On December 1, 1948, an unknown man was found lying dead on the
sand on Somerton Beach next to the neighborhood of Glenelg, about
7 miles (11 km) southwest of Adelaide, South Australia. He had no
money or identification on him, the labels in his clothing were
cut off, and his minimal possessions yielded no clues. Further
adding to the mystery, a rolled-up scrap of paper with the
Persian phrase "tamám shud," translating to "is over" or "is
finished," was found in the man's watch pocket around the time of
his autopsy. The scrap was later discovered torn from a copy of
the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, a circa 11th-century collection of
poems by Khayyam, known as "the Astronomer-Poet of Persia." The
book found tossed into a car after a public appeal by the police
appeared to have previous writing indentations on a page adjacent
to the torn-out one, revealing a local phone number and text
speculated to be a coded message. With no further clues as to the
Somerton Man's identity other than an abandoned suitcase left at
the Adelaide railway station, a plaster cast was made of the
man's bust following the coroner's inquest, and the body was
embalmed nine days after its discovery and buried. For almost 74
years, the mystery of the Somerton has intrigued authorities,
amateur sleuths, and the general public, including physicist,
Electrical and Electronic Engineering professor Dr. Derek Abbott.
For over a decade, Dr. Abbott and his team of grad students at
the University of Adelaide worked on cracking the code found in
the Rubaiyat and attempting to arrange a genetic DNA analysis. In
partnership with internationally recognized forensic genealogist
Dr. Colleen Fitzpatrick, Abbott and Fitzpatrick announced on July
26, 2022, that they have finally uncovered the identity of
Australia's most famous "John Doe." Extracting DNA from chest
hairs found in the Somerton Man's plaster cast has led them to a
name and an occupation. But will this name lead to solving the
remaining puzzle pieces? Pathologists at the time believed he was
likely poisoned, but why, and by whom? Was there a Cold War
connection, and why did he spend his last day in Adelaide?
Circling back to the alternate name for this case, tamám shud, is
this mystery really over, is it finished?
Visit our webpage on this episode for a lot more information.
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