When important people die, things usually go as planned. But sometimes pieces go missing for
religious or political reasons, or… maybe even as the result of a barbaric Ivy League prank.
Margaretha Geertruida MacLeod, better known as Mata Hari, was a Dutch courtesan,
exotic dancer, and convicted spy who worked for the Germans against France during World War I.
"Countries that are at war see spies everywhere. Women, in particular come under suspicion."
She was shot by a firing squad after spending her final night in Vincennes,
the same place where the doomed King Louis XVI
and his wife Marie Antoinette spent their final hours before execution.
What happened to her body is less clear. There were initially rumors
that the execution had been faked and she hadn't really died. But as far as is known,
she was indeed shot and ended up as a classroom cadaver at the University of
Paris' medical school for student dissection. Apparently, no one had shown up to claim it.
Now, according to Georgetown University, her head was, at some point, separated from
the rest of her body, preserved, and taken to the Paris Museum of Anatomy,
where it remained until 2000. That year, a museum inventory found that the head
had disappeared without an update to the record, suggesting that it had been stolen. Roger Saban,
then-curator of the museum, noted that there was no way to know when the remains had been
stolen and could only issue a plea for their return. Her head remains missing to this day.
Florentine scientist and polymath Galileo Galilei is best known for building on Polish clergyman
Nicolaus Copernicus' theory of heliocentrism — the idea that the Earth revolves around the sun.
"This discovery was revolutionary, because it really proved, beyond the shadow of a doubt,
that the earth is not the center of the universe."
In the process, he got into a number of fights with churchmen,
which escalated into a papal condemnation.
Galileo died in 1642. He was buried in Florence's Basilica of Santa Croce's Novitiate Chapel — a
small, easily missed side chapel — without much fanfare. But in 1737, his admirers decided he
needed a more majestic tomb. With the help of Duke Gian Gastone de' Medici, admirers moved
his body to the church's north aisle, across from the burial place of famous sculptor Michelangelo
Buonarotti. Despite clerical objections, he got a monument, which remains there to this day.
"I object." "Even I object."
"Then I object, too."
But as the body was being moved, someone removed two of his fingers, one thumb, some vertebrae, and
a tooth. The vertebrae ended up at the University of Padua, while the rest was passed down in one
family until 1905, when they disappeared. They resurfaced at an auction sometime in the 20th
or early 21st century. As the story goes, the label containing the description of the famed
astronomer's body parts, which were kept in a jar, fell off and was lost. The auctioneers had no idea
of the treasure they possessed. But someone who knew his history bought them and brought
them back to Florence's Museum of the History of Science, which has held onto them to this day.
St. Francis Xavier was born in 1506 in Navarre, which is today part of Spain. In 1542,
he became part of a Jesuit mission to minister in the Portuguese colony of Goa, India. There,
he ministered to locals and Portuguese settlers, many of whom were former prisoners,
and caused plenty of problems for the colonial authorities. He would go on to preach in what
is today Malaysia and make the first Roman Catholic convert in Japan — a man named Anjiro.
St. Francis died before heading to China, whereupon he was placed in a casket and taken
to Goa. There, something bizarre happened. Two months after burial, his body was still intact,
despite being covered in lime to dissolve the flesh — a telltale sign of sainthood. As a result,
in 1554, his body was exhibited in Goa, where a Portuguese noblewoman bit off his toe and took it
as a souvenir. The digit resurfaced in Lisbon in 2009 when her descendants made it public.
"it's been there for like a long time, and it's like a miracle to see it."
Most of Francis' body remains in the Basilica of Bom Jesus in Goa. But there
was considerable demand for his relics by Jesuit orders around the globe. In 1614,
his right arm was sent off in pieces to Rome, Malaysia, and Macau. And one of
his hands ended up in Japan. Not ideal, but at least he can be venerated all over the world.
Anne Boleyn was the second wife of Henry VIII following his bitter campaign for a divorce
from Catherine of Aragon. She is credited with turning Henry towards Protestantism
as a way of obtaining a divorce without the pope's approval. But after two miscarriages
and charges of adultery, Boleyn fell out of favor and was executed in 1536.
Anne was buried in the Chapel Royal of St. Peter ad Vincula near the Tower of London. But,
according to the East Anglian Daily Times, there is a country estate called Erwarton Hall
that Boleyn had frequented when visiting her aunt and uncle. Legend has it that,
after her execution, her heart was removed and sent in a small heart-shaped casket
to Erwarton to be buried in the crypt. In 1837, this heart-shaped casket resurfaced
and was buried with a plaque claiming that it belonged to the dead queen.
"They found a casket which contained dust, which they believe to be Anne Boleyn's heart."
This isn't the only legend involving Boleyn's remains, either. It's been alleged that,
in the 1840s, Anne's whole body – heart included – was moved from London to her ancestral home near
the village of Salle. Obviously, they can't both be true, but there's no way to prove
either story. Unless someone can ask her ghost, who, legend has it, haunts Salle every May 19.
Geronimo's Skull
Geronimo was an Apache leader and medicine man best known for his
dogged resistance to American and Mexican encroachment on his tribe's territory.
"At the time, he's really one of America's great enemies, but then,
slowly, when people see he's fighting for his own people, he becomes a hero."
Geronimo died in 1909 at Fort Sill, Oklahoma,
after 14 years in confinement. Geronimo is buried in the Beef Creek Apache Cemetery.
Legend has it that, in 1917, the body was dismembered by none other than the members
of Yale secret society Skull and Bones under the leadership of Prescott Bush — father of
President George H.W. Bush and grandfather of President George W. Bush. According to ABC News,
Bush and some of his fellow Bonesmen went down to Ft. Sill while school was out and
dug up the bones to bring back to "The Tomb" — Skull and Bones' New Haven headquarters.
So is it true? A letter between two Bonesmen discovered in Yale's Sterling Memorial Library
appears to confirm the rumor, although Bonesmen — at least those willing to
talk — have always denied the story. But Geronimo's great-grandson Harlyn
believes Geronimo's skull really is at Yale and offered his own DNA to be tested against it,
so that the bones can be returned to the Apache chief's ancestral home in Gila, Arizona.
"I spoke with several Bonesmen, who told me that inside the Tomb there is a glass
display case containing a skull. And the Bonesmen have always called it 'Geronimo'."
Yale denies possessing the skull or any other bones of Geronimo. Furthermore,
Yale historian Alexandra Robbins notes that there's been nearly a century of
opportunity for one of Skull and Bones' 800 or so members to move the bones somewhere else,
making it unlikely that they'll ever resurface.
Nearly everyone alive on November 22, 1963, remembers where they were when
President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. What people don't know is that
part of his brain went missing from the National Archives in 1966. According to Boston Magazine,
Kennedy's brain was removed from his skull during his autopsy and ended up
in a locked cabinet in the Executive Office of the President. Eventually,
it went to the National Archives, and from there it disappeared.
JFK researcher James Swanson has theorized that the president's brother Robert Kennedy
stole the brain, the locker, and all the documentation of the president's autopsy.
Swanson argues that it was not part of a cover-up on the part of conspirators,
but simply Kennedy trying to hide his brother's poor health.
"Had the American public known just how sick Jack Kennedy was,
he probably could not have been a presidential candidate."
JFK had always been depicted as the handsome,
vigorous president. To protect that legacy, it was important to ensure that
the true details of his health were never made public. At least that's one theory.
On the other side are allegations of a cover-up. According to The Washington Post,
a 1998 staff report for the Assassinations Records Review Board alleged that the photos
of Kennedy's brain were not really Kennedy's brain. With the 1978 House Select Committee
on Assassinations' conclusion that Kennedy was killed by multiple gunmen,
a cover-up is certainly a possibility. But since the physical brain has disappeared,
there's no way to confirm or deny the allegations, and, for now, they remain unproven.
St. Anthony of Padua was a Portuguese Franciscan priest known during his life as a great preacher.
He died in 1231 and quickly became a saint — "everyone's saint," as Pope Leo XIII referred
to him on account of his worldwide popularity. As the cult of veneration around St. Anthony grew,
his body was moved to a larger church so that more pilgrims could visit. But when his body was
exhumed, it had had completely decomposed, with the exception of his tongue and jaw. In fact,
his tongue gave off a shining aura. This was taken as a sign that, even in death, the great
preacher's tongue — with which he had communicated his message — continued to be incorruptible.
Naturally, the incorrupt tongue and jawbone were separated from the body and kept in
an ornate reliquary in the Basilica del Santo in Padua. And in the years since,
the tongue has taken multiple tours around the world, most recently to
Europe and North America to celebrate the 750th anniversary of the saint's death.
The Gospel of Matthew tells us that John the Baptist, a New Testament precursor to Jesus,
was beheaded by King Herod Antipas. John had rebuked Herod for marrying his brother's wife,
so he threw the prophet into prison. After dancing for the king at his birthday, Herod's niece,
Salome, asked for John's head on a platter, so Herod beheaded him to please her. John's
disciples took the headless body for burial. The head's location, however, is still debated.
Tradition holds that John's head was sent to the cathedral in Amiens, France,
after being brought over from Constantinople. But Rome's Basilica of San Silvestro also claims
to have the prophet's head. And then there's Duke Wilhelm V of Bavaria, an avid collector of relics,
who also believed himself to be in possession of the saint's head, which is now housed in Munich's
Residenz Museum. Finally, the fourth iteration of the saint's head resides in the Umayyad Mosque
of Damascus, a Catholic basilica dedicated to the saint before the Islamic conquest.
At this point, there are two possibilities. Either one of the stories is real or none are,
and the actual head is long gone or somewhere else altogether. In 2010,
Bulgarian excavators working in the ruins of the Rila Monastery found the body of a
Middle Eastern man who had lived in the first century, suggesting that maybe these were the
true remains. It's impossible to know for sure, but a fascinating story nonetheless.
Buddhist tradition holds that Buddha was cremated upon his death. Afterward,
his followers recovered four teeth and three small bones from the ashes of his funeral
pyre. These were stored in eight stupas and are venerated in shrines across the Buddhist world.
One of the recovered teeth was given to the King of Kalinga, and eventually transferred to Ceylon,
now Sri Lanka, for safekeeping. The king of Ceylon — a devout Buddhist — happily received
the tooth and instituted an annual procession and festival in its honor.
The tooth has been stolen from Ceylon multiple times, most notably in the 16th century,
when it fell into Portuguese hands. The Portuguese were intent on destroying
Buddhist artifacts — including Buddha's tooth — and advancing Christendom. At one point,
the king of Pegu, now Burma, offered a ransom to procure the artifact for himself. But the story
goes that the Archbishop of Goa ordered the tooth publicly ground into powder,
burned, and tossed into the river in the effort to eradicate native religions.
Despite the apparent destruction of Buddha's tooth, monks still protect somebody's tooth
at the Temple of the Sacred Tooth in Kandy, Sri Lanka. They wash the tooth in scented
water every Wednesday and perform venerations three times each day.