Discovered remains belonging to Christopher Columbus

Although Columbus died in the Spanish city of Valladolid in 1506, he wanted to be buried on the island of Hispaniola, today shared by Haiti and the Dominican Republic. His remains were brought there in 1542, transferred to Cuba in 1795, then brought to Seville in 1898 after Spain lost control of Cuba in the Spanish-American War. On October 10, after two decades of testing and DNA research, forensic expert José Antonio Lorente confirmed that the incomplete remains in the Seville church belonged to Columbus.

For a long time, many experts believed that the tomb inside the church contained Columbus’s remains, but it was not until 2003 that Lorente and historian Marcial Castro were granted permission to open the tomb and find the remains inside. At that time, DNA technology could not yet decode small amounts of genetic material to provide accurate results.

“Thanks to new technology, the hypothesis that the remains in Seville are those of Christopher Columbus has been clearly confirmed,” said Lorente, who led the study at the University of Granada. This conclusion was reached after the research team compared DNA from the tomb with DNA taken from Columbus’s brother Diego and his son Fernando.

The scientist also commented that part of Columbus’s remains may still be in the Caribbean. In 1877, excavations at the church of Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic discovered a small lead box with the inscription “Famous and distinguished man, Christopher Columbus”. The remains in the box are now buried at the Faro a Colón (Columbus Lighthouse) monument in Santo Domingo Este.

The achievement in DNA analysis also revealed whether the explorer was Italian or not, a controversial issue in the scientific community. Some say Columbus was born in Genoa, while others think he was Polish, Spanish, Scottish or Jewish. Research on nationality is complicated by several factors including large amounts of data, but Lorente says the results from his and his colleagues’ research are almost completely reliable.

Although the research team does not know exactly where Columbus was born, they think it is most likely Western Europe, possibly the Spanish city of Valencia. They speculate Columbus hid his Jewish origin or converted to Catholicism to avoid religious persecution.

Columbus set sail on August 3, 1492 from the port of Palos, Spain, hoping to find a waterway to Asia to exchange goods. With three ships named Nina, Pinta and Santa Maria, Columbus and about 100 sailors embarked on a journey that took them to the other side of the world. On October 12, 1492, the fleet landed in what is now the Bahamas and later that month, Columbus discovered Cuba and thought it was mainland China. In December, the expedition continued to find Hispaniola, which Columbus thought was Japan. On his second voyage in 1493, Columbus reached Puerto Rico and enslaved many native Taino people.