Arab Spring, encouraged by Obama, looks like freedom winter for non-Muslims

Arab Christians (2nd class citizens) joined the uprising hoping for equality now fear even worse persecution. Did Obama know this would be the outcome all the while?

Christians worry Egypt being hijacked by Islamists

CAIRO (Reuters) - Last January, Nazih Moussa Gerges locked up his downtown Cairo law office and joined hundreds of thousands of fellow Egyptians to demand that President Hosni Mubarak step down.

The 33-year-old Christian lawyer was back on the streets this month to press military rulers who took over after Mubarak stepped down to end a spate of sectarian attacks that have killed at least 28 people and left many afraid.

Those who camped out in Tahrir Square side by side with Muslims to call for national renewal now fear their struggle is being hijacked by ultra-conservative Salafist Islamists with no one to stop them.

"We did not risk our lives to bring Mubarak down in order to have him replaced by Salafists," Gerges said. "We want an Egypt that will be an example of democracy and freedom for the whole world."

Sectarian tensions are not new to Egypt, where Christians make up around 10 percent of the population of 80 million. But the frequency and intensity of clashes have increased since Mubarak's overthrow.

Many blame a broader weakening of law and order that began as the protests against Mubarak gathered pace and police deserted the streets. Authorities are trying to rebuild security forces to deal with increased lawlessness following mass jail breakouts.

Egypt's military rulers have vowed to punish those behind sectarian clashes, banned demonstrations outside places of worship and promised to give Christians equal rights.

But Christians say no one has been tried yet for the burning of a church in Helwan, south of Cairo, in March or for violence in the Cairo suburb of Imbaba on May 7 that left 15 people dead. At least 13 died in clashes after the Helwan incident.

The army has said 190 people will face trial over the Imbaba clashes, which began when a group of Salafists demanded to look inside a church where they suspected a female convert to Islam was being held against her will.

IRON FIST?

When Christians gathered to worship in the eastern Cairo district of Ain Shams last week, they said Salafists and other local Muslims blocked access to the church and pelted them with cinder blocks.

The Christians said they had to abandon their attempt after security forces arrested eight of them.

"The General has said he will strike with an iron fist. Where is the iron fist?" said Marcelino Youssef, a spokesman for a Christian youth group that has been leading protests against sectarian attacks. He was referring to Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi, who heads Egypt's ruling military council.

For some Egyptians, including Christians, alarm over the recent inter-faith violence may be overdone. They say revolutions are often accompanied by a spike in violence that can carry sectarian undertones.

"If there are events which could lead to clashes every now and then, this may happen," said Milad Hanna, a prominent Christian thinker. "They (Muslims) are normal people, not angels."

Some blame leaders of Egypt's Coptic church for cultivating fear of Muslims, in turn stoking sectarian tension by making the Christian community more defensive.

"The Church has promoted a fear of Muslims, arguing that the Egyptian people lack awareness and that democracy will not work in our context," Muslim political scientist Amr Shobaki wrote in a column in newspaper al-Masry al-Youm on May 14.

DISCRIMINATION

The sectarian clashes have prompted many Christians to vent pent-up grievances at perceived discrimination since the 1970s.

Gerges recalls bitterly the time when he applied to join the prosecutor's office in southern Cairo soon after graduating from Ain Shams University with distinction.

He said he was told by the recruiting official that his qualifications made him the ideal candidate.

"Then he looked at my family name and shook his head."

For Gerges, the message was clear: a Muslim gets priority over a Christian when it comes to government jobs.

Egyptian Christians say discrimination against them starts in school.

"Coptic history has been removed" from textbooks, said Imbaba priest Sarabamon Abdo Rizeq. "How is a Muslim going to love me if he doesn't know anything about my Christianity?"

At a sit-in outside state TV headquarters by the Nile in central Cairo, protesters posted a list of what they called "The Copts' Demands."

They included giving Christians equal access to government jobs, recognizing Egypt's Coptic history by making it part of the school curriculum, and easing restrictions on the construction of churches.

Christians complain that under laws inherited from Ottoman rule, Copts are required to obtain special permits from the head of state to build or repair a church.

"Our demands are actually basic rights," said Malak Maher, 33, one of the protesters. "We want equality."

(Additional reporting by Mohammed Zaki; Editing by Tom Pfeiffer and Mark Trevelyan)

VP ‘Bite Me’: “the boldest decision … any president has undertaken on a single event in modern history.”

Oh, Come On!

By Jonah Goldberg

I’ve been wanting to write about the rhetorical overkill deployed by this administration when it comes to touting the president’s decision to kill bin Laden. I mean, is this really something only Barack Obama had the singular courage to do? Really? A Republican president wouldn’t have killed bin Laden under similar circumstances? But I was also reluctant because, yes, the president deserves praise for doing it and there are so few things I find praiseworthy in his agenda, better to focus on the things that revolve around fundamental disagreements. But this is just beyond the pale.

Joe Biden calls Obama’s action against Bin Laden, “the boldest decision … any president has undertaken on a single event in modern history.”

Seriously? Of course, “modern history” is a relative term, so presumably he’s excluding the Emancipation Proclamation or Truman’s decision to bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki. But how about Gerald Ford’s pardon of Nixon? Or Bush’s surge?

And of course, boldness doesn’t necessary depend on success. Carter’s botched mission to rescue the hostages was certainly bolder. So was Kennedy’s Bay of Pigs. Indeed, given what a loose cannon Joe Biden is, Obama’s decision to pick him as a running mate might even be bolder.

Video here. There’s a lot more to say, but I’ve got to head out for a few.

Palin hits the trail. Is it the campaign trail?

IT'S ON: PALIN HITS THE TRAIL

Is She Prepping for a Presidential Run?

GALLUP: Now Near Top of GOP Field

VP ‘Bite Me’ needs to start another ‘summer of recovery’ tour

FORECLOSURE SALES 'ASTRONOMICALLY HIGH'

Sale of seized homes at 28% of all sold

JOBLESS RISE AGAIN: 424,000

UPDATE: GDP 1.8%

Barney partial to Fannie

Barney Frank knocked on his Fannie

Rep admits to helping lover land job at mortgage giant in ’91

Barney Frank admits helping boyfriend land job at gov't lender Fannie Mae

Don’t know whether this is Barney’s boyfriend or just someone he is groping!

U.S. Rep. Barney Frank admitted he helped his ex-lover land a lucrative post with Fannie Mae in the early 1990s while the Newton Democrat was on a committee that regulated the lending giant — but he called questions of a potential ethical conflict “nonsense.”

“If it is (a conflict of interest), then much of Washington is involved (in conflicts),” Frank told the Herald last night. “It is a common thing in Washington for members of Congress to have spouses work for the federal government. There is no rule against it at all.”

Frank said he helped his former longtime companion, Herb Moses, land a job at Fannie Mae in 1991 after Moses graduated with a master’s degree in business administration from Dartmouth College. Frank said he was approached by a Fannie Mae executive and vouched for Moses, who formerly worked as an economist in the Department of Agriculture.

Now, why do the ‘man made’ global warming enthusiast scientist want to hide their research?

Could it be because it’s a fraud! That’s already been proven!!! ‘If’ the planet is warming –maybe it is, maybe not -- it has little, if anything, to do with mankind’s activity!

Climate scientists complain about Freedom of Information laws

Judge orders UVA To release climate research

Billions in Stimulus Awarded to Tax Cheats

3,700 owed $757M, GAO report reveals

Stimulus recipients found to be tax cheats

One construction company that won multiple awards of money under President Obama’s 2009 stimulus program was delinquent on its federal tax bill to the tune of $700,000, even as a company executive was blowing hundreds of thousands of dollars at casinos.

Yet another company failed to pay taxes, entered into a payment plan with the Internal Revenue Service, and then repeatedly defaulted on that agreement - and still won stimulus contracts worth more than $1 million, according to a Government Accountability Office report released Tuesday.

All told, government investigators found that during the period they examined, one out of every six stimulus contract or grant dollars went to a known tax cheat, according to Sen. Tom Coburn, an Oklahoma Republican who, along with several colleagues, requested the GAO review.

The review found that at least 3,700 stimulus recipients owed a total of more than $757 million in taxes, but were awarded $24 billion in stimulus money.

“Average Americans are likely wondering why we gave such a huge amount of federal money to tax cheats when our national debt is more than $14 trillion,” Mr. Coburn said. “That $24 billion went to such people looks like we are rewarding people for potentially criminal behavior.”

GAO said the number of cheats and the total dollar amount of unpaid taxes is likely higher than their findings because IRS databases don’t record amounts owed by taxpayers who have not filed returns or who have not been assessed delinquent payments by the IRS.

Federal law does not bar tax cheats from getting contracts, nor does it allow the IRS to share taxpayer information. It does allow the government to dock payments to cheats in order to make up their missing taxes, but only up to 15 percent.

Daniel I. Gordon, the procurement administrator in the Office of Management and Budget, said the Obama administration is trying its best to limit awards to cheaters, but that Congress needs to give the government more authority to let the IRS share data with the agencies that dole out the money.

He also said the president’s 2012 budget calls for giving the IRS authority to levy up to 100 percent of federal payments made to vendors that owe delinquent taxes.

Complicating the process, the GAO said much of the money couldn’t be recouped by the levy program because the stimulus grants were first made to states, localities or prime contractors, which then awarded them to subcontractors.

GAO said that loophole must be closed.

The government investigators took a closer look at 15 stimulus recipients whose histories raised red flags. The 15 were responsible for $40 million in unpaid taxes, and had all engaged in potentially criminal activities, including withholding payroll taxes from employees but never sending the money to the IRS.

All 15 have been referred to the IRS for follow-up.

The tax-cheat problem is not unique to the stimulus program, but it has brought the matter into focus again.

The Democrat-controlled Congress passed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in February 2009 in an effort to boost the struggling economy, and Mr. Obama promised the money would be responsible for funding 3.5 million jobs.

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You're forged! Trump declares Obama's birth certificate fake

Trump knows the story has no more legs. The media is not going to focus on this. WND is the only place that will still push the issue.

Let’s see if Trump makes an issue of it. Let’s see if he calls a news conference and makes the rounds on the talk shows. I’ll be he won’t!

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'I always said I wanted to know if it was real'

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Billionaire businessman Donald Trump, who staged a weeks-long public campaign questioning Barack Obama's eligibility to be president during March and April – and rose to the top of the pool of potential candidates for the 2012 GOP nomination then as a result – says he believes the "birth certificate" released by the White House is forged.

His comments came yesterday in a telephone call to WND senior reporter Jerome Corsi, Ph.D., who is appearing on wall-to-wall radio programs – between 10 and 20 per day – to respond to questions about his latest best-seller, "Where's the Birth Certificate? The Case That Barack Obama is Not Eligible to be President."

Trump asked Corsi about the book, its evidence and what is happening next in the effort to document whether Obama is, in fact, constitutionally qualified for the presidency under Article 2, Section 1's "natural born citizen" requirement.

Trump said his period of almost-complete silence on the issue following the release by the White House on April 27 of the image of a "Certificate of Live Birth" from the state of Hawaii was not because he was satisfied with the document.

"I always said I wanted to know if it was real," Trump told Corsi.

The image has been challenged by a number of experts in the field, and the original, of course, has yet to be seen, much less analyzed.

The state of Hawaii said it inserted "safety paper" into a copy machine and copied onto the new paper the original image from its state records. However, state officials were unwilling to confirm to WND after the image was released that what was issued by the White House was, in fact, an accurate representation of their original records.

During their conversation, Trump told Corsi his own computer expert told him at the release that it was a computer-generated document.

That opinion has been repeated many times, and WND has reported on a few of the objections that have been raised by various experts:

• Ivan Zatkovich, of Tampa-based eComp Consultants, for example, analyzed the various layers in the PDF file released by the White House, and concluded: "The content clearly indicates that the document was knowingly and explicitly edited and modified before it was placed on the web."
  The image that was released, described by the White House as "proof positive" of Obama's Hawaiian birth:

  
  Image released by the White House April 27, 2011

  Zatkovich, with 28 years experience in computer science and document management and for more than 10 years an expert witness providing testimony in federal court in both criminal and civil litigation, said the multiple PDF document layers are unusual.
  "When a paper document is scanned on a scanner and saved as a PDF file it normally contains only a single layer of graphical information. The PDF that appears on the White House website however, contains multiple layers of graphic information. Multiple layers usually appear in a document like this when it is being edited or modified in some fashion.
  "It is possible to take a single layer PDF and inadvertently create multiple layers, without changing the image in any fashion. But that does not appear to be the case here. The multiple layers in the PDF document are a result of changes made to the image," his report said.
  Among the various items that were separated into different layers include the main text, the mother's occupation, the dates accepted, the stamp and signature of the state registrar and the time stamp of the state registrar:

  
  The document is broken into layers.

  The background layer – with all of the additional layers removed – essentially has the text removed except some random portions of signatures and a white border where the text appears on other layers:

  
  The background, without layers of information added on top

  Also, the main layer of text reveals most of the wording on the document, with strange exceptions such as the first part of Stanley Ann Dunham Obama's signature. The main text layer has only "unham Obama." Likewise, "Kenya" is spelled "enya" and "Barack" is spelled Ba ack."

  
  The layer with the main parts of the text

• Secondly, Karl Denninger, the former of CEO of MCSNet, a Chicago networking and Internet company, said the presence of "kerning" in the text confirms manipulation.
  Denninger posted a series of reports online, including on YouTube, where he explains his concerns, which focus around the lettering as it appears on the document that reportedly is a photocopy on green "safety paper" of the original record in Hawaii

  He explains that the type on the birth document show evidence of "kerning," the squeezing of letters into a line so that they intrude into adjacent letter spaces. Kerning is routine since the advent of word processors and computers, but impossible with a typewriter.

  

  Denninger explains that in the image above, of the name of the hospital, the "a" and the "p" share vertical space on the line.

  "This process, of course, requires that you know what the next letter is. With a computer this is pretty easy, since the computer can retroactively go back and adjust, and it also can typeset the current letter with the knowledge of what the previous one was," he reported. "A typewriter, on the other hand, is a mechanical device. It does not know what the next letter is that you will type, nor does it know what the last letter was that you typed. It thus has a typeface that always leaves physical space between the boundary of each character."

  His full explanation is on video:

  "To refute this point you must come up with a typewriter that contains a flux capacitor and thus is capable of accurately predicting the future," he said. "This document has been assembled by somebody on a computer."

  He contends "there's only one way we're going to get the truth – a forensic document examiner is going to have to go look at the certificate and authenticate it. The real one – not a printout."

• Then there was a YouTube poster, who identified himself as orangegold1, and posted a video that claimed the White House either was ignorant in posting the document, or was submarined by someone inside the walls who wanted people to suspect the document.

Perhaps most significant unresolved issues is that two weeks before Obama finally released his "long-form birth certificate," Hawaii's former Health Department chief Chiyome Fukino – the one official who claimed to have examined Obama's original birth document – was interviewed by NBC News' national investigative correspondent Michael Isikoff, who reported that Fukino told him she had seen the original birth certificate and that it was "half typed and half handwritten."

However, the document released by the White House was entirely typed. Only the signatures and two dates at the very bottom were "handwritten." What Fukino described is apparently a different document from what Obama released to the public.

Among other questions that remain about the document:

• The objectivity of "experts" cited by the mainstream media to verify the birth certificate is suspect, including that of Fox News Channel's Jean-Claude Tremblay, who assured America they "should not be suspicious" of the document, but who, WND discovered, had heralded Obama's election victory in an online post.
• Obama's posted birth certificate contains the same anomalies as a well-known forgery that claimed he was born in Kenya, suggesting the anomalous markings came from the same source. "How could Obama's 'real' birth certificate share these unique characteristics with an obvious forgery?" asks Farah. "For the life of me, I can't figure out an answer other than they were created by the same person or persons."
• The birth certificate's reported delivering physician, Dr. David Sinclair, differs from previously published reports and even the myth-busting Snopes.com's original entry, which named Dr. Rodney T. West as the doctor of record.
• Obama's purported birth certificate contains over a dozen differences in form from the verified, Hawaii copy of the birth certificate issued to the Nordyke twins, born the next day at the same reported hospital.
• The local registrar listed in the Nordyke twins' birth certificate is notably different than the local registrar on the Obama birth certificate.

• Though Obama was born before the Nordyke twins, and though his birth was filed with the registrar three days before the twins' birth, Obama's purported birth certificate has a higher registration number.
• The age of Obama's father, as listed on the document, conflicts with previously discovered documents about Barack Obama Sr.
• There are no notations on the document indicating Obama's adoption by his Indonesian stepfather, Lolo Soetoro, as are often made – even replacing the name of the birth parents – when a child in the U.S. is adopted.

In addition, the SmokingGun.com website notes several irregularities with the Obama birth certificate that do not appear on the Nordyke twin's birth certificates:

• In Box 3, "This Birth," there are two "Xs" above "Twin" and "Triplet" – why are these "Xs" here and what do they signify?

• What is the meaning of the smudges in the Obama birth certificate in the box containing the name of the attending physician?

• What is the significance of the numbers, seen vertically, on the right side of the Obama birth certificate?

There are those Obama critics, too, who says that the document released by the White House, if authentic, actually proves Obama's ineligibility. They cite the indication that Barack Obama Sr. was listed as the father, but he never was a U.S. citizen. They contend those who wrote the requirement for presidents to be a "natural born citizen" disqualified dual citizens at birth, such as Obama.

Obama Jr. himself even seemed to hold that position, suggesting in a resolution he co-sponsored to address Sen. John McCain's status as a "natural born Citizen" that the status requires "American citizen" parents.

Listen to Corsi's account of the conversation with Trump:

"I told him he needs to publicly say that the document in the vault, the original long-form birth certificate, needs to be exposed and examined independently," Corsi said. "The doctor's records, the Kapiolani records of Ann Dunham to corroborate she was in that hospital."

"I told him if you don't press these issues you can't be surprised if there are those who think you're working with Barack Obama [on the dispute]," Corsi added.

During much of April Trump made regular appearances on talk shows and news broadcasts, and almost every time either he or the interviewer raised questions about Obama's eligibility. At the same time, he regularly was in conversation with Corsi and others who helped Corsi investigate the Obama eligibility dispute about the evidence that exists.

As a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll demonstrated, by raising questions about Obama's eligibility repeatedly, going as far as suggesting Obama's tenure might be illegal, Trump rose in popularity among GOP voters.

In that poll, 19 percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents said they'd likely support Trump for the 2012 GOP nomination.

His support rose from only 10 percent just a month earlier.

WND has reported on Trump's statements regarding Obama's eligibility:

"There's something fishy about the whole thing," Trump has said of Obama's background, birth story and constant refusal to release a wide range of documents that would reveal information about his heritage and upbringing.

Trump has also been skeptical regarding the oft-cited 1961 Honolulu newspaper notices.

"I see so much fraud in this world, an ad like that could have been staged. I see so many fraudulent things going on that would be like the least of it," Trump said.

He suggested it was incredible that no doctor, nurse or other person has come forward to recall the birth of such a famous person.

Trump told Fox News host Bill O'Reilly the significance of the dispute isn't clear to many people.

"If you are going to be the president of the United States you have to be born in the United States – and there is doubt [about Obama]," he said. "If he wasn't born in this country, it's one of the great scams."

Trump also was on MSNBC, where he was asked whether it was a serious issue:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

"There is certainly a chance that he was not born in this country. Now if he was not born in this country, that means he can't be president. It's very simple," Trump explained.

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Previous stories:

Trump pumps Corsi for latest on Obama

'Criminal' Obama secret gets no media attention

Dems join Obama panic attack on book

Guess what prompted Obama to release birth certificate!

Shock poll: Only 38% believe Obama's birth story

Trump popularity skyrockets as he questions eligibility

Trump on tour: Something 'fishy' about Obama

Now look who's getting grilled over eligibility

Pawlenty's solution to eligibility question: Trust CNN

Donald Trump: Obama presidency possibly illegal

Trump: Obama spending millions to hide his past

Donald wars with Whoopi over Obama's eligibility

Rush: Trump's questions a service to Obama

Hannity flings open doors to birth-certificate questions

THE BIG LIST of eligibility 'proofers'

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THE FULL STORY: See listing of more than 200 exclusive WND reports on the eligibility issue

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CHARGE: TSA Pats Down Child, Little Old Lady, Ignores Man in Arab Garb

This is the government conditioning Americans to be subservient; there is absolutely no logic that this is to make you safe or even feel safe.

Video: Congressman On Recent Flight: TSA Patted Down Child, Little Old Lady; Ignored Man In Arab Garb

The Hill reports: "I walked through … right behind me there was a grandmother — little old lady, and she was was patted down," Rep. Paul Broun (R-Georgia) said on C-SPAN's "Washington Journal."
"Right behind her was a little kid who was patted down. And then right behind him was a guy in Arabian dress who just walked right through. Why are we patting down grandma and kids?"

As recently as the 18th century British royalty ate parts of the human body

British royalty dined on human flesh (but don't worry it was 300 years ago)

They have long been famed for their love of lavish banquets and rich recipes. But what is less well known is that the British royals also had a taste for human flesh.

A new book on medicinal cannibalism has revealed that possibly as recently as the end of the 18th century British royalty swallowed parts of the human body.

The author adds that this was not a practice reserved for monarchs but was widespread among the well-to-do in Europe.

Medicinal cannibalism: Both Queen Mary II and her uncle King Charles II both took distilled human skull on their deathbeds in 1698 and 1685 respectively, according to Dr Sugg

Even as they denounced the barbaric cannibals of the New World, they applied, drank, or wore powdered Egyptian mummy, human fat, flesh, bone, blood, brains and skin.

Moss taken from the skulls of dead soldiers was even used as a cure for nosebleeds, according to Dr Richard Sugg at Durham University.

Dr Sugg said: 'The human body has been widely used as a therapeutic agent with the most popular treatments involving flesh, bone or blood.

'Cannibalism was found not only in the New World, as often believed, but also in Europe.

'One thing we are rarely taught at school yet is evidenced in literary and historic texts of the time is this: James I refused corpse medicine; Charles II made his own corpse medicine; and Charles I was made into corpse medicine.

'Along with Charles II, eminent users or prescribers included Francis I, Elizabeth I's surgeon John Banister, Elizabeth Grey, Countess of Kent, Robert Boyle, Thomas Willis, William III, and Queen Mary.'

The history of medicinal cannibalism, Dr Sugg argues, raised a number of important social questions.

He said: 'Medicinal cannibalism used the formidable weight of European science, publishing, trade networks and educated theory.

'Whilst corpse medicine has sometimes been presented as a medieval therapy, it was at its height during the social and scientific revolutions of early-modern Britain.

'It survived well into the 18th century, and amongst the poor it lingered stubbornly on into the time of Queen Victoria.

'Quite apart from the question of cannibalism, the sourcing of body parts now looks highly unethical to us.

'In the heyday of medicinal cannibalism bodies or bones were routinely taken from Egyptian tombs and European graveyards. Not only that, but some way into the eighteenth century one of the biggest imports from Ireland into Britain was human skulls.

'Whether or not all this was worse than the modern black market in human organs is difficult to say.'

This painting of Charles I's execution in 1649 shows people surging forward to mop up the former king's blood. It was thought to have healing properties

The book gives numerous vivid, often disturbing examples of the practice, ranging from the execution scaffolds of Germany and Scandinavia, through the courts and laboratories of Italy, France and Britain, to the battlefields of Holland and Ireland and on to the tribal man-eating of the Americas.

A painting showing the 1649 execution of Charles I showed people mopping up the king's blood with handkerchiefs.

Dr Sugg said: 'This was used to treat the "king's evil" - a complaint more usually cured by the touch of living monarchs.

'Over in continental Europe, where the axe fell routinely on the necks of criminals, blood was the medicine of choice for many epileptics.

'In Denmark the young Hans Christian Andersen saw parents getting their sick child to drink blood at the scaffold. So popular was this treatment that hangmen routinely had their assistants catch the blood in cups as it spurted from the necks of dying felons.

'Occasionally a patient might shortcut this system. At one early sixteenth-century execution in Germany, 'a vagrant grabbed the beheaded body "before it had fallen, and drank the blood from him..".'

The last recorded instance of this practice in Germany fell in 1865.

History: Author Dr Richard Sugg, from Durham University, delves into the dark world of medicinal cannibalism in his new book Mummies, Cannibals and Vampires

Whilst James I had refused to take human skull, his grandson Charles II liked the idea so much that he bought the recipe. Having paid perhaps £6,000 for this, he often distilled human skull himself in his private laboratory.

Dr Sugg said: 'Accordingly known before long as "the King's Drops", this fluid remedy was used against epilepsy, convulsions, diseases of the head, and often as an emergency treatment for the dying.

'It was the very first thing which Charles reached for on February 2 1685, at the start of his last illness, and was administered not only on his deathbed, but on that of Queen Mary in 1698.'

Dr Sugg's research will be featured in a forthcoming Channel 4 documentary with Tony Robinson in which they reconstruct versions of older cannibalistic medicines with the help of pigs' brains, blood and skull.

The book, called Mummies, Cannibals and Vampires, will be published on June 29 by Routledge and charts the largely forgotten history of European corpse medicine from the Renaissance to the Victorians.