The National Museum of Ethnology in Leiden has announced that the Netherlands is to return bones and skulls from five Australian Aboriginals to their tribal descendants.

The bones were presented to Sebald Justinus Brugmans, a scientist from  the city of Leiden, by the Australian botanist Joseph Banks in 1819. They will be handed over to two members of the Bundjalung tribe on Tuesday by Science Minister Ronal Plasterk.

Illustration from Wikimedia Commons