Otzi the Iceman
Otzi the Iceman
Who was Otzi?
Otzi, also called Otzi the Iceman, is a well-preserved natural mummy of a man. He is Europe's oldest known natural human mummy, and has offered an unprecedented view of Chalcolithic Europeans. Several experts have meanwhile attempted to reconstruct the Iceman’s facial features. The Dutch artists Adrie and Alfons Kennis created the most recent reconstruction, which will also be on display at the South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology. It is based on the very latest research findings.
Where and how was he found?
On Thursday, September 19, 1991, on a sunny afternoon Erika and Helmut Simon, from Nuremberg in Germany, were enjoying a vacation walking through icy landscape high up on a mountain overlooking the Otz valley in the Alpine borderlands between Austria and Italy. On their descent from a peak near Tisenjoch they wandered of a little from the recommended route in the hope of finding a short cut and, as they roamed an elevated plateau near a drawn back mountain glacier at 3.21 kilometers above sea level, they passed a gully filled with thawing ice and melt-water within which they noticed something odd. Further investigation showed this object to be an actual human corpse. These remains, originally thought to be those of a mountaineer or hill-walker who had died on the mountain in comparatively recent times, eventually became famous as belonging to Otzi who died around 5,300 years ago!
What we know about him personally?
Based on animal hair from his clothing, Otzi herded sheep, cow and goats. The skin from his clothing came from domesticated animals, according to a 2008 study in Rapid Communications in Mass Spectrometry. That would make Otzi a member of the more progressive culture at the time, unlike the more primitive hunter-culture that existed around the same time. The mummy was without a doubt an adult male. Judging from his bone structure, he was around 45 years old. During his lifetime he was around 1.60 m tall. He was slim with
Who was Otzi?
Otzi, also called Otzi the Iceman, is a well-preserved natural mummy of a man. He is Europe's oldest known natural human mummy, and has offered an unprecedented view of Chalcolithic Europeans. Several experts have meanwhile attempted to reconstruct the Iceman’s facial features. The Dutch artists Adrie and Alfons Kennis created the most recent reconstruction, which will also be on display at the South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology. It is based on the very latest research findings.
Where and how was he found?
On Thursday, September 19, 1991, on a sunny afternoon Erika and Helmut Simon, from Nuremberg in Germany, were enjoying a vacation walking through icy landscape high up on a mountain overlooking the Otz valley in the Alpine borderlands between Austria and Italy. On their descent from a peak near Tisenjoch they wandered of a little from the recommended route in the hope of finding a short cut and, as they roamed an elevated plateau near a drawn back mountain glacier at 3.21 kilometers above sea level, they passed a gully filled with thawing ice and melt-water within which they noticed something odd. Further investigation showed this object to be an actual human corpse. These remains, originally thought to be those of a mountaineer or hill-walker who had died on the mountain in comparatively recent times, eventually became famous as belonging to Otzi who died around 5,300 years ago!
What we know about him personally?
Based on animal hair from his clothing, Otzi herded sheep, cow and goats. The skin from his clothing came from domesticated animals, according to a 2008 study in Rapid Communications in Mass Spectrometry. That would make Otzi a member of the more progressive culture at the time, unlike the more primitive hunter-culture that existed around the same time. The mummy was without a doubt an adult male. Judging from his bone structure, he was around 45 years old. During his lifetime he was around 1.60 m tall. He was slim with