Was Christopher Columbus Jewish? Geneticists battle over contentious claim

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The documentary Columbus DNA His True Origin, broadcast on Spain’s National Holiday suggests that [Christopher Columbus] was not Genoese and Christian but Spanish and Jewish. The absolute protagonist of the documentary, forensic scientist José Antonio Lorente, has not yet published any scientific study to back his claims.

…

[Francesc Albardaner] … explains his theory: “Columbus was a Sephardic Jew, following Jewish traditions and customs. He had Jewish teachers who taught him the Jewish religion, but apparently in the public sphere, he was a Christian. According to my theory, he was born into a family of silk weavers in [the Spanish city of] Valencia, where there was a long tradition of silk weaving within the Jewish community.”

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Antonio Alonso, former chief of the National Institute of Toxicology and Forensic Sciences, is not convinced: “Unfortunately, from the scientific point of view, no assessment can be made after watching the documentary, since it does not provide any data on what has been analyzed. My conclusion is that the documentary Columbus DNA does not show the DNA of Columbus at any given moment and scientists do not know what analysis has been undertaken.”

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