In 1838, after decapitating two Dutch emissaries and decorating his throne with their heads, King Badu Bonsu II, the ruler of the Ahanta tribe in present day Ghana, was himself beheaded by Dutch soldiers. For more than 150 years, King Bonsu's head was lost until an author found it stored in a jar of formaldehyde in a Dutch museum. Ghana immediately asked for the King's severed head back and, in July 2009, members of the Ahanta flew to The Hague and staged a mourning ceremony that included pouring gin libations on the floor of the Foreign Ministry before taking the head back to Ghana.
Top 10 Famous Stolen Body Parts
In a ceremony on May 9, a French museum in the town of Rouen returned to officials from New Zealand the embalmed head of a Maori warrior, which had languished in the museum as an exotic collectible for over a century. TIME takes a look at history's other notable pilfered remains.