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Where are the Soviet-held remains purported to be Hitler's skull and jaw now?
Executive summary
The items long described as Adolf Hitler’s dental remains (a lower jaw with teeth) and a skull fragment with a bullet hole are held in Russian archives: the jaw in the FSB (successor to the KGB) archives and the skull fragments in the Russian State Archive (Federal/State Archive), though accounts differ about access and authenticity (FSB/State Archive) [1] [2] [3]. U.S. researchers in 2009 reported the skull fragment they examined was from a woman while multiple later French-led studies argued the jawbone matches Hitler’s dental records, leaving an unresolved but well-documented dispute [4] [3] [5].
1. What Moscow says it has and where it keeps it
Russian officials and archival heads have publicly stated that most of Hitler’s burned body was destroyed in 1970 and the remaining physical items now preserved are limited to a jawbone kept in FSB archives and skull fragments held in the State (Federal) Archive in Moscow [1] [2] [6]. Russian press and the archives themselves staged an exhibition in 2000 showing at least the skull fragment and photos of the jaw, signaling institutional custody inside Russia’s security and state-archival systems [7] [8].
2. The 2009 UConn study that shook the story
A University of Connecticut-linked team examined a small skull fragment and reported DNA and osteological evidence suggesting that fragment belonged to a woman, not Hitler, a finding broadcast by the History Channel and widely covered in 2009 — which prompted Russian officials to publicly defend the archive items’ provenance [4] [3] [1]. That UConn analysis focused on a particular skull piece recovered and catalogued in Russian archives and led to renewed scrutiny of the chain of custody [4].
3. The jawbone’s separate status and identification claims
Dental records have long been the strongest element tying remains to Hitler: Soviet-era dental autopsy records, German dentist testimony and X‑rays from 1944 were used by earlier odontologists and later by French forensic teams who concluded the jawbone in Moscow matched Hitler’s dental work — the French work was able to sample the jaw while being more limited with the skull fragments [4] [5] [9]. That separation — skull fragments and jaw held in different archival places and subject to different access — fuels competing conclusions [3].
4. How the remains were reportedly handled historically
Contemporary and later Russian accounts say the bodies recovered in Berlin were examined by SMERSH and other Soviet services, moved to Magdeburg/Buch area facilities, and that in 1970 KGB agents exhumed, cremated and scattered most ashes to prevent any cult site — leaving only jaw and skull fragments in archive custody [7] [10] [2]. Russian officials have framed disposal as a preventive political choice; some Western historians used the preservation of dental pieces as the basis for concluding Hitler died in the bunker [11] [10].
5. Scientific disagreement and methodological limits
The body of reporting shows two distinct forensic pathways: DNA/osteological analysis of a skull fragment (UConn) that suggested a female origin, and dental/odontological comparison of the jaw (Norwegian/American work in the 1970s and later French work) that supports the jaw’s authenticity and links it to Hitler’s dental X‑rays [4] [3] [5]. Limitations are explicit in the literature: some teams could not sample both items, portions were not available for testing, and chain-of-custody and archival cataloguing problems complicate definitive mtDNA linkage without comparison to maternal relatives [9] [12].
6. Why this still matters — politics, provenance, and conspiracy
Russian archival claims have political overtones: publicizing destruction of the corpse and holding tiny relics in security archives were defensive acts against potential neo-Nazi pilgrimage, and Russian officials have disputed foreign testing or its implications [2] [6]. Conversely, sensational TV programming and selective presentation of partial tests have fueled conspiracy narratives about Hitler’s fate despite the dental-evidence tradition that underpins most professional historical consensus [11] [5].
7. Bottom line for researchers and the public
Available reporting shows the jawbone is stored in the FSB archives and skull fragments are in the State/Federal Archive in Moscow; the jaw has stronger forensic support from dental comparisons, while at least one skull fragment has produced results consistent with a female individual — the two findings are not yet reconciled because of sampling limits, access restrictions and archival provenance questions [1] [4] [3]. Further resolution would require coordinated, transparent sampling of both items with modern DNA comparison against known maternal-line relatives — a step researchers have noted as decisive but which, as of the cited reporting, has not been completed [9] [12].