zoomata.com staff

If a British historian is right, Italians in Venice have spent the last 400 years or so praying to conqueror Alexander the Great instead of city patron St. Mark.

Both historical figures were mummified and hidden in Alexandria.
Legend has it that remains of the Macedonian king were disguised as those
of Mark the Evangelist to keep them from harm during a religious uprising, while the remains of the saint were smuggled out in a basket to become the centerpiece and namesake of the most elegant drawing room in Europe, St. Mark’s Basilica.

Historian Andrew Chugg, author of ‘The Lost Tomb of Alexander the Great’, wants the remains dug up and examined to prove his theory. Chugg may meet with less resistance from Church officals than expected.

Ettore Vio, architect and procurator of the Venetian basilica, says the foreign historian is but another voice in the chorus of local authorities who have long debated about whether the bones at the crypt in the heart of La Serenissima belong to St. Mark. And that it may be time to discover once and for all whether a skeleton switcheroo took place.

It would be the latest in a series of dramatic discoveries made by Italian scientists using modern technology on ancient remains. Poet Petrarch was recently found to have lost his head when researchers discovered after DNA testing that the skull found in his tomb most likely belongs to a woman. Over the last decade or so, figures like painter Giotto and Dante’s ‘Cannibal Count’ Ugolino della Gherardesca have made headlines and become the object of exhibits, books and documentaries following DNA testing.? text 1999-2004 zoomata.com
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