DNA analysis of the 15th-century explorer showed his Jewish origin, something he concealed during a time in which Jews were being persecuted

In 2003, José Antonio Lorente, professor of forensic medicine at Granada University, and the historian Marcial Castro, exhumed what were believed to the remains of Columbus from Seville cathedral to take DNA samples. They also took DNA from the bones of his son, Hernando, and brother, Diego.

Scientists have ‘definitively’ proved identity of remains – with navigator’s precise origins to be revealed