Vatican opened graves of two princesses in search for missing girl.

The Vatican confirmed that "the outcome of the search has been negative", according to ANSA. Emanuela's brother Pietro is quoted as saying: "There was nothing, nothing, not even the princesses," adding: "We were ready for everything except the graves being empty."

The tombs at the Teutonic College, adjacent to St Peter's, belonged to Princess Sophie von Hohenlohe, who died in 1836, and Princess Carlotta Federica, who died in 1840.

The daughter of an employee at the Vatican Bank, Orlandi disappeared while returning to her family home in Vatican City after a music lesson at the Basilica of S. Apollinare in Rome.

The latest search for Orlandi, who vanished without a trace on 22 June 1983, followed an anonymous tip-off received last summer by her mother and brother, who still live within the Vatican's walls.

Over the decades the unsolved Orlandi case has sparked conspiracy theories ranging from kidnap by a terrorist group demanding the release of Mehmet Ali Ağca, the Turkish man who shot Pope John Paul II in St Peter's Square in 1981, to the involvement of the Banda della Magliana, Rome’s notorious criminal gang founded in the 1970s.

In 2018 human remains found underneath the Vatican nunciature to Italy, located in Rome's Parioli district, sparked speculation that Orlandi might have finally been found. However DNA testing revealed that the bones belonged to a man who died sometime between the years 90 and 230 AD.

Photos Il Messaggero