An art collector has found a tooth, thumb and finger of the famous renaissance astronomer Galileo that had been missing for more than a century.

The body parts, cut from his corpse when the Vatican finally allowed the controversial Italian scientist a church burial held 95 years after his death in 1642, vanished in 1905.

But they appeared at a recent auction as unidentified artefacts contained in a 17th century wooden case and bought by the unnamed collector who suspected they might be Galileo's.