said that a pendant and a cowrie shell, found on Moomomi Beach, are not the museum's rightful possession under the terms of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, the law governing the repatriation of human remains and sacred items to native Hawaiians. The museum said it hired outside legal experts to make the determination.

The two items were found in an area believed to be sacred burial sands and were later donated to the museum. Hui Malama claims that the people who found such objects were grave robbers and that the museum does not have rightful ownership to stolen goods.

Museum Director Bill Brown declined to comment. The museum has previously said that if it can establish ownership to an item under state law, then it believes it owns it under NAGPRA.

Ayau disagrees with the museum's interpretation of owning the kii.

The dispute over right of possession could set a precedent here and nationally because many museum collections contain items that were taken from sacred sites by people who later sold or donated them.

The letter is the first time the museum has applied its interpretation of right of possession to an item in its collection.

The museum's letter said that in the case of the kii, it "asserts a right of possession as a good faith purchaser for value from a 'native.' There is no evidence to indicate that the native was a thief."

The kii, according to museum records, was purchased by the museum from Dr. C.M. Hyde, who bought it from a native Hawaiian on Molokai who allegedly found it wrapped in burial kapa.

But Ayau said that under NAGPRA only someone with ownership has the right to give away an item. Ayau contends that the native Hawaiian found the kii and did not have family or other ownership ties. Under NAGPRA the native Hawaiian was not "authorized" to sell it to the museum, Ayau contends.

The letter also asked the claimants to submit documentation demonstrating the closeness of their ties or "cultural affiliation" with the cowrie shell and pendant.

Under NAGPRA the museum will decide which of the four groups has the closest tie to the items before they are released to any of them.

Another claimant to the three artifacts is Na Lei Alii Kawananakoa, a native Hawaiian organization that includes Abigail Kawananakoa, a wealthy Campbell Estate heiress; Rubellite Johnson, a scholar of Hawaiian culture, language and history; and Edith McKinzie, a kuma hula and expert in Hawaiian genealogy.

A third claimant is La'akea Suganuma, president of the Royal Hawaiian Academy of Traditional Arts. The museum declined to name a fourth claimant.