Queen’s pedigree proved by drop of spring water

The 1,064-year-old bones of a woman discovered in 2008 in a tomb in Magdeburg Cathedral, in Germany, are those of Eadgyth, pronounced Edith, half-sister of Athelstan, the first king of all England.
The bones were found in a lead casket in a monument to Eadgyth in the cathedral and were sent for analysis to the University of Bristol because archaeologists in Germany were unable to confirm that they were from the granddaughter of Alfred the Great, who married Otto, the Holy Roman Emperor, and died in her adopted home in Saxony at the age of 36.
A plaque on the casket was inscribed Edit Regine cineres hic sarcophagus habet (the remains of Queen Eadgyth are in this sarcophagus) but it would have been easy for the bones to have been mixed up or substituted while being moved in medieval times. It was analysis of enamel from the teeth in the upper jaw, the only surviving fragment of the skull, that provided the crucial evidence.
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