DNA verifies Columbus’ remains in Spain

Spanish bones linked to explorer, but Dominican claim could still be valid

Associated Press
Updated: 10:33 p.m. CT May 19, 2006

MADRID, Spain - Spanish researchers said Friday that they have resolved a century-old mystery surrounding Christopher Columbus's burial place, which both Spain and the Dominican Republic claim to be watching over. Their verdict: Spain's got the right bones. - CNN
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This does not mean that the Dominican Republic does not also have some of his remains. However, the DR isn't allowing any testing, so the truth of their claim is not known.

Further DNA testing may provide strong evidence of exactly where Columbus is from, something that remains in dispute.

"Castro says the team is now focusing their DNA tools on another Columbus mystery: his country of origin. Traditional theory says he was from Genoa, Italy, but another line of argument says Columbus was actually from the Catalonia region of northeast Spain.

One piece of evidence supporting this latter idea is that when Columbus wrote back from the New World in Spanish — not Italian — he used words and phrases that reflected influence from the Catalan language, Castro said.

The new team has now collected DNA samples from more than 350 men in Catalonia whose last name is Colom — the Catalan way of saying Columbus — and from 80 in Italy whose last name is Colombo. The material is obtained by wiping the underside of their tongues with a cotton swab."

In this case, it is the Italians that aren't cooperating.

I did a paper on Columbus in the early 90s. I am convinced that, if the Italian claims are true, then further testing would find that his family hadn't been in Italy too long. There is no record of his family in Italy before his father, and there should be. (Other families, not only wealthy ones, have records from before that time.) I don't think that there is any record of his having written in any dialect of Italian. He could have been any one of almost a dozen ethnic heritages; there is evidence for quite a few. (But, no, I don't think he was Macedonian.)

quote:

There is no record of his family in Italy before his father

Some have theorized that the reason for this is that his father converted from Judaism and changed his name. Look what he named his son, can there be a more overtly symbolic Christian name that Christopher Dove? Not an uncommon practice among converts.

If I had to bet, JR, I would say that his family was Jewish. There is as much evidence for that as for any other group, if not more. The timing is right, too. Had his family been living in Spain, they may have moved out (to Italy) when they saw the pressure to expel the Jews getting stronger.