Russians Still Squabbling over Czar's Bones
Reuters, 10 March 1997

YEKATERINBURG, Russia -- Nearly six years after they were dug up, the remains of Russia's last royal family still lie in the town mortuary in Yekaterinburg, the Urals city where revolutionary Bolsheviks shot them in 1918.

"What to do with the remains now falls into the sphere of politics, not medicine, and that has yet to be decided," said Nikolai Nevolin, Yekatarinburg's chief coroner and temporary custodian of the country's most contested bones.

After extensive DNA tests in Russia, Britain and the United States, scientists have declared that these are definitely the remains of Czar Nicholas II and his family. Exhuming the body of the czar's brother for DNA comparison tests in 1994 provided the final confirmation.

"The work has been completed and it is recognized that, yes, this is truly Nicholas II and his family," said Eduard Rossel, governor of the Sverdlovsk region surrounding Yekaterinburg.

However, Russia's Orthodox Church, of which Nicholas was once head, has raised doubts about the scientific findings. Their questions have not only put off a church decision on canonizing the czar, but have again delayed burial plans.

Not the Czar's Final Resting Place

Moscow, which is building Russia's foremost cathedral, St. Petersburg, where other Romanov emperors are buried and Yekaterinburg all claim their city is the proper place to bury Nicholas, who renounced the throne 80 years ago this month to avert civil war.

But as the decision remains mired in controversy, the bones lie on the third floor of the town mortuary, locked behind an unmarked metal door next to a laboratory where coroners are examining more recent skulls and bones.

The bones of the czar, his wife Empress Alexandra, their children and four servants are kept in individual cases covered by a plastic bubble. Some of the skulls show bullet holes from their June 1918 murder; one shows a rich set of gold teeth.

Followers of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad, which broke with the Moscow-based church after the Bolshevik revolution, consider these bones holy relics, as they canonized the czar and his family in 1981.

The Moscow-based church, however, in February deferred a decision on making the czar and his family saints, even though there appears to be growing support for such a decision.

"Many of us think this should have been done long ago," said Oleg Murdasov, a carpenter who helped build a wooden chapel near the site of Nicholas II's death in the basement of the now-destroyed Ipatiyev House.

Alexander Avdonin, the geologist who in 1978 found the unmarked pit where Nicholas II and his family were buried, has convinced mortuary officials to put small postcards of icons next to each set of remains.

This family was very religious," said Avdonin, who is now seeking to set up a museum on the Romanov dynasty. "They should be speaking with God."

Locals Want to Bury Czar Here

The provincial governor has unveiled plans for a possible final resting place, a church to be financed by private contributions on the Ipatiyev House site. The bones would be visible behind glass in the church crypt.

"We have a Christian tradition to bury people where they died, so I foresee that they will be buried here," Rossel said.

Even though the Ipatiyev House is no longer there, the site has become a regular stop for wedding parties paying tribute to Russia's past.

Local believers have erected a small wooden church nearby, and a wooden roof covers the site of the proposed larger church. A tombstone gives the name of those who perished here.

"I feel we must bury the remains here, but the government commission must make the recommendation," said Avdonin. "The commission has not worked in a year, due to the war in Chechnya, (President Boris) Yeltsin's illness and other factors."

The church blames the long delay on Russian politics.

"The decision to dig them up was taken without any participation of the church," said spokesman Boris Kosinsky. "An exact decision on what to do with the remains should have been taken at the very beginning, before they were exhumed."

Even Yeltsin has been involved in the controversy surrounding the czar's remains because in 1977, as a provincial Communist Party boss, he ordered the Ipatiyev House to be demolished.

Both government and church officials say it may still be some time before the remains are finally removed from the city mortuary. Nevolin said he fears even more tests may have to be conducted to satisfy all doubters.

"You can carry out investigations forever, much as an artist can continue adding paint to a canvas until the paint is finished. Now it is time to have the ritual and bury him." (Reuters)