Remains found under a church floor in the Netherlands could belong to the famous musketeer d’Artagnan.

Archaeologists believe these may be the ‘lost’ bones of the soldier who inspired the hero of the famous novel, The Three Musketeers.

Workers discovered the grave, containing human remains, in front of the altar after part of the floor of St Peter and Paul Church in Maastricht subsided.

Experts are now racing to confirm through DNA testing if the skeleton is that of the famed French musketeer, Charles de Batz de Castelmore d’Artagnan, with multiple items found in the grave also pointing to the owners identity.

D’Artagnan rose to fame more than 150 years after his death when a fictionalised version of his exploits cast him as the protagonist of Alexandre Dumas’ 1844 novel.

The real-life musketeer served the French King Louis XIV, eventually becoming captain-lieutenant of the Musketeers of the Guard.

The nobleman was killed on 25 June 1673, during the French siege of Maastricht in the Franco-Dutch War, after being struck in the throat by a musket ball.

Transporting his body back to Paris in the summer heat would have been difficult.

The church where the body was found stands near where the French army’s campsite was located.

The body was also discovered with part of a bullet next to it and a coin that dates to the relevant period, experts said.

A letter dating from around the time of his death said he had been buried in consecrated ground.

Jos Valke, deacon at St Peter and Paul Church, helped unearth the skeleton and is 99% certain the remains belong to Charles de Batz de Castelmore – known as Count d’Artagnan.

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Mr Valke joked: “Under an altar – it couldn’t be much holier than that. When you add it all up, then, it seems plausible to us. But of course, nothing is certain yet.”

The church had previously been identified as a possible resting place of the 17th-century soldier.

The DNA retrieved from a jawbone is now being tested against that of D’Artagnan’s descendants to see if there’s a match.

Archaeologist Wim Dijkman told Reuters: “This has truly become a top-level investigation, in which we want to be absolutely certain, or as certain as possible, whether it is the famous musketeer, who was killed here near Maastricht.”

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department has settled for roughly $1.2 million a lawsuit from Michael Flynn, the former national security adviser to President Donald Trump who pleaded guilty during the Republican’s first term to lying to the FBI about his conversations with a top Russian diplomat and was later pardoned.

Court papers filed Wednesday do not reveal the settlement amount, but a person familiar with the matter, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to disclose nonpublic information, confirmed the total as about $1.2 million.

The settlement resolves a 2023 lawsuit in which Flynn sought at least $50 million and asserted that the criminal case against him amounted to a malicious prosecution. It also represents a stark turnabout in position for a Justice Department that during the Biden administration had pressed a judge to dismiss Flynn’s complaint. Attorney General Pam Bondi, a former personal lawyer for the president, has openly criticized the Russia investigation in which Flynn was charged and the Justice Department in the last year has opened investigations into former officials who participated in that inquiry.

The Justice Department cast the settlement as an “important step in redressing” what it says was a “historic injustice” of the Russia investigation that shadowed Trump for much of his first term.

“This Department of Justice will continue to pursue accountability at all levels for this wrongdoing. Such weaponization of the federal government must never be allowed to happen again,” a spokesperson said.

In a separate statement, Flynn said: “Nothing can fully compensate for the hell that my family and I have endured over these many years — the relentless attacks, the destruction of reputations, the financial ruin, and the profound personal toll inflicted upon us all. No amount of money or formal resolution can erase the pain caused by a prosecution that should never have been brought.”

The settlement is the latest turn in the long-running legal saga involving Flynn, one of six Trump associates charged as part of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into potential ties between Russia and Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign. That investigation found Russia interfered in the election on Trump’s behalf and that the Trump campaign eagerly welcomed the help, but it ultimately found insufficient evidence of a criminal conspiracy.

Flynn, a retired Army lieutenant general who vigorously campaigned at Trump’s side, served for weeks as his first national security adviser before being pushed out of his position. He remained a Trump ally even after agreeing to cooperate with Mueller’s team. He was pardoned in the final weeks of the president’s first term.

Flynn pleaded guilty in December 2017 to lying to the FBI when he said he had not discussed with the Russian envoy, Sergey Kislyak, sanctions that the outgoing Obama administration had just imposed on Russia for election interference. During that conversation, Flynn advised that Russia be “even-keeled” in response to the punitive measures, and assured him “we can have a better conversation” about relations between the countries after Trump became president.

The conversation alarmed the FBI, which at the time was investigating whether the Trump campaign and Russia had coordinated to sway the election. In addition, White House officials were stating publicly that Flynn and Kislyak had not discussed sanctions, which the FBI knew was untrue.

Flynn was ousted from his position in February 2017 after news broke that Obama administration officials had warned the White House that Flynn had indeed discussed sanctions with Kislyak and was vulnerable to blackmail. He pleaded guilty months later to a false statement charge.

But Flynn later sought to withdraw his guilty plea, saying federal prosecutors had acted in “bad faith” and broken their end of the bargain when they sought prison time for him.

The Justice Department in 2020 moved to dismiss the case, asserting that the FBI had no basis to interview Flynn about Kislyak and that any statements he made during the interview were not material to the FBI’s broader counterintelligence probe.

Flynn was pardoned by Trump in November 2020, ending the court case and the legal wrangling.

In his lawsuit, Flynn maintained his innocence and said he was targeted by the “virulently anti-Trump leadership” of the FBI’s Russia investigation. He contended that investigators pursued him despite knowing there was no evidence of a crime and coerced his guilty plea.

“He was falsely branded as a traitor to his country, lost at least tens of millions of dollars of business opportunities and future lifetime earning potential, was maliciously prosecuted and spent substantial monies in his own defense,” says the lawsuit, adding that Flynn will continue to suffer “mental and emotional pain.”

On display will be the uniform belonging to chief engineer Montgomery Scott, known as Scotty, as played by Pegg in 2009’s Star Trek film, as well as Admiral Jean-Luc Picard’s uniform, worn by Sir Patrick in the Paramount+ Star Trek: Picard TV series, which ran from 2020 to 2023.

A brother and sister from Perth have honoured their late grandad with matching IRN-BRU tattoos, celebrating his love of the iconic Scottish drink

Devoted IRN-BRU fans descended on Glasgow’s Empire Ink on Saturday, March 21, for the first-ever TAT-BRU parlour, where exclusive free tattoos celebrated the soft drink’s refreshed look and 125th anniversary.

Fans travelled from across Scotland, with some making hundreds of miles just to get inked in tribute to the brand that has been part of their lives for decades. Among them were brother and sister Gemma, 32, and Thomas, 30, Swan from Perth, who made the trip to commemorate their late grandad, Jimmy, a lifelong fan of IRN-BRU.

Jimmy passed away six months ago, just a few weeks shy of his 87th birthday, after a battle with lung cancer. Even in his final days in a hospice, he was never without a can of his favourite soft drink.

The siblings decided to get matching tattoos to honour their grandad’s memory and the role IRN-BRU played in their whole family.

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Speaking about the tattoo, Thomas said: “It’s fitting, he definitely would have liked it, he always liked seeing my other tattoos, so I’m sure this would have got his approval. He was a regular can of IRN-BRU man and used to drink it every day.

“He was always the one who would sneak me a can when I was told no, I’d never go to his house without being offered some,” he continued.

“I saw the event on Facebook and sent it to my sister who had spotted it at the same time and immediately replied that she’d already booked 11 am. We were both really close to him, so it’s nice to have this wee memory.”

The TAT-BRU event drew a diverse crowd, with many fans of the popular drink getting their skin permanently tattoo’d for a variety of personal and emotional reasons.

Another punted Steven Prentice, 38, made the 350-mile round trip from Inverness to get a tattoo. As he said: “I love it, it was absolutely worth the long drive down. I’ve got many tattoos and I try to get a tattoo in each place I visit, this is like a wee souvenir from Glasgow.”

Maria Maclennan, 38, a silversmithing lecturer at Edinburgh’s College of Art, added a can design to her impressive collection of tattoos, saying: “I’m a metalsmith and my partner’s an engineer, so we both love a good girder – though these days, it’s my bed that provides me with strong horizontal support.

“Bru was born long before any of our time and it’ll live on after we all leave this mortal coil.”

Over 50 tattoos were given out during the event, featuring a range of designs inspired by the legendary packaging, including the return of the famous “Made in Scotland from Girders” strapline and the iconic girder emblem.

The legendary ‘molten man’’insignia from 1988 was also back, celebrating the brand’s industrial heritage while giving it a modern touch.

Kenny Nicholson, Director of Brand at IRN-BRU said: “For 125 years, IRN-BRU has proudly been Made in Scotland from Girders.

“To celebrate our milestone we’ve brought this iconic slogan back, in an evolved look that typifies our industrial roots and the maverick bravery at the heart of BRU.

“The TAT-BRU parlour showed just how much BRU means to people, through the generations, and now those lucky fans can wear their permanent girders with pride.”

Editor’s note: The UK’s Food Standards Authority and Health Security Agency both advise against eating clay, soil or earth. Links to their guidance are included in this article.

When I ask people if they have ever eaten soil before, they tend to give me a strange look. But geophagy – the deliberate ingestion of any kind of soil – is a practice that archaeological evidence from Kalambo Falls in Zambia suggests has been part of human history for at least 2 million years.

British archaeologist John Desmond Clark reported that Homo habilis, a species of human who lived between 2.2 and 1.6 million years ago, was digging into the earth to mine clays from below the topsoil. This led to the inference that the oldest evidence of geophagy by humans was at that prehistoric site on the border of Zambia and Tanzania.

More recently, anecdotal evidence suggests a prisoner condemned to death in 16th-century Hohenlohe (now part of Germany) was allowed a last request of consuming a small clay tablet after receiving his supposedly lethal dose of mercury. The tablet was reputedly a piece of terra sigillata – clay traditionally mined from the Greek island of Lemnos. To the amazement of the court, the convict survived the mercury poisoning and was merely banished instead.

Geophagy is still practised widely around the globe, including by some women experiencing food cravings during pregnancy. But it should not be confused with the eating disorder pica.

In my research on geophagy practices in the UK, clays appear to be the most popular types of soil consumed. But these are only a sliver of the many types of soil people are known to eat.

In Amsterdam’s Museum of Edible Earth, researcher and artist masharu has brought together more than 600 soils used in geophagy. These include melt-in-the-mouth pemba from Surinam and montmorillonite green clay from France, which is claimed to be an anti-ageing treatment.

The museum is now in the UK for the first time. Adult visitors to Somerset House in London are being invited to sample a “tasting menu” of its soils, and even contribute their own tasting notes.

The symbolism of soil

For many people, eating soil carries deep symbolic meaning. Soil is a common theme in genesis stories that describe how a people originated, including Adam in the Bible’s Old Testament.

Among the Luo people in Kenya, women who practice geophagy during pregnancy prefer eating red clays due to the links between soil, fertility and blood. These clays are understood to replenish the blood lost during pregnancy to the unborn foetus, which is referred to as remo ma ichweyogo nyathi (the blood you form the child of).

In the 20th century, eating soil was sometimes used to determine guilt in Java. If a crime was committed with no witnesses and the cross-examination failed, suspects would ingest a small amount of soil from their ancestors’ graves and call upon them as witnesses to their innocence. If one of the suspects grew ill or died over the next few months, they would be found guilty.

Today, thinly sliced clay from Java is still eaten as a snack known as ampo.

Soil’s growing appeal

The benefits and risks of eating soil have been highlighted amid recent social media interest in geophagy, such as the trend for filming soil taste tests on TikTok.

A collaboration between researchers at the universities of Glasgow, Strathclyde and Crete suggests clays from Lemnos may have wider health benefits, such as preventing the progression of inflammatory diseases (although, so far, only shown in mice).

Bentonite, which is also used in cosmetic face masks, was mentioned as a favourite edible clay by some customers of a London health-food shop I spoke to.

One reason clays such as bentonite appear to be a popular choice is that they can host Streptomyces, a genus of bacteria that, alongside being a useful source of antibiotics, produce geosmin. This chemical emits the pleasant smell associated with dry earth after rainfall – and also contributes to a pleasantly “earthy” taste.

But any kind of soil should always be consumed with caution. In 2013, Public Health England identified calabash chalk as a particular risk for pregnant women. Its warning was triggered by widespread consumption of this chalk within some Asian and African communities in London, as a nutritional supplement or morning sickness antidote, and the potential threat posed by lead present in some of these soils.

The UK Food Standards Authority has also warned about the presence of lead and other toxic chemicals in commercially available clays.

Some soils may contain hidden dangers such as heavy metals pollutants, parasitic worms and cancer-causing moulds. Additionally, faecal contamination of soils may introduce bacteria such as E coli, which can cause food poisoning.

While these health risks do not apply to all soils, and some of these concerns can be addressed through the way clays are processed, it is advised that anyone interested in practising geophagy should seek careful guidance first.

The exhibition of edible soils by masharu, on show in London until April 26, seeks to challenge the stigma and negative perceptions around eating clay by focusing on the often-overlooked sensations of soil. From environmental science to health research, soil is no longer being treated like dirt.

Anyone with information on the collision near Lampeter is being urged to contact Dyfed Powys Police

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A motorist has died following a two-car crash on the A482 on Tuesday night. Dyfed-Powys Police is appealing for witnesses to, or anyone with information about, a fatal collision on the A482, between Lampeter and Ciliau Aeron.

It took place around 9.30pm on March 24, and involved two cars; a black Renault Clio and black Peugeot 208