BADU BONSU II — THE AHANTA KING WHOSE HEAD WAS KEPT IN THE NETHERLANDS FOR 171 YEARS
🇬🇭 BADU BONSU II — THE AHANTA KING WHOSE HEAD WAS KEPT IN THE NETHERLANDS FOR 171 YEARS
In 1838, an Ahanta king was executed by Dutch colonial authorities. His head was taken from the Gold Coast and preserved in the Netherlands. For generations, his people carried the memory of their king while his remains stayed thousands of kilometres away.
His name was Nana Badu Bonsu II.
During the 1830s, tensions between the Ahanta kingdom and Dutch authorities escalated into open conflict. In 1838, two Dutch emissaries were killed, and the colonial authorities retaliated against Badu Bonsu II. He was captured, sentenced to death and hanged. His head was then removed and transported to the Netherlands.
There, his remains became part of the anatomical collection at Leiden University Medical Centre. The king who had ruled in the Gold Coast was reduced to a specimen in a European medical collection.
More than a century and a half later, Dutch author Arthur Japin encountered the story while researching his historical novel about Kwasi Boachi, the Asante prince sent to the Netherlands in the 19th century. Reports place his rediscovery of the preserved head around 2002, although accounts differ on the precise date. Japin helped bring the matter to public attention.
The discovery helped set in motion a process that led Ghana to formally seek the return of the king’s remains. The Ahanta community and Ghanaian authorities pursued their repatriation, and the Dutch government eventually agreed.
On 23 July 2009, the remains were formally handed over at a ceremony at the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs in The Hague. Ahanta representatives took part in traditional rites, including the pouring of libation, as the king’s remains were returned to Ghana.
For the Ahanta people, this was about more than bringing home historical remains. It was about dignity, ancestral respect and the right to honour a king whose death had taken place under colonial rule.
Nana Badu Bonsu II’s story is a reminder that colonial history did not end when the fighting stopped. Its consequences could remain in museums and medical collections for generations.
In 2009, after 171 years away, a part of the king’s story finally came home.
