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Science

Discovering Columbus 24

Posted by michael from the skeletons-in-the-closet dept.
jonerik writes "The New York Times has this article (no registration required) on plans to test the DNA on various sets of bones which are claimed to have been those of Christopher Columbus (or, as he's known in Spain, Cristóbal Colón). The plan is for José Antonio Lorente (English translation here), director of the Laboratory of Genetic Identification at the University of Granada to extract DNA from the bones of Columbus' illegitimate son Hernando and compare it to DNA extracted from bones in Seville and Santo Domingo which are both claimed to be those of Columbus. It is hoped that the testing can be carried out by 2006, the 500th anniversary of Columbus' death."
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Discovering Columbus More

Discovering Columbus

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  • or, as he's known in Spain, Cristóbal Colón

    I always thought he was an ass. Now I know he's a colon.

    Oh, F1R57 P057.
    • "The New York Times has this article (no registration required) on plans to test the DNA on various sets of bones which

      And incidentally, when I clicked the link to the alleged no-registration-required article, it asked me to register. Cute.
      • And incidentally, when I clicked the link to the alleged no-registration-required article, it asked me to register. Cute.

        Sorry. In theory replacing the "www" part of a N.Y. Times URL with "college" is supposed to bypass the registration. Guess it didn't work in this instance.

  • Finally a legitimate use for illegitimate bones?
    • The real questions are: How do they know the bones of his illegit kid are really of the kid? How do they know that the illegit kid is really his (that is, the mother could have been lying!)? It seems that this would only raise questions, no matter what results came back...earlier post on scam bones is also valid....

  • I doubt it... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by gnovos ( 447128 ) <gnovos.chipped@net> on Friday May 24, 2002 @04:57PM (#3581530) Homepage Journal
    There is absolutly NO WAY that either of these two cities would be willing to let anyone test these bones. It is too big a risk. Back in the days when the bones were first collected, selling bones of famous people was a scam as ubiquitous as emails from Nigeria today. There is a REAL good chance that *neither* of these sets of bones are real and a possibility they are not even human...
  • Why all the fuss about Columbus? He wasn't the first European to "find" the "New World". It was either the Norse (Leif the Lucky and Erik the Red move west after perpetrating the "Greenland" real estate scam). Or some lunatic Irish monks in the sea-going coracles. And the Clovis beat them both by playing the old "Bering landbridge" card. Time to rename Columbus Day I think.
    • Maybe you're just disagreeing to have fun, but the fact is that Columbus' visit was the one that caused a huge change in the world. When would the America's have been colonized if Columbus hadn't done it? Maybe around the same time, I don't know if there were other explorers pitching the same thing. But it doesn't matter that the phone would have been invented at exactly the same time if Bell hadn't been born, we still celebrate him as the inventor.

  • Being born in Italy (Genoa, 1451) [millersville.edu] his real name was Cristoforo Colombo, even though I guess he is mostly referred to with hi Spanish name Cristobal Colon
  • Everyone's dream job: playing with a 500-year old guy's bone.

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