Vandals decapitate 800-year-old crusader

In an act of sacrilege the ancient tomb of a Crusader knights has been broken into and descricrated. The crusader’s head was “severed from his body and taken away”. The attack took place at the  800-year-old resting place of a “crusader” laid in a crypt in a Dublin church which has been decapitated by vandals.

History of St. Michan’s church

The foundation of the church was built in 1095 to serve the remaining and ostracized Vikings, who were still in Ireland after the rest had been killed or kicked out by Wolf the Quarrelsome and other Irish forces in 1014. It became a Protestant Church at the Reformation. The church was rebuilt in 1686, and a large pipe organ was installed in 1724, on which Handel is said to have first played the Messiah. But all along, as the church changed, the crypt stayed the same: slowly mummifying all that lay within it.

There are a number of theories as to why the corpses in the basement have been preserved over time. One is that the basement contains limestone, making the basement particularly dry and therefore good for mummification. Another is that the church was built on former swamp land, and that methane gas is acting as a kind of preservative of the bodies. Other theories involve the presence of oak wood in the soil, or the building materials used in the church.

Regardless of the reason, whatever is preserving the mummies, is also disintegrating their coffins. After a certain amount of time the wood falls away and a well preserved mummy comes tumbling out. This is where the loophole comes in, for though it would be inappropriate for the Church to break open caskets looking for mummies, when the mummies reveal themselves, so be it.

The mummies have indeed revealed themselves. While there are caskets strewn about and in small nooks in the wall – some coffins are falling apart enough to reveal an arm or leg – the most visible mummies are “the big four,” four mummified corpses which have no lids on their coffins and are displayed together. (Only two of the six crypts are open to the public for viewing.) On the right is, a woman, simply called “the unknown,” and well, there isn’t much more to say about her. The middle one is known as “the thief” and is missing parts of both feet and a hand, some say the hand was cut off as punishment. It is believed the “thief” later converted and became a priest or respected man, which is why he is buried in the church. (Or possibly, he was never a thief at all and lost the hand in some other way…) Next to him on the left lies a small woman, thought to have been, and known as, “the nun.”

The main attraction is an 800 year old mummy called “the crusader.” Though it may be apocryphal, it is believed that he was a soldier who either died in the crusades, or returned and died shortly thereafter. This assumes that these were the 4th crusades the only ones that match with a date of 800 years old.

The Crusader was quite tall for the time – six and a half feet tall, a giant back then – and his legs have been broken and folded up under him to fit him into his small coffin. His hand stretches out of the casket slightly and visitors were once encouraged to give it a shake. Today, you are still allowed to touch his hand, but only lightly on his long dead finger, lest you wrench his whole hand off.

Archdeacon David Pierpoint said the crusader’s head had been “severed from his body and taken away”. The discovery was made as a tour guide was preparing to open the church for visitors on Monday afternoon.

Archdeacon Pierpoint said he was upset and disappointed that the church had been targeted again by vandals.

The crypt of St Michan’s was vandalised previously in 1996.

He said initially he was “quite disgusted” when he saw what had happened, but now he was “just sad”.

“It’s a sad day for the church and a sad day for humanity that someone would do such a thing.”

Crusaders fought in a series of religious wars known as the Crusades which were sanctioned by the Church in the medieval period. The most commonly known of the crusades were campaigns in the eastern Mediterranean aimed at recovering the Holy Land from Muslim rule. There were seven major crusades as well as many less significant ones.

The discovery was made as a tour guide was preparing to open the church for visitors on Monday

Tours of the site are being cancelled for the foreseeable future. Last year about 27,000 people visited the church.

In a statement, the Church of Ireland said the crypt had been badly damaged and several of the mummies, including the 400-year-old remains of a nun, had been desecrated in the incident.

The crusader’s body was turned over and his head was removed.

Archdeacon Pierpoint said a solid steel internal gate was also taken but the immediate concern was securing the vaults.

There are also concerns the remains will disintegrate in the open air as the conditions in the crypt keep them preserved.

Gardaí (Irish police) are examining CCTV footage from the church.

‘Football with heads’

The crypt of St Michan’s was previously vandalised in 1996, when a group of teenagers broke in and took a number of mummified bodies from their coffins.

“They dragged them onto the ground and seemed to be playing football with their heads,” Archdeacon Pierpoint told the Irish Times.

He added: “Thankfully at that time the guards did their jobs extremely well and they caught the perpetrators.”

Following the 1996 break-in, the crypts were closed to the public for a week, while the bodies were recovered.