Spain finds remains of 'Don Quixote' writer Cervantes

Spain on March 17 unearthed the apparent remains of literary giant and father of the modern novel Miguel de Cervantes, found in a Madrid convent almost 400 years after his death.
      
Forensic anthropologist Francisco Etxeberria said that after a year-long search his team had positively identified in an alcove in a convent crypt "some fragments" of the Spanish "Don Quixote" author who died in 1616 a week after William Shakespeare.
      
Though there is no genetic proof of the find at this stage, Etxeberria's team of anthropologists and archaeologists said they were confident of the claim on the basis of the documentary research they carried out.
      
They based their findings on fragments "discovered in the ground of the crypt of the current church of the Trinitarians," Etxeberria said.
      
Archeologist Almudena Garcia-Rubio said there was "no confirmed genetic identification".
      
Etxeberria however said "we are convinced that we have amid these fragments something of Cervantes."       

In January the team announced the discovery of a casket at Madrid's Convent of the Barefoot Trinitarians during excavations aimed at solving the mystery of the writer's final resting place.
      
A fragment of a board of one of the caskets had the letters "M.C." formed in tacks, they said.
                      
Cervantes is recorded as having been buried at the convent's chapel in the centre of the Spanish capital a day after his death on April 22, 1616, but the exact whereabouts of his grave were unknown.
     
Etxeberria's team launched in April 2014 what is the first significant search for the remains of the greatest writer of the Spanish Golden Age.        

Using infrared...