The Museum of London has announced it plans to re-bury most of the 17,000 skeletons in its collection after proper study and has sparked debate focusing on the morality of keeping human remains for research purposes.

The 17,000 skeletons are Britain’s largest collection of archaeologically excavated human remains and the museum’s director, Jack Lohman, believes the possible reburial of the collection remains ‘an ethical issue’.

Consequently, the museum is currently reviewing different long-term approaches to the storage and curation of its skeletons, which could provide a solution that is deemed both ethically acceptable and also recognises the importance of the skeleton’s research value. Long-term storage options include using a church, cemetery or mausoleum.

Hedley Swain, head of the museum’s Early History department, said: “We take our responsibility as the holder of the country’s largest collection of excavated human remains very seriously and it is only natural for us to examine what to do with them. Reburial is one option, but it must be weighed against the very real research value of this material. It is hoped that a solution can be found which all will feel comfortable with.”

The museum has also recently been awarded a grant of £435,000 by the Wellcome Trust to create a groundbreaking online database to give details of many of the skeletons in the collection for use by researchers.

The Wellcome project will be undertaken by the museum’s newly created Centre For Human Bio-Archaeology, which is part of the London Archaeological Archive and Research Centre which curates evidence from over 5,000 archaeological excavations in London. Details: www.museumoflondon.org.uk