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Stay ahead with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more

A new DNA study of the 500-year-old remains of Christopher Columbus has revealed that the controversial explorer was actually a Sephardic Jew from Western Europe.

Spanish researchers announced their findings in a new documentary entitled Columbus DNA: The True Originbroadcast on Spanish national broadcaster TVE. Since 2003, scientists have tested samples from remains buried in Seville Cathedral in Spain, believed to be the final resting place of the 15th-century explorer.

In the documentary, Jose Antonio Lorente, a professor of forensic medicine who led the research at the University of Granada, said his analysis showed Columbus’ DNA was “compatible” with his Jewish ancestry.

During the 21-year investigation, DNA experts compared samples from the remains with those of Columbus’ known relatives and descendants. “We have DNA from Christopher Columbus, very partial, but sufficient. We have DNA from Fernando Colon, his son,” Professor Lorente told CNN. “And in both Fernando’s Y chromosome (male) and mitochondrial DNA (transmitted from the mother), there are traits compatible with Jewish ancestry.”

It was previously believed that Columbus was an Italian from Genoa, born in 1451 into a family of wool weavers. Over the years, historians have suggested that the explorer could have been Greek, Basque, Portuguese or British. Although researchers were unable to determine Columbus’s birthplace, after analyzing 25 possible locations, they recognized that he likely came from the Spanish Mediterranean.

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“The DNA indicates that Christopher Columbus’ origins were in the western Mediterranean,” said Prof. Lorente. “If there were no Jews in Genoa in the 15th century, the chance that he came from there is minimal. There was also no large Jewish presence on the rest of the Italian peninsula, which makes things very weak.”

An estimated 300,000 Jews lived in Spain before the era of the “Reyes Catolicos,” in which Catholic monarchs King Ferdinand II and Queen Isabella ordered Jews and Muslims to convert to Christianity or risk exile. The expulsion of Jews from Spain took place in 1492, the same year Columbus made his first voyage to the Americas.

Now researchers believe that Columbus hid his Jewish identity or converted to Catholicism to escape religious persecution. The term “Sephardic” is derived from Sepharada Hebrew word referring to the Iberian Peninsula, which includes modern-day Spain and Portugal.

As a result of the research, Prof. Lorente also confirmed the theories that the remains in Seville Cathedral belonged to Columbus. “The outcome is almost absolutely reliable,” he said.

Columbus died in 1506 in the Spanish city of Valladolid. He had wanted to be buried in Hispaniola, which is now divided into Haiti and the Dominican Republic. His remains were brought there in 1542 and then moved to Cuba in 1795 and finally to Seville in 1898.

Sponsored by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, Columbus completed four voyages for Spain across the Atlantic Ocean. However, his conquests – and the subsequent genocide and colonization of the indigenous population in the Americas – have been widely condemned. As a result, many states and cities in the United States have decided to rename Columbus Day, the holiday honoring the explorer, to recognize the violence committed against Native Americans since Columbus and his crew arrived on land.