The body of Richard III, the last king of England to fall in battle, may have been discovered. But what evidence will be needed to confirm it is him?

Lost king: Richard of York (Image: Getty Images/SuperStock) Leicester car park where human remains have been found (Image: University of Leicester) Checking the trenches (Image: University of Leicester) Stone frieze may be part of the Church of Grey Friars choir stall (Image: University of Leicester) Advertisement

What exactly has been found?

The body of an adult male has been excavated from what is believed to be ruins of the choir area of the Grey Friars church in Leicester. It’s now a car park in the city centre, but was used as a church in the late 15th century. Some records suggest that Richard III, the last Plantagenet king of England, was buried here.

So how do we know it’s him? Has the body got a hunched back?

We don’t know it’s him – yet – but yes, the skeleton does show signs of spinal curvature. Contemporary accounts, reinforced later by Shakespeare, described Richard III as being “hunchbacked”. The newly found body appears to have scoliosis, a form of spinal curvature that would have made the man’s right shoulder appear higher than the left shoulder. The classic “hunchback” is caused by kyphosis but there is no evidence of this in the Leicester skeleton.

Any other evidence?

Yes. The man who became this skeleton took a beating. He has a small penetrating wound to the top of the head, and a much larger wound where a slice has been cut off the skull at the side and back – consistent with the swing of a blade. On 22 August 1485, Richard III was killed at the Battle of Bosworth Field by blows that some accounts describe as being so violent they drove his helmet into his head.

The Leicester skeleton also has a barbed iron arrowhead stuck in its upper back. But the middle ages were violent times, so again this is only supporting evidence.

Can DNA testing determine if the body is Richard III?

Perhaps. The Richard III Society says it has located someone – Londoner Michael Ibsen – who is apparently the 17th great grand-nephew of Richard III, in the female line. Ibsen’s late mother Joy Ibsen is purportedly a direct descendent of the King’s eldest sister, Anne. Richard’s male relatives were executed.

Leicester University geneticists hope to extract mitochondrial DNA taken from the skeleton’s teeth and compare it with DNA from Ibsen. Mitochondrial DNA is transmitted only through the female line, so if Ibsen really is a direct descendent, his mtDNA can be compared with that from the skeleton.

Mitochondrial DNA is present in thousands of copies per cell, so is easier to extract from degraded tissue than nuclear DNA, which is only present in one copy, in the nucleus. MtDNA was used, for example, to identify the remains of Jesse James, the 19th century American outlaw. But in that case, the living maternal relatives were a great grandson and great-great grandson. With Richard III, many more generations have passed, so the challenges are that much greater.

How can we be sure Joy Ibsen is a direct descendent?

This is one of the shakiest parts of the project, relying as it does on historical records stretching back hundreds of years. The family tree linking Ibsen with Richard III’s sister was made by historian John Ashdown-Hill. Kevin Schürer at Leicester University is leading the team assessing the historical evidence to try and corroborate Ibsen’s genealogy.

“It’s prudent to have a second set of eyes go over the tree and to use other historical data to try and verify it,” says geneticist Turi King at Leicester University, who is working on extracting the ancient DNA. Until we know how much mtDNA we can get out of the skeleton, we won’t know whether we can say if it is related to Michael Ibsen or not.