Bulgaria’s claim to have unearthed six bones belonging to John the Baptist has received a boost from scientists who have concluded after dating them and analysing their genetic code that they could indeed be relics of the man who baptised Jesus.
The remains, which include a molar and a piece of cranium, were found in 2010 in a marble sarcophagus in the ruins of a medieval church on the island of Sveti Ivan (St John) off Bulgaria’s Black Sea coast near the resort of Sozopol. They are on display in a church in Sozopol.
An Oxford University team dated a knuckle-bone to the first century AD, when John the Baptist would have lived, while geneticists from the University of Copenhagen established the full DNA code of three of the bones.
The genetic analysis showed the bones were from the same person, a man who most probably came from the Middle East.
Relics of saints or fragments of the true cross on which Jesus was crucified, according to Christian tradition, have been a powerful draw for pilgrims and tourists for centuries. – (Reuters)