The New Murrey and Blue blog

Honestly, I begin to wonder how on earth we managed before DNA was discovered. It has transformed so many fields, not least for the police, but its use now reaches way back into history, especially since the discovery of Richard III’s remains in 2012. See here: https://www.historyextra.com/period/medieval/richard-iii-plantagenet-car-park-king-timeline-discovery-leicester-reburial-key-dates/

More recently DNA also proved that Kasper Hauser wasn’t the lost son of the Grand Duke Carl of Baden. See here https://murreyandblue.org/2024/08/07/the-dna-of-a-true-king-versus-the-dna-of-a-fake-prince/.

Now, because of DNA, we have proof that a 12th-century Norwegian saga is true! “….Researchers have confirmed a centuries-old story about a royal attempt to poison water with the help of DNA analysis of 800-year-old human bones from a medieval man’s skeleton found in Norway….” See here: https://greekreporter.com/2024/10/29/medieval-man-dna-norse-sverris-saga-poisoning-plot-true/.

I’m afraid I had trouble with the sentence quoted in the previous paragraph, wondering how DNA analysis helped to poison water 800 years ago! 🙄 Oh dear, how finicky my old grey cells can be at times.

The saga relates that in 1197 AD, during an attack on King Sverre Sigurdsson’s castle near Trondheim in central Norway, a dead man was thrown into a castle well. “….This historical event is mentioned in ‘Sverris Saga‘, a story from the 12th to 14th centuries, which tells the tales of Norwegian and Icelandic kings….” Now it’s believed the remains, first found in 1938, have been identified as the man in the saga.

Of course, having the skeleton is the key….but other tantalising mysteries have to remain mysteries because there is nothing physical to work with. We need the proven remains of the boys in the Tower to discern when they died, and we need access to That Urn to find out what’s inside it. But until some actual evidence is found I’m afraid far too many people will continue to believe the Tudor propaganda that the boys were murdered at Richard’s command in 1483. In spite of all the progress that has been made on his behalf in recent years, Richard remains the original Wicked Uncle.

Read more here https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/dna-analysis-of-medieval-man-thrown-into-a-well-suggests-story-in-norse-saga-really-happened/ar-AA1sVGAs, here https://arstechnica.com/science/2024/10/ancient-dna-sheds-light-on-well-man-from-norse-saga/, and here https://www.newscientist.com/article/2453247-dna-helps-match-well-man-skeleton-to-800-year-old-norwegian-saga/, as well as many other sites.

Go here to see the timeline of DNA’s development: https://www.sciencefocus.com/the-human-body/dna-a-timeline-of-discoveries