Art connoisseurs owe a great deal of gratitude to the Medici family of Florence, Italy who funded such Renaissance masterpieces as Michelangelo’s painting of the Sistine Chapel and da Vinci’s Mona Lisa portrait. But the family’s stature provoked illicit tales of feuds and murder plots spread by rivals jealous of their wealth and power. A new C.W. Post study is using high-tech scientific research to find out whether challenge the bum rap the family received during the 16th century when they ruled Tuscany. After examining the remains of some prominent members of the Medici dynasty, a renowned C.W. Post scientist has solved their mysterious deaths more than four centuries later.

During the summer of 2004, Dr. Bob Brier, a senior research fellow at the C.W. Post Campus and one of the world’s foremost authorities on mummies, exhumed the skeletal remains of Grand Duke Cosimo I the Great, his wife Eleonora and their young sons Garzia, 16 and Giovanni, 19. Mysteriously, the mother and two sons died within weeks of each other. Florence legend says that in 1562, Garzia stabbed his brother to death. Cosimo then supposedly killed his younger son, which caused Eleonora to die of a broken heart.

"The bones of the two brothers are very well preserved and there are no signs of knife or sword wounds," said Dr. Brier.

"We now know the myth started by the family’s enemies is not true." Through DNA analysis, Dr. Brier hopes to prove his theory that the brothers and their mother actually died from contracting malaria.

Dr. Brier is studying the remains, which are buried in the San Lorenzo Church in Florence, as part of an investigation of the Medici’s diets, lifestyles and causes of death and how they relate to today’s modern illnesses.

Dr. Brier’s research was the subject of a story on "60 Minutes" and a TLC television documentary, "Mummy Detective: Crypt of the Medici," both of which aired in October 2004. Dr. Brier served for 33 years as a professor of philosophy in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.