Special Sub-Topic: The Rest Of My Body, Please! Click Here To Play: The Rest Of My Body, Please!

Some people say that they left their heart in San Francisco. Composer Frederic Chopin really left his heart in which city?

Warsaw. Following his death in 1849, Chopin was buried in the Père Lachaise graveyard in Paris. (The same graveyard that Jim Morrison would be buried in 122 years later.) Before he was buried, his heart was taken, according to his request, and was entombed in a pillar in the Church of the Holy Cross in Warsaw, Poland.

Whose middle finger can you see at the Florence Institute and Museum of the History of Science?

Galileo. When Galileo died in 1642, Pope Urban VIII, still bitter about their ongoing feud over the “theory” of the Earth revolving around the sun, refused to allow him to have a proper burial. He was moved to a proper grave in the Church of Santa Croce in 1737, but during the move a devotee of Galileo, Anton Francesco Gori, cut off the middle finger of his right hand. It passed through a few museums, before ending up at the Florence Institute in 1927. Now that we know that Galileo’s “theories” have been proven right, and he has triumphed over the Inquisition, his middle finger is raised upward for all those blind to science to see.

This leader was dug up three years after his burial and what remained was posthumously hung drawn and quartered. His head then floated around for nearly 300 years before being buried.

Oliver Cromwell. Cromwell was given a grand state funeral when he died in 1658, but the public opinion changed following the reestablishment of the Monarchy in 1660. On January 30, 1661, the anniversary of the execution of King Charles I, Cromwell’s body was hung from the gallows at Tyburn. After being separated from his body, Cromwell’s head sat atop a pole at Westminster Hall as a warning against regicide and treason. Popular legend has that in 1684, after hanging for 23 years, a strong wind dislodged the head, and it was taken home by one of the guards. The guard hid it for many years, and eventually it is know to have made it into the possession of one Samuel Russell in the 1770’s. After a few more owners, it finally found its way into the collection of Josiah Wilkinson. It stayed in the Wilkinson family, who in 1930 allowed scientists to confirm that the head was indeed Cromwell’s. In 1959, the head was offered to numerous institutions, but only Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, which counts Cromwell as an alumnus, was willing to take it. And so after 299 years, the head of Oliver Cromwell finally was buried…again.

In November 2005 it was announced that two pieces of which famous composers skull were located in California?

Beethoven. Beethoven’s skull was still with him when he was buried in 1827. It was during an exhumation in 1863 that pieces were given to Dr. Romeo Seligmann as a gift. The bones past down from one generation to another until they came into the possession of Paul and Joan Kaufmann of Danville, California. The pieces are on loan today at San Jose State University.

Where is Einstein’s brain (or at least most of it)?

Princeton Hospital in Trenton, New Jersey. When Einstein died in April 1955 he wished for his body to be cremated and his ashes to be scattered in an undisclosed location. Dr. Harvey, the Princeton Hospital pathologist on duty at the time of Einstein’s death, removed Einstein’s brain and kept it, all in the name of science of course. The brain then spent the next 40 years wandering around the country with Harvey, who sent bits and pieces to anyone who wanted to study it. The brain did in fact spend some time in a doctor’s office near Kansas City, but it was returned to Princeton Hospital in 1997.

Most of Stonewall Jackson is buried in the Lexington, Virginia cemetery that bears his name. But what part of him is not there?

His left arm. Jackson was mistakenly shot three times by his own men in the evening of May 2, 1863. His left arm had to be amputated, and he succumbed to pneumonia eight days later. His body was buried in Lexington, where he had taught at VMI before the war, but his amputated arm was buried on the 2nd of May at the Lacy Family Plot in Fredericksburg, Virginia.

While Jeremy Bentham can still be seen in his glass display case at the University College in London, which part of him is made of wax, since the original(s) was(were) damaged?

Head. The English philosopher was involved in the establishment of the University College, London (founded in 1826) and left a considerable amount of money to it in endowments. But there was one stipulation, his body was to be preserved and he was to be allowed to attend Board Meetings and “oversee” the disbursement of the endowment. As he requested, his body is housed in a wooden cabinet, except for his head, which was damaged during the embalming process. In its place sits a wax replica. The real head was displayed for a few years, but after numerous thefts by students, it was locked in a vault.

Religious zealots stole Voltaire’s body, but they couldn’t steal which part of him, since it is housed in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris?

Heart. 23 years after his body had been moved from Champagne to the Parthenon in Paris, “Ultras” (right-wing religious zealots) stole his remains and dumped them in a trash heap. No one knew about the heist for 50 years, when in 1864 his sarcophagus was checked, and found to be empty. His heart and brain had been removed prior to the burial in Champagne, and while his heart resides in the Bibliothèque Nationale, his brain has been lost, ever since it was “accidentally” sold in an auction.

The Buddha’s (Siddhartha Gautama's) tooth is located in which country?

Sri Lanka. According to legends, when the Buddha died his body was cremated, but his left canine tooth survived. It became a royal symbol of power, and as a result, numerous wars were fought over it. In the 4th century it was in the possession of King Guhasiva of Kalinga, who feared that it would fall into the hands of his enemies. He secretly sent his daughter to Sri Lanka with the Sacred Tooth. The King of Sri Lanka built a palace for the tooth, and as the seat of power in Sri Lanka shifted, new palaces were built. Today it is currently located at the Sri Dalada Maligawa in Kandy, Sri Lanka.

During the French Revolution the heart of Louis XIV was stolen, and eventually sold to Dean of Westminster, the Very Reverend William Buckland. What did he do with it?

Ate it. This is truly disturbing. Around 1840 Buckland got his hands on the heart of Louis XIV, and being one who claimed to have eaten his way through the animal kingdom, he ate it with a side of beans. In case you haven’t realized, King Louis XIV died in 1715. That is 125 years. I am seriously grossed out.