Posted on 01/08/2006 7:26:45 PM PST by CurlyBill
Forensic scientists say they have failed to unravel the 200-year old mystery of the skull of legendary Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
Austrian television commissioned American and Austrian scientists to carry out DNA tests on a skull that some experts insist is Mozart's.
The scientists hoped to match its DNA to genetic samples taken from what they believed are the skeletons of Mozart's grandmother and niece.
The scientists said on Austrian television Sunday that the skeletons do not match the skull, and that the skeletons are also unrelated - creating a whole new mystery of who is buried the Mozart family crypt.
Mozart was buried in a Vienna pauper's cemetery in 1791. The skull was thought to have been dug up 10 years later.
And if we found Mozarts skull, what would we do with it? I mean other than something tacky like sell it on e-bay.
ping
Pretty odd - almost like the Mozart and Haydn rumors got mixed up.
No, that would be for the piece of pizza crust that has an IMAGE of his skull on it, and which the owner immediately froze in the freezer for several years upon seeing it before finally deciding to sell their prized possession to pay for their elderly mother's health care (sarcasm).
Not sure... I guess they could use the skull to make a realistic depiction of what he looked like. They could then give (part of) the proper burial he was denied in 1791.
I'd rather listen to his music.
When they dug up Mozart, they found his corpse slowly erasing the notes from a sheet of music. They asked him what he was doing, and he answered, "Decomposing."
It's not clear that he was buried in a mass grave, although that was implied in the movie Amadeus. The article says that he was buried in a pauper's cemetery. I saw a picture of the skull on the cover of an archaeology magazine about 15 years ago. Apparently it was dug up by the person in charge of the cemetery, who would have been is a position to remember its location.
Sounds like the little bastard played a mean piano!
Yes... however paupers were usually buried in unmarked graves which were often in the same hole, side by side, or even on top of each other. Essentially, you have a mass of dirt and bones. If there was no match, the man dug up the wrong skull... as there were probably many others in nearly the same spot.
UNNNGH
Alas poor Yorick............................................................I hardly knew him.
Wow....best joke i've heard in a while...!
Of COURSE the DNA isn't going to match.
They didn't even KNOW about DNA back in those days, never mind how to test for it.
The scientists said on Austrian television Sunday that the skeletons do not match the skull, and that the skeletons are also unrelated - creating a whole new mystery of who is buried the Mozart family crypt.
Is this where someone should interject ... 'tis a wise child, indeed, who knows his own father ... ?
Q: What did the music teacher find on the piano bench?
A: Beethoven's Last Movement
xlnt
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