J.T. Zealy
1850
Fassena, profile

Daguerreotype
Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology
President and Fellows of Harvard College, Peabody Number: 35-5-10/53051
 
The legal case of Tamara Lanier v. Harvard University (2019–2025) represents a landmark confrontation over the ownership, moral stewardship, and institutional accountability surrounding historical photographs of enslaved individuals. The daguerreotypes at the center of the dispute—made in 1850 by Joseph T. Zealy under the direction of Louis Agassiz—depict Renty Taylor and his daughter Delia, forcibly photographed in South Carolina to advance Agassiz’s racist theories of polygenesis. In 2019, Tamara Lanier, identifying herself as a direct descendant of Renty and Delia, filed suit against Harvard, asserting that the university had no right to retain, reproduce, or profit from the images, which were created under conditions of coercion and dehumanization. The 2022 ruling by a Massachusetts court acknowledged that while Lanier did not possess a legal claim to the daguerreotypes under existing property law, her case raised legitimate ethical and emotional concerns, particularly regarding the trauma perpetuated by Harvard’s continued possession and use of the images. In a landmark 2025 settlement, Harvard agreed to transfer the daguerreotypes to the International African American Museum in Charleston, South Carolina—where they would be interpreted within a public history framework rooted in descendant community engagement—and also provided a confidential monetary settlement. This outcome marks a pivotal moment in the evolving discourse on reparative justice, institutional reckoning with slavery, and the rights of descendants in determining the fate of visual materials created in contexts of systemic violence.
 
Object Description: Mounted daguerreotype in case, black male, nude to waist, profile view. (Two parallel lines run vertically from cheekbones to temple). J.T. Zealy, photographer. Label reads: "Fassena (carpenter) Mandingo, plantation of Col. Wade Hampton, near Columbia, South Carolina."
 
LL/106124