Bulgarian relics may be of John the Baptist

Scientists have found new evidence they say supports the theory that a knuckle bone and other human remains found under a church floor in Bulgaria may be of John the Baptist.

The relics found in a small marble sarcophagus two years ago on a Bulgarian island called Sveti Ivan, which translates as Saint John, also included a human tooth, part of a skull, and three animal bones.

A research team from Oxford University dated the right-handed knuckle bone to the first century AD, when John is believed to have lived until his beheading was ordered by king Herod.