Gino Fornaciari*, Federica Bortolotti**, Giacomo Gortenuti***, *Divisione di Paleopatologia, Dipartimento di Oncologia, dei Trapianti KEY-WORDS: natural mummy, Digitalis, poisoning, Italy, late Middle Ages Abstract Corresponding author: G. Fornaciari, Division of Paleopathology, Department of Oncology, Via Roma 57, 56126 Pisa – Italy.
Introduction In February 2004 Cangrande’s tomb was opened, to allow the paleopathological study of the corpse. When the very heavy stone lid of the sarcophagus (Fig. 1A) was raised, what appeared was a well preserved body, wrapped in precious silk textiles and still wearing some clothes (Fig. 1B). He was lying on his back with his arms folded across the thorax and his lower limbs extended (Fig. 1C). Radiology Autopsy Histology Pollen analyses Toxicology Conclusions
It transpires that the actual cause of death was poisoning from lethal amounts of digitalis, a drug which is extracted from one of the ‘foxglove’ families of plants. Evidence leans towards deliberate murder by poisoning. A physician of Cangrande’s was hanged by his successor Mastino II (Varanini, 2004), adding more weight to the possibility that foul play was at least suspected, although who was ultimately behind the killing is likely to remain a mystery. Tables
Table 1. Results of pollen anlyses, with presence of Digitalis (foxglove) in the feces
Table 2. The immunochemical methods adopted and their sensitivity.
Table 3. Toxic concentrations of digoxin and digitoxin in the liver and rectal feces of Cangrande.
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