Spanish excavation fails to find poet Lorca's lost bones (Roundup)

Dec 18, 2009, 15:08 GMT

Granada, Spain - The fate of the lost bones of the acclaimed Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca remains a mystery after experts failed to find the mass grave which was believed to contain them, a regional justice official said Friday.

The two-month excavation had shown that 'there were never any burials' at the site near the southern city of Granada, Begona Alvarez said.

The author of Gypsy Ballads was shot dead by supporters of right-wing dictator-to-be Francisco Franco at age 38 at the start of Spain's 1936-39 civil war.

Most historians agree he was executed in Alfacar near Granada, and many had also thought he had been buried there with several other people.

Some historians insisted on opening the site to confirm the truth about Lorca's death and to give Spain's most beloved modern poet a dignified burial.

Lorca's descendants opposed the move, arguing that would single the poet out from among anonymous war victims.

The Andalusian regional authorities finally ordered the opening of the site at the request of most of the families of the five other people who were thought to have been buried there.

The excavation and other investigations on the ground, however, did not yield any evidence of the soil ever having contained human remains, Alvarez said.

The Federico Garcia Lorca park marking the 'mythical' site, however, would be left there, the official explained.

Those investigating the fate of Lorca's remains now faced the 'challenge' of 'starting from zero,' said Maribel Brenes of the Association for the Recovery of Historic Memory which participated in the project.