The head of Henry IV of France

[Louis]

Henry IV (13 December 1553 – 14 May 1610) was King of France from 1589 to 1610.

A 400-year-old mummified head has been identified as that of French king Henry IV, whose body was mutilated by revolutionaries during a symbolic desecration of the tombs of the country's monarchs in 1793.

A team of multidisciplinary researchers, who carried out an extensive forensic examination of the mummified head and its inner parts, concluded that the head actually is of the beloved king as thought earlier.

The team, led by osteo-archaeologist Philipp Charlier of University Hospital R Poincare in Garches, compared the head with sculptures and portraits of Henry, and digitally reconstructed the face.

The result was a dead ringer for the beloved king, the researchers said, adding that the same techniques could be used on the other mutilated remains of French royalty, LiveScience reported. The story of how Henry IV's head became the subject of a forensic investigation can be traced to 1589, when his predecessor , Henry III, was assassinated by a fanatical monk.

The head stayed in the hands of private collectors until recently . The mummified head was well-preserved , and the royal brain lay undisturbed inside the skull. ​

timesofindia.indiatimes.com

 

[Hedgehog]

Such weak minds when they desecrate these Tombs, such a lot of this went on in Egypt with the Pyramids, and the underground Tombs in the Valley of the King's, which is a wonderful place to visit