So I was saw a video about how nobody knows where Genghis Khan's grave site is, it was likely intentionally kept a secret by his close confidants. And nobody really knows where he died, or the details of his death, all we have is a bunch of old "legends" which obviously detail completely different circumstances to where his corpse was really sent.
This got me wondering, of course old legends told generation after generation a bunch of times over are going to change. It would be pretty crazy if Genghis Khan's body was discovered, which led to giving legitimate credence to what was previously nothing more than an old legend. The thought of a legend being passed down and told to 10's or dozens of generations later proving to have a semblance of retained accuracy sounds interesting. Has this ever happened?
Not quite as old as Genghis Khan, but Richard III, the famed hunchbacked King of William Shakespeare's play who likely murdered his nephews and usurped the throne, was said to have been deformed and "misshapen" while this is greatly exaggerated it was confirmed that he had suffered from scoliosis by the discovery of his skeleton.
"I, that am curtailed of this fair proportion, Cheated of feature by dissembling nature. Deformed, unfinished, sent before my time Into this breathing world, scarce half made up". (Act I, Scene i, lines 18–21)
Unlike Genghis whose body to my knowledge has never been found, Richard III's body was curiously discovered under a car park in Leicester in 2012. His body had been buried at a church called Greyfriars, however during the reign of Henry VIII Greyfriars was dissolved and the church was demolished and sold to property developers. While the site of his grave was known until at least 1612 through a commemorative pillar, in time this too was lost. Centuries later however during the excavation of a car park in the city of Leicester, a skeleton was discovered which was later identified to be belonging to Richard. This skeleton was confirmed to have had an unhealthily curved spine, while this means the original and popular claim that he was so warped that dogs barked at him is false, it did verify that his condition was not entirely made up, even if it was heavily embellished.