The towering, hand-carved totem pole is being rematriated, not repatriated, and after being put into a sleeping state on Monday the 11-metre (37ft) object will be transported in a military aircraft from its current home in Edinburgh to what is, everyone involved agrees, its true home in Canada.
“It was a wonderful occasion,” said the National Museum of Scotland curator, John Giblin, after witnessing the spiritual ceremony to begin the pole’s complicated 4,200-mile journey.