ARCHAEOLOGISTS EXTRACT SKELETON DNA
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[ June 19th 2005 ]

British and American archaeologists have successfully extracted DNA from a skeleton unearthed in the grounds of an English church in the hope of identifying one of the founders of Jamestown.

According to Associated Press, researches removed a small part of Elizabeth Gosnold Tilney's skeleton from beneath the floor of All Saints Church in the English village of Shelley, 60 miles northeast of London. She is the sister of Capt. Batholomew Gosnold, who oversaw the expedition that led to the 1607 founding of Jamestown, the first permanent English settlement.

Tilney's sample will be analyzed at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C., and compared to a sample taken from the skeleton believed to be Gosnold's, Associated Press reports.