Reminiscent of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, scieintists have discovered a long-rumored secret crypt of the Medici family.
The vaulted chamber was found under a stone floor behind the main altar of the Medici chapels in the church of San Lorenzo in Florence. Under the gaze of sculptures by Michelangelo and his pupils, researchers lifted a stone slab to find seven steps leading down to the entrance. According to Italian media reports, the hidden crypt is between 2.1 metres (7ft) and 2.4 metres high and six metres by at least four metres wide.
[…] On Tuesday researchers opened the tomb of the last of the dynasty, the grand duke Gian Gastone de’ Medici – and were astonished to find it empty. Gino Fornaciari, of Florence University, told the Ansa news agency: “Behind a first marble panel we expected to find a second stone slab. Instead, we found a wall.”
In trying to locate the final resting place of Gian Gastone, who died in 1737, they stumbled on the secret crypt. The stone slab blocking the entrance to the stairs was found a few metres away from Gian Gastone’s mysteriously empty tomb.
It was known that some of the Medici family’s remains were moved from their original burial places in 1857. And, according to the early 20th-century British historian GF Young, the coffins of Gian Gastone and his grandfather had been moved to a secret crypt accessible only down hidden stairs. Until yesterday’s discovery, his account had been dismissed as baseless rumour.
However, inside the crypt, there were another eight bodies, one of an adult and the remaining seven of children.
Cool.
(via Cronaca)