Medici family's famous hunting grounds may have killed them, report suggests

The Medici family's history is rife with power struggles, intrigue and murder, but organs interred in the family tomb point to another killer — malaria, which the individual may have caught at the Medicis' hunting grounds.

Because of their power and status, they buried their dead like monarchs in the San Lorenzo Basilica in central Florence, keeping the skeletal remains of the bodies in coffins with the organs removed and stored in separate terracotta jars that often bore just the Medici family crest. "We knew red blood cells could be preserved," said Albert Zink, director of the Institute for Mummy Studies in Italy where the research was conducted. He had previously led a study that found red blood cells in the 5,300-year-old remains of Ötzi the Iceman."But we did not expect to see the parasites," Zink told Live Science."Five hundred years had passed."

Clear proof of malaria The new study marks the first time the pathogen itself was microscopically observed, rather than detecting proteins the parasite produces.

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