medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
In a message dated 17/10/2003 22:24:38, [log in to unmask] writes:
<< L's relics in Padua
were DNA-tested in 2001; my source says they were "found to be probably
genuine." Genuine what? Genuinely related to somebody? Genuinely human
bones? I really don't understand this. >>
I expect someone else who has the time will do a search on this and come up
with a url. However, from memory of news items at the time, I think what was
meant by 'genuine' was that the radio-carbon dating gave a mean date of the
first century AD, and that chemical analysis of the teeth and bones suggested that
their owner may have been brought up or lived in the Eastern Mediterranean
(rather than, say, Italy or northern Europe). I am not sure where DNA comes into
it - I thought that DNA extraction from long-dead bones was still quite
difficult, though I suppose improvements in techniques are taking place all the
time.
Graham Gould
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