St Lucius's Skull Confusion

[Schwadevivre]

Researchers try to answer mystery of saintly skull
Link is dead. See later post for additional info.

The skull of St. Lucius was one of the most important relics of medieval Denmark, and was housed in Roskilde Cathedral. However, a team of scientists recently made a study of the skull, and although an examination shows it to belong to an elderly male, the result of the carbon 14 dating leaves no doubt: This is not St. Lucius, who died around AD254.

The researchers though the skull might have been mixed up with that of King Sigurd Jorsalfarers but ...

The dating was carried out by Jan Heinemeier at the Department of Physics,University of Aarhus. The results showed that the skull came from the period AD340-431, and therefore proved that it did not belong to St. Lucius (died AD254) or Sigurd Jorsalfarer (died AD1130).

 

[Loquaciousness]

I must admit to not being surprised. There was a great deal of trading in relics during Medieval times, and many fakes were created round about this time ( in my opinion the Turin shroud is a great example of this ). So for instance, there are currently about 8 skulls of John the Baptist.

 

[EnolaGaia]

The link in post #1 is dead. The MIA webpage can be accessed via the Wayback Machine:

https://web.archive.org/web/2014123...rchers-try-to-answer-mystery-of-saintly-skull

 

[EnolaGaia]

The carbon dating results rule out one Saint Lucius, but there are multiple saints with that name.

There is one for whom an estimated death date does - or at least may - fall within the range given by the carbon dating results.

This is the Saint Lucius from North Africa. This Lucius is listed as having a date of death around 430 CE, though this date doesn't align with the known reign of the Vandal king who ostensibly killed this Lucius and the other two with whom he's venerated.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quintian,_Lucius_and_Julian