Alleged bones of Beethoven will be analyzed in Vienna – 07/20/2023 – Science

Vienna received bones that are supposed to be fragments of the skull of Ludwig van Beethoven, who died in Austria in the 19th century. Experts hope to examine them to discover the causes of the composer’s deafness and death.

“Your place is here, in Vienna”, declared this Thursday (20th) at a press conference the American businessman Paul Kaufmann, who donated these relics to the Medical University of the city.

In 1990, he inherited the bones, which were inside a bank vault on the French Riviera. “There were many treasures, including the box with ‘Beethoven’ on the surface.”

The ten pieces of bone belonged to his ancestor Franz Romeo Seligmann, a Viennese physician who participated in 1863 in the exhumation of the composer’s skeleton for scientific purposes.

After that, these remains passed from generation to generation, changing countries after the family fled Nazism in Germany.

After analyzes to confirm its authenticity, the results of which will arrive in about ten months, investigations will be carried out to try to find out more about the cause of the various pathologies suffered by the musician.

“That was also Beethoven’s wish. It’s not about keeping a relic in a box,” said Christian Reiter, a coroner.

In 1802, in a letter addressed to his brothers, the composer explained that he wanted his illness to be described after his death and made public.

But two centuries later, the causes of his death, on March 26, 1827, aged 56, remain a mystery.

These bone fragments were examined in 2005 in the United States and it was concluded that the composer could have been the victim of lead poisoning, which would explain above all his digestive problems.

At that time, people used to drink from glasses made of this metal, and lead and mercury were often used in medical treatments.

However, in March, a study based on DNA analysis of Beethoven’s hair was published which revealed a strong predisposition to liver disease and a hepatitis B infection towards the end of his life.

Researchers, on the other hand, still haven’t been able to clarify the causes of his progressive deafness.